Glad to be back

Posted by Bill Rini @ 1:03 am

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Some of you may have been wondering where IÂ’ve been the last several weeks. Well, I spent the better part of the last couple of months preparing to sit for the Project Management InstituteÂ’s (PMI) Project Management Professional (PMP) exam. That combined with my regular workload left me precious little time to blog (or do much else). But the exam is over, I passed, and IÂ’m back now.

I thought it might be a fun post to walk through the PMP exam process for anybody who is considering taking the plunge themselves. First off, just what the heck is the PMP exam?

The PMP exam is a certification exam designed to test the candidateÂ’s understanding of the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK) as defined by the folks at PMI. The idea is that all projects share common elements, regardless of industry, and that knowing what these elements are and by applying project management best practices one can improve the chances of project success. Whether one is building software or airplanes, projects can be broken down into a set of process groups. PMI likes the following groupings:

Initiation
Planning
Execution
Control
Close-out

Others may call them by different names or have more or less process groups but these five are the core. Within each process group are knowledge areas, which contribute to project success. PMI recognizes the following areas of knowledge:

Integrated Change Control
Scope Management
Time Management
Cost Management
Quality Management
Human Resources Management
Communications Management
Risk Management
Procurement Management

ThereÂ’s also a new area covering Professional Responsibility but this is a more generic ethics area that is applied to all of the knowledge areas listed above.

Those nine areas break down into 39 sub-areas, which I’ll spare you. The important thing is that it’s a lot of material. Unfortunately, it can be a little deceptive. PMI’s “The Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge” (aka the PMBOK Guide) is only 216 pages including the glossary. See, the PMBOK Guide tells you what you need to know but doesn’t always give you the specific information. For that, you need to either get into a prep class or pick up one of the 400+ page self-study guides that are put out by various authors.

The PMP exam is not a test of what you can memorize but what you know and how you apply it. Before you can even register to take the exam you have to list, project by project, how many hours of project experience you have. If you have a baccalaureate level degree you must demonstrate 4500 hours of prior experience and without a degree you must demonstrate 7500 hours. On top of that, you must have completed a PMI authorized course in project management worth at least 35 hours of study.

Once you have the prerequisites out of the way, you can apply to take the exam. In fact, youÂ’ll find thatÂ’s the easiest part of the entire process though it may take several hours just to fill out the forms. From there, youÂ’ll need to hit the books pretty hard. I started about 2 months from my test date and put together a study plan. Every single day I had some form of studying on my calendar.

IÂ’ll walk you through the resources I used to study for the exam:

The PMBOK Guide. You canÂ’t pass without it (IMHO). ItÂ’s written by PMI so common sense will tell you that a lot of the exam questions will be about information in the

PMP: Project Management Professional Study Guide by Kim Heldman. It weighs in at 576 pages and youÂ’ll need to read every one of them. I particularly like HeldmanÂ’s book because of the chapter tests and the final exam at the end of the book. The questions are the most like those on the exam in terms of complexity and depth of knowledge. The questions are also what is called situational. That means, you are given a situation or set of facts and must base your answer on the information given. The PMP exam does this as well so itÂ’s good practice.

PMP Prep Pac: This is a package of prep courses for the PMP exam taught by the International Institute for Learning (IIL). At $850, itÂ’s a bit expensive but if you donÂ’t already have your 35 hours of training required by PMI, this will take care of that. The PMP Prep Pac includes:

PMP Basics: A very introductory course to project management. I canÂ’t say I was floored by the content but it wasnÂ’t bad either.

PMP Prep Online: This is an excellent online study course where you have an instructor who walks through the PMP exam areas step by step and helps fill in the blanks.

PMIIQ: I have a love/hate relationship with this part. It’s a software package authored by Dr. Kerzner. It also comes with his book “Project Management: A Systems Approach” which is an excellent book but is not really a good PMP exam study guide. It wasn’t written for that purpose so it tends to deviate from the PMP standards and goes into way more depth than you need for the PMP exam. The software package is a series of tests you can take. It has well over 1000 questions in it’s database so you get your money’s worth.

In addition to those resources I also found a ton of useful information in the Yahoo Group PMCert. They have tons and tons of sample questions and a community of PMPÂ’s who are more than willing to explain concepts that may seem difficult.

I will offer this word of caution though; many of the free exams are a hodgepodge collection of random questions some of which are for a previous version of the PMP test and are no longer valid. On the PMCert group I watched on more than a few occasions as two certified PMP’s politely argued that one answer was better than another for a particular question. Trouble is, they were both right. In other words, a lot of these questions are poorly written and some have questionable answers. So, what it comes down to is that you get what you pay for. Although, that being said, some of the non-free practice exam providers (who shall remain nameless) aren’t a great deal better. Let’s just say that if a practice exam provider offers a sample exam that’s riddled with grammar and spelling errors, it says something about the quality control going on there. In the immortal words of Forrest Gump, “That’s all I have to say about that.”

After two months of prep, I felt a little punch drunk going into my final few days of studying. I battled through it though and sat for the 200 question, four hour exam bright and early on a Saturday morning. ItÂ’s not an easy exam but itÂ’s not too difficult either. If youÂ’ve done your homework and have several years worth of project management experience under your belt you should be able to do well on the exam. I do have to admit though; it feels a lot better to have it over with.

Anyway, thatÂ’s my story. If youÂ’re thinking about taking the exam please feel free to either post something here or to shoot me an email via my contact link with any questions you may have.

Best,

Bill

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