Passed PMP Last night

[dpak]

I passed the exam last night and here are my lessons learnt.

1. The biggest hurdle: I have been a member of PMI for 3 yrs. Have
been practicing PM for a few years. Applied for the exam in 2006 but
did not pay / schedule it. Again applied in 2008 and this time paid
the exam fees immediately in Jul 2008. Have been busy with work and
travel and did not get to scheduling the exam. The first jolt was the
switch from 3rd ed to 4th ed of PMBOK. I thought I can prepare before
the deadline and did not get to studying and the deadline passed.
Pushed myself and spent about 3 hrs everyday from wknd of July 11th.
Mostly used the time to read through the PMBOK and take notes. I got
bored of the material and lacked motivation after the first week.
Stopped studying and took two days off (around chapter 3). Came back
again to the same study mode for 3 more days and then gave up again
(ard Chapter 8). Two days later called PMI to see if I can take the
exam in Sept / Oct. They said my exam time period expires on Jul 29th.
That did it! Scheduled my exam for the last date, last exam of the
day! My biggest concern as I embarked on a five day crash course was
ITTOs. I was very sure I will not be able to memorize it.
2. Forced myself to complete the PMBOK and finished one read by Fri
last week. Spent 1 day with Rita 3rd edition book. This helped clear a
lot of the concepts. I did all the KA questions after each section.
3. Read PMBOK all over again on Sunday. This time it was an eye
opening experience. I read somewhere that the PMBOK is really a gold
mine for practitioners and I truly appreciated that when I read it a
second time. This time also read the appendices and the glossary
section. Got a good understanding of the KAs and the processes. Also,
by this time, I got a feel for the spirit of the major ITTOs. By this
I mean, what are they fundamentally representing and how they work
together and are interlinked.
4. Took a lot of questions online on Mon and Tue along with 2 full
length tests (Oliver Lehmann and Headfirst PMP). Scored 79% and 66%
resp.
5. Mon and Tue, I must have practised writing down the KAs vs
processes and formulaes atleast 6 times, Was confident of doing this
within 13 mins as suggested by many on the forum. Did not bother with
the ITTOs. Relied on the understanding of the concepts.
6. Here is the best thing that I did - joined this forum. Throughout
the last 3-4 months, eventhough I was not studying, I was reading all
the mails. The successes, failures, questions, people supporting each
other, discussions back and forth. This external inspiration made up
for my lack of motivation internally. Special thanks to Harwinder and
Fai. You guys are great! I used all the tips that others provided over
the last 5 days - ss sheets, ITTO chart, formula sheets, questions,
etc.
7. I put in an avg of 14-16 hrs everyday the last 5 days. Two other
suggestions that I followed - visited the center the day before and
ensured all my id docs were acceptable. I even followed somebody's LL
to get a couple of hrs rest before a 5.30 pm test. Too much
adrenaline. Did not work for me!
8. Got to the exam at 4.15 pm. Signed in and kept reading my notes
till 5.20. Entered the exam at 5.30 pm exactly. Used 2 mins to go over
the tutorial. Made sure I did not click next after last page (again a
LL from this group). 13 mins to do the brain dump. 3 hrs to answer all
the questions. I marked about 100 questions for review and did go back
and make the change on 20 to 30 of them.

Here is a short list of what I wish I had done better:
1. Prepared for 1 month instead of the crazy cram. Maybe increase the
prep time if it is part of a study group. I could not find study
partner in the bay area from this forum. The study group would have
helped a lot with the ITTOs and understanding the interdependencies.
Also, IMO with a group, you feel you share the risk instead of
retaining it!
2. DFDs - The one thing I do regret is not paying attention to these
when I did my cursory reading of the PMBOK the first time around. This
is the crux. The most important thing in the 4th ed. IMO. The DFDs
clearly show the flow, the interdependency and to an extent the
stregth of the dependency.
3. Read a prep guide (one is good enough) - RM, Kim Heldman, Andy
Crowe, Headfirst or any other material you can get your hands on. More
than anything else, the prep guide gets you in the mode to appreciate
PMBOK more. The PMBOK is the ultimate resource though. Even the notes
I made from the PMBOK was useful for revisions. I used PMBOK 4th ed
and RM (3rd ed).
4. I was really worked up about the ITTOs when I started preparing.
Please do not. Especially, memorizing them. In the end, I felt, I
could have handled this better. It was not worth all the stress.
Understand the concepts. ITTOs will be ingrained. Experience in PM
practices helps immensely.

If I could do it with this chaotic approach, all you aspirant out
there who have worked harder will definitely succeed. Goodluck.

A big thanks to everybody who sent LL.

Deepak.