TOPIC: Passed PMP (9th Aug) - 3P, 2MP

Hi All,
I passed PMP on 9th August.
Got 3P, 2MP.
Time to give back. Thank you all for your suggestions and inputs and details in this forum.

During the exam:

1. Exam was difficult. Especially the first 30 questions were really difficult, but I learnt from “Lesson learnt” that sometimes these difficult questions might have THOSE “25 questions” which are not counted. After completing first 30 questions, I thought I am gonna fail. But then I remembered the Lessong learnt that its too early to decide, so I didnt loose the sight.
2. Most questions were scenarios or situation based, with lengthy background, so I had to read each question twice. I thought I am gonna check myself at every 30 minutes to compare with the clock. First 30 minutes 30 questions like wise
3. I had around 60 questions MARKED coz the questions were quite confusing, so I had to have atleast 30 minutes to REVIEW them at the end. Less than 3 questions were “around one line in length”. Most questions were 3-4 lines long. One or two were questions were 5 lines line
4. Questions were pretty confusing, so I had to read MOST questions twice. What I did was as below
5. I always first tried to read the ASK statement, like “what PM should do, what is FIRST thing PM should do, What is NEXT PM should do, EXCEPT, NOT”
6. Then I read the complete questions
7. I tried not to skip a single word
8. It was quite easy to FILTER two answers, but it was REALLY very difficult to select from the remaining two, whatever mistakes I made, I think that would have been selecting from the remaining two types of answers coz of the confusion and similarity
   
9. I had around 5 questions on EVM, mostly to calculate whether the Cost variance and schedule variance are good or bad and whether the project is ahead and delayed with respect to cost and schedule variance
10. There were many questions on Stakeholder management. Please read and understand it correctly
11. Many questions on Change request as well, I think around 7-8 questions on change request
12. Please understand well about BUSINESS CASE, coz I got around 3 questions on business case
13. Only one question on Procurement as far as I remember, that to very direct. Just to identify the type of procurement contract
14. Around 4 or 5 questions on DIRECT ITTO (so don’t memorize ITTO)
15. Only one question to calculate the communication channels
16. Around 5 questions on “whether you are in Perform quality assurance or in Quality control”, like you will conduct Audit or inspection
17. Around three questions were on WBS
18. Two questions on COMMUNICATION management, like what type of technology will you use and how will you share, whether formal or informal
19. No questions were on Maslow, Herzberg, McClelland type of theories (for team development)

Preparation
1. I prepared 4 months study plan in the begging of Apr 2016.
2. Initially first two weeks I just listened to PMBOK 5 using smartphone application called “CAPTI” on IOS and also PDF narrator
3. I suggest below for studies
4. I took the PDU from www.project-management-prepcast.com but honestly I didn’t listen to the PODCAST coz I already finished the RITA by the time I bought the project-management-prepcast.
5. I Read only two books, don’t over read and over study (I think I over studied in some cases)
6. I read Rita’s book and PMBOK 5 (didn’t touch any other book)
7. Read one chapter on Knowledge area per day and take simple exam
8. Take as many tests as possible. Take lots of tests and try to understand what you did right and what is wrong
9. I took all 9 tests from project-management-prepcast.
   
   Here are the scores for the exams I took on Simulators.
Test Results of PMP PrePCast Simulator
PMP Exam 9 (ITTO) 189/200 94.5%
PMP Exam 8 164/200 82.0%
PMP Exam 7 157/200 78.5%
PMP Exam 6 162/200 81.0%
PMP Exam 5 176/200 88.0%
PMP Exam 4 151/200 75.5%
PMP Exam 3 164/200 82.0%
PMP Exam 2 152/200 76.0%
PMP Exam 1 144/200 72.0%

Other tests:
www.examcentral.net/pmp/question-answer?...st&cl=Mjc1MjM3&tlt=2 - 77%
www.examcentral.net/pmp/question-answer?...st&cl=Mjc1MjM3&tlt=2 - 82%
www.headfirstlabs.com/PMP/pmp_exam/v1/quiz.html# - 72%
www.oliverlehmann.com/pmp-self-test/75-free-questions.htm - 61%
www.techfaq360.com 78%

Some other tests on processes only:
Rita 50 qustions 84%
Rita only Initiation 80%
Rita only Execution 68%
Rita only Monitoring and controlling 62%
Rita only Closure 60%


20. I tried to deeply understand the ITTO during the last one month by drawing some flowcharts. I suggest you take “Control QUALITY” as centre of the flow chart and create the flowcharts and you can easily understand all the processes.
21. Control Quality process takes and gives inputs/output to many processes and that will help you to CRACK the entire "Execution, Monitor and Control Project Work".
22. There are some places where I tried to memorize the ITTO but at very basic level. But I tried to understand ITTO more than memorizing it.
23. For ITTO I used below chart (though it has around 2 or 3mistakes)
www.slideshare.net/PedroArcas/mapa-procesos-pmbok-5

FINALLY
1. Don’t memorize ITTO. Never! Never! Its difficult, and waste of time and memory
2. Don’t read TOO many lessons learnt, it will make you nervous:) I know you can ignore mine as well
3. Don’t over study, over read, but rather have a PLAN to crack PMP
4. Take as many tests as possible and
5. Above all, please understand the ITTO information flow and what does it indicate.

I have created a sheet called "ImpPoints" in the attached excel, that might be useful for aspirants.

Good luck

Few more points:
1. During exam, you can use RIGHT click to MARK uncorrect answers to filter out the answers from the four
2. I asked the Prometric for a handy calculator coz I was not comfortable using the calculator in the laptop, and they happily provided me one

Manoj,

Congratulations on passing the PMP exam and thank you for taking the time to post your extensive lessons learned and advice. Great spreadsheet as well. Good luck.

Mark

Congrats!

Your post and attachment are very helpful!

I can't wait to pay it forward.

Hi Manoj
Alhamdulillah! I cleared my PMP exam today. Your attached xl-file was enormously helpful. I even changed my plan to go through Edward's study notes to go through your file with the time i have. Thanks very much for sharing your study notes. I would recommend my friends to use this as one of their reference sheet to have the summary of the study for each chapter.

Regards,
Mohammad Ahsan

Thats nice Manoj. Congratz.. Excel is awesome but I cant use since I have my exams on 18 Aug. Dont want last minute changes.
Can you please tell me how was the actual test compared to Prep cast simulator ? see my scores in Prepcast till now. I am yet to take 7 & 8.
PMP Exam 1 75%
PMP Exam 2 79%
PMP Exam 3 80%
PMP Exam 4 81.5%
PMP Exam 5 85.5%
PMP Exam 6 76.5%
Can I crack PMP...I am worried coz of my 6th exam marks are less...

Hey Riyaz, your score is good. I am sure you can easily pass. Dont worry about one particular test score, that happens and it depends upon many things.
Actual test questions are little bit confusing, so I suggest you mark as many questions as possible, but AFTER clicking on the best answer FIRST TIME. Coz when you come back to review the questions, you can easily select the answer from the two similar options. That is what I observed.
Also, even if you feel that you are doing HORRIBLE in the test, dont loose sight and dont loose hope, coz we dont know how PMI calculates score, so you have to be confident and always remind yourself that you are here to PASS.
I can suggest below things
1) Please re-review all basics once again before exam. You dont have to use my excel since you dont have much time, but you can refer to sheet "ImpPoints" in my excel, which has around 700 points which will surely increase your knowledge of all processes. Rest all sheets you can ignore
2) Please plan a strategy for test day, like what will you read first, question or answers, how many questions in how many minutes etc.
3) Finally, while leaving for exam, tell your self that you are going to the test center not to attend the exam but to get your certificate coz you know you gonna pass.
You will pass. Good luck

I meant to say questions were like what is in Business case, what is the difference between SOW and business case, what happens if you dont hvae a bsuiness case, who prepares business case etc.

Thanks Manoj,
OK lets see. I have exams on 18 Aug.

Thanks Manoj! Your "ImpPoints" sheet was very useful for me to clear my exam on 30th Aug.

Hi Manoj,

Congrats on passing PMP, recently me too has got same 3P and 2MP. There was questions from business case and sow , it was not direct questions,necessary to know the each elements. Also has got plenty of questions from communications and stakeholders, always two choices looks correct answer, it was really tough. I didn't even look when I click on end button, I thought I would fail. But when I passed it was really unbelievable. But the simulator is really good. If we think most difficult question are those 25, pm prepcast simulator and real exams are almost same difficulty, we will be trained to face situational questions. I believe if we avg of more than 80% on simulator, there very less chance to fail. Our mind automatically will be able to choose right choice.

I hope this will help someo e who are still looking for pmp.

Nonce again congrats and good luck to your career.

Thanks
John George

Congrats John Chelikuzhiyil George. Glad to hear that you cleared it. Best wishes and welcome to the club

Nice thread