TOPIC: Passing the PMP exam on the 1st attempt and lessons learned

Hi everyone,
I cleared off my PMP exam on the 1st try on 15 June.
I wanted to convey my experiences and lessons learned so that everybody can benefit, just like I did while preparing.
First of all, I have to inform you that it took me 2 years to start studying and get certified!!
The sole reason for this was that, I am an active officer in the Turkish Army and due to multiple deployments I could never schedule my exam, let alone submitting my application!!
So my recommendation; try to submit your documents and book your exam whenever you make up your mind about certification. I did not say "whenever you are ready", because you will never be ready to take the exam literally;)
So, my journey started with reading the PMBOK and it made no sense to a person like me with no vast project management experience.
Then I purchased Rita's book in order to UNDERSTAND the PMI mentality which was the right decision. Rita's book really makes you realize and understand the concepts.
In order to fulfill the eligibility requirements for the application, I purchased Cornelius's Prepcast with the Simulator version. Prepcast makes a difference while visualizing the concepts via presentations and podcasts.
As a supplementary reference, I purchased Andy Crowe's PMP Exam book. It was nice to have but was not a must have reference once obtained Rita's.
Once the PMI flow started to make sense, I started taking almost daily 25-50 question quizzes online on the www.examcentral.net .
I highly recommend this website, because their questions are concise and up to the point. I truly benefited from the Examcentral.
My exam eligibility would be due on June 21 so I booked my test on June 15.
I fired off PM Prepcast's simulator 3 months prior to the exam and started taking the mock exams.
What helped me a lot was taking screenshots of the wrong and marked questions for further analyzes nd memorizing the needed ones.
I have to emphasize that I mostly benefited from the simulator's questions. Those were the closest ones to the actual questions on the test!!
Before the test day:
Since i never had the chance of taking a week or so from the work and study in a bootcamp mentality, the only thing i could manage was to get one day off before the exam. That was the moment to success because without that one single day of studying about 10 hours, i could not have managed to be successful, now i realize!!
What i did was, to re-read the PMBOK's highlighted parts which gave me a BETTER last minute understanding of the PMI concepts while incorporating the simulator questions to the concept on my mind.
During the test:
1) created the dump sheet,
2) drew a smiling face on the scratch paper (this helped me whenever i felt like i was going down-this was a tip (smile) that I got from Rita and believe me it helps!!)
3) Do not expect wordy situational questions as long as the ones on the PM Prepcast Simulator. This is a good thing since i have prepped with longer questions.
4) However; do not get misled or distracted by the size of the texts. Most of the times i spent more time on short questions.
5) In many questions the difference between the 2 answers out of 4 (the correct one and the closest to the correct answer) was so subtle that I had to re-think and scan my knowledge!! Read the questions slowly and CAREFULLY!!
6) Do not expect to see direct ITTO questions as the ones on the mock tests. Most ITTO questions were rather tested my understanding of the ITTO mentality and flow. Do NOT MEMORIZE the ITTOs!!
7) I had marked more than 60 questions for review and did not change more than 4-5 questions on the review phase during the last 30 minutes.
The exam was hard for me but I could manage to pass all knowledge areas with "moderately proficient". Trust your study and instincts!! As i mentioned earlier, many questions' answers were either "this or that", so it was not crystal clear (at least it was so for me).

Conclusion:
Do not elongate the certification process like me, it is really tiring and discouraging sometimes.
Cornelius has done a good job on limiting the Simulator eligibility with 3 months!! Fire up the simulator and clear your certification in 3 months.
Read the PMBOK once again before the exam.
Apologies for not providing a shorter post mortem, but I tried to convey maximum lessons learned out if my personal journey.
I wish all the aspirants the best through this tough but invaluable experience...
Emre Tuzun

Dear Emre Tuzun,

Congratulations on passing your exam!

Thank you for sharing your success and lessons learned. We are glad to hear that our products helped you to prepare and pass your exam.

Good luck in all your future endeavors.