TOPIC: Officially a PMP now!

I started my PMP journey in mid March 2011 when I purchased the PM PREPCAST to obtain the required 35 contact hours to satisfy application requirements. I must say that stumbling upon Cornelius Fichtner's website was the wisest thing I did in my PMP certification journey. I found the PREPCAST material to be well-designed, well-presented, and focused on delivering key concepts to the experienced project manager as well as the mid-level project management professional. Kudos to Cornelius and his team for introducing this top-class product into the PMP exam prep market space.


My Journey to PMP

I first began with PMP PREPCAST and downloaded it onto my iPod. I used to listen to it at all times except those when I had to sleep or bathe or perform professional duties. I took the contact hours test on the PM PREPCAST website exactly 2 weeks from the day I purchased it and successfully obtained the certificate. I immediately began the PMI application process of capturing work experience related information in a very neat spreadsheet tool I obtained from a friend who had used it for his PMP application. I was cleared to register for the PMP exam within a matter of 3 days from submitting my application to PMI. I scheduled the exam for May 23rd 2011.

I obtained a copy of Rita Mulcahy's PMP Exam prep, 6th edition and meticulously read through each chapter once. I took all the practice tests at the end of each chapter. I finished the last chapter 3 days before the PMP exam and took two free full length online tests (Headfirst and PMStudy) two days before the exam date. I did not do anything a day before or on the day of the exam.

I highly recommend taking at least two online exams and then carefully going through the answers you got wrong with the explanations for the correct answer. This helped me a lot in the actual exam as I immediately recognized several similarly worded questions that I got wrong in the practice test and understood the right answer to be able to confidently choose the correct answer on the actual PMP test.

I took 2 hrs and 57 minutes to finish the test and was delighted to see the "CONGRATULATIONS" message pop up on the screen after I clicked "End Exam"! phew... what a relief.


Summary
Stay calm, stay focused and be confident in your abilities and preparation for the exam. My personal opinion is that 90% of the exam will test your real world experience in project management and the remaining is based on equations, theories, etc.

And finally, please don't forget to thank your family and friends who have supported your absence from their lives during your preparation phase. They ought to be appreciated and compensated (with a lovely dinner) for their sacrifice!

Good luck and many thanks once again to PM PREPCAST for aiding my preparation towards PMP Certification.

First of all i say congratulations for the success!!
Pls can you tell us your level of real world experience as you mentioned in your leasson learned.
It appears you spent roughly three months,some people do spend almost one year for preparation.
Thank you.

Hi Gbolahan,

I roughly spent 1 month actually reading up material for the exam. The remaining time was spent either preparing the application or taking PM PREPCAST to get the contact hours. I spent an hour or two usually on weekdays and weekends, not regularly though.

As far as my real work experience is concerned, I have around 5 years of consulting and 4 years of project management experience managing different projects ranging from $50,000 to $1M.

How much time needs to be spent on preparation is purely a function of confidence, grasp of project management concepts, and time management. For me, I thought 6 weeks from the day I logged on to PROMETRIC's website is a reasonable target to take the exam and I prepared accordingly.

Hope this helps.