Things to know before becoming a PMP – Part Four

As mentioned earlier, no one walks in off the street, takes the exam and just passes. So you will have to spend SOME money just to get ready for the exam. (And the exam itself currently costs money of course. Details later). So let’s start with the second question first. Can you self-study? The answer is YES. (With a caveat that I will get to). I know lots of people who, together with a good set of books and exams, have self-studied and gotten their PMP. So what’s the key to their success and what kind of money did they spend? I’ve gotten to know some of these candidates over my 10 years of teaching and I would say unequivocally that they are bound together largely by at least one thing – self-discipline. (Some of them are bound together by not having money to pay an instructor but that’s a different story). These candidates did their research, found out what materials were out there, attended chapter meetings, talked to PMI and then treated it like a project. No they didn’t create a Microsoft Project schedule. Yes they did set up a timeline with a deadline and milestones. And they stuck to it. And they studied every night and took self-exams frequently to gauge their level of readiness. (Not all of them studied totally alone. One of my friends went to a PMI chapter and finding no study group, started one. ) So in a sense some of these people DID have instructors. Just not paid ones.

So I think the question you have to ask yourself is this – am I a self-starter? Do I have the self-discipline? And as mentioned above, sometimes the question is just, Can I afford an instructor? If not, and if you really want the certification, then you are going to have to dig the self-discipline up from somewhere. So the bottom line here is yes you can self-study. Now, I want my blog to be independent of any vendors. But I can tell you that a lot of people have gotten a significant amount of training out of Rita Mulcahy’s book. And it is a very good book. My only caveat here is that you MUST also have a large bank of self-exam questions. Some of the free questions on the Internet might be ok, and some of them, well, it’s the Internet and is to be taken with a grain of salt. So try to find a bank of exam questions that has at least 600 or so. The Mulcahy book is less than 100 dollars. Not sure about how much the exam banks cost. You will have to do a little research here.

So what’s the caveat that I mentioned earlier? It’s this – in order to apply for the exam, PMI requires you to have 35 contact hours of project management education. This does not include self-study. So if you are a prospective self-studier – and have taken 35 hours somewhere previously – you are all set. However, many people don’t have this training and so have to study with an instructor who will then provide them with the 35 hours of training by virtue of the PMP Prep class. This may be the only reason you need an instructor but it can’t be overlooked. Those without 35 contact hours of education need not apply.

Having said all that, some people discover that they simply cannot self-study. (I couldn’t). Either the material is too hard, they don’t have the discipline or they just prefer to be led through the material by a qualified instructor. (One note here – an instructor will get you through all the material in 3-4 days. You won’t have mastered everything by then. But you will likely get through your first pass more quickly than you would studying on your own). So now you have some choices to make. One question comes to mind immediately:

Frankly, there are a lot of PMP instructors out there. Just Google ‘PMP certification’ or ‘PMP instruction.’ You’ll ask the question, how do I know which ones are good or bad?  I suppose you can first ask them their pass rate. But they will all quote a number greater than 95%. So armed with that information, what do you now do? Well the simple truth is that all of the vendors of PMP training are basing their materials largely on one book, the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). So some vendors may emphasize one thing here, some vendors might emphasize something else there. But now having taught from, I think, four different vendors, I can tell you that the materials are very similar. (I’ve also helped create training materials and PMP-style questions for one of the vendors). Because how far from the PMBOK can they stray?

So one of the things I’d look for is the breadth and variety of their materials. See if they provide some or all of the following:

-A student workbook, typically comprised of the instructor’s slides.

-A study book that is usually a distillation of the PMBOK and other related information. Often includes exam questions.

-Access to a bank of exam questions, either online or on a CD. I would argue there should be at least 600.

-Flash cards for memorization purposes. (Not a deal-killer if they don’t. You can make your own).

-A quick reference guide to key concepts. (Ditto but nice to have).

-PMBOK. Not all vendors provide this. Again, not a deal-killer. If you like the vendor and their price, you can pick this up yourself at Amazon for about $40 USD.

-A guarantee. Not all vendors provide this but it’s nice to have. Typically a guarantee says something like, If you fail, we will allow you to enter another class OR If you fail, we will pay for the re-take of your exam.

-Email access to the instructor for questions after class ends, perhaps for some specified time up to when you take the exam.

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