According to our 5A-class students’ experience of preparing for PMP project manager certification (authorized by American PMP), efficient exam preparation undoubtedly saves time and effort. Here are some tips.
Keep learning every day. If it’s really hard to persist, at least I need to complete the daily practice. The time arrangement and review plan of each returning student I have heard can be very helpful for me to make a suitable study plan for myself.
Practice what I have learned. For example, consider my family as stakeholders in the project. Especially for people who have children like me, it is important to spend at least one day in a week to accompany children. They inspire me in all aspects and help me to be energetic and find an effective way to study.
Read books and watch course videos. It’s essential to read through PMBOK in advance. But if we really can’t do that, we can watch the course videos. Because videos can be viewed at an accelerated speed, it will not take too much time to watch them.
Keep attending live-streaming class. And do the preview and review work carefully. Although it is a commonplace suggestion, by following it, you can undoubtedly save a lot of time and effort. In the process of live-streaming class, since teachers are very experienced, they can take the state of most students into consideration. Students need to follow the teachers in class. As long as we can keep up with the rhythm and listen to teachers attentively, the course will be increasingly interesting and attractive. After all, the course itself is related to our work, and we may be familiar with it. And those unfamiliar knowledge points may be more likely to stimulate our desire for learning.
Make use of the WhatsApp group to deepen the impression of knowledge points. The most important after-class resource for us is the WhatsApp group of students set up by teachers. In the group, we can encourage each other as well as compete with each other. We search for knowledge in a very rigorous but humorous way. Everyone in the group can put forward their own views on a certain knowledge point of management, and others who are interested can add a few words or give some opinions. We can also exchange some learning materials on hand, share our learning state and experience, and convey our happy mood and optimistic attitude. Here you are not learning alone and simply do some repetitive work.
Be active. We must learn actively. Very often when you don’t do so, others just cannot help you. If you are not active, then you will shrink back when encountering a problem and find it difficult to achieve something. It’s not just about learning, it’s about doing everything. As long as you are willing to put on your thinking cap, you will find that there are more ways than problems.
The PMP exam should be attached importance to. The project management to be learned is a very professional system which requires a certain amount of effort. The following is a student’s summary of his experience in preparing for the exam, for reference only.
Manage learning as managing a project of which the aim is the PMP certificate. Since it is a project, a project plan is essential. The head teacher will make a good learning plan for everyone. I think that students can make appropriate changes to the WBS according to their own situation, and then give feedback to the teacher about the plan.
PMBOK is very important. One characteristic of the PMP exam is that answers of almost all the exam questions can be found in PMBOK. That is to say, as long as you understand PMBOK thoroughly, you can pass the exam. However, because of the massive content of PMBOK, it is not easy for people without enough project management experience to fully understand it.
For an experienced project manager, it’s OK to skim PMBOK for the first time to grasp the general content of the system and see whether it is consistent with his own experience. For those who have little project experience or are still students in school, it’s very important to understand the 15 supreme maps before learning PMBOK. This can help to better grasp what to learn and manage in project management, and make it easier to understand PMBOK in later study.
Do intensive reading of PMBOK and watch intensive lecture videos synchronously. This is a process of knowledge accumulation with the longest duration during my preparing for the exam. This process must be carried out in strict accordance with the plan. No matter how busy I am, I have to keep learning every day, even if I only study for half an hour. I just can’t stop for a single day. This is my experience in learning the Japanese version of PMBOK. In fact, this process is very hard. I often go to bed at 2:00 or 3:00 a.m. and sleep for only 3 to 4 hours. But if you take this stage of learning seriously, it will be easier in later study which may otherwise be very painful.
The study of Successfully Passing the PMP (a textbook) is carried out after the first intensive reading, mainly to strengthen the memory of important knowledge points. I think it is very important. In fact, I didn’t read the textbook very carefully which I think is a failure in my preparing for the exam.
Through practice exams and the explanation of exam questions, we can master important knowledge points and accumulate exam-taking experience. Three practice exams are the key to passing the PMP exam. If the scores are not good at first, don’t lose heart. Watch the videos to master the key points and repeat taking the practice exams. Before the formal exam, I took the three SPOTO’s practice exams three times for each. Without taking the practice exams, it should be difficult for me to pass the formal PMP exam.
It’ important to finish the homework assigned by the head teacher, pay as much attention to exercises as to questions of practice exams, and conduct repetitive learning.
Review the notebook of mistakes in exercises again the day before the formal exam to deepen your memory. Many mistakes I have made in my exercises are about concepts and understanding of the questions. So I have no choice but to memorize them by rote.
Finally, SPOTO’s explanation of knowledge points is worth reading. Students with poor scores in the practice exams are suggested to carefully read that. There may be some difficulties but SPOTO’s explanation of the PMP is well-organized and not difficult to understand. And there are practice exam papers in the end.