How I approached the PMP^® exam

Below is outlined how I wrote and passed* the PMP^® exam and thereby obtained PMI^®'s PMP^® designation.

Included are an experience tallying spreadsheet, and some study notes you will hopefully find useful.

(This information is provided free in the hopes it will be useful to others. It is provided as-is and without warranty of any kind. It may contain inaccuracies, or be out of date, or not apply to your circumstances.)

It took me under four weeks start to finish (with course & exam seats being available, and having sufficient time to study), and I passed ranked “proficient” (of Proficient/Somewhat Proficient/Not Proficient) in all categories.

Here's how I did it:

1. Bought a copy of the PMBOK^® Guide (that's “Project Management Body Of Knowledge”).**
   
   
   1. Read the first four chapters. (That's what I got through prior to taking the course. Ideally would have read the entire book, but the first four chapters were enough so that, when I later took the course, I knew what the instructor was talking about and where everything fit in.)
      
      
   2. Took notes, particularly on the five Process Groups:
      • Initiating
      • Planning
      • Executing
      • Monitoring & Controlling
      • Closing
   
   
2. Verified my project work experience would meet the PMI requirements for the PMP designation. (Not a bad idea to do this before investing more time and money!)
   
   
   1. Checked that my experience fell into each of PMI's five “Process Groups”. (You may want to review exactly what they entail; see #1 above, and refer to PMI.org.)
      
      
   2. Checked that the projects I intended to list on the application didn't overlap, that I had up-to-date contact info for the colleagues whose permission I planned to ask to use as references, and in general that I could meet all of the PMP eligibility requirements.
   
   
   
3. Seeing that I should meet the experience requirements, searched for a course that would meet the PMI hours of education requirement.
   
   
   1. While other courses taken earlier in my career might have counted towards this, I am very glad I took a course that focused on the exam material:
      
      
      • The exam covers all the material in the PMBOK, but also a wide range of other material not addressed in any detail in the PMBOK. Thus, regardless of my centuries of project experience and posession of the PMBOK, I needed to know this other material.
        
        
      • As with any multiple-choice exam (LSAT, GMAT, etc.), what the exam is really testing is how good you are at taking the exam. Thus, the best preparation (in addition to studying and knowing the material) is to do practice questions. A good exam prep course provides lots of practice questions.
        
        
   2. I took “PMP Exam Power Prep”, a five day course offered by Nexient Learning. The course followed material from ESI International. The instructor was very knowledgeable and provided valuable tips on what areas of study to focus on.
      
      
4. Upon completing the course, joined PMI (paying the registration fee), and filled out the experience requirement portion of the PMP application using PMI's online form.
   
   
   1. Before entering the experience info online it was helpful to do a rough copy, since there is a long timespan and a lot of work to review.
      
      
   2. This Excel spreadsheet was helpful in totalling experience across projects (thanks to JG for the original version).
      
      
5. Once the PMP application was accepted, booked a PMP exam seating at a Prometric testing centre. With nine days left, studying took the following form:
   
   
   1. Finished reviewing and completed the practice questions from the last few sections of the course material.
      
      
   2. Wrote the full 200 question paper practice exam provided by the course.
      
      
   3. Did a complete section-by-section review of the course material, again completing each section's practice questions, in parallel with skimming the equivalent PMBOK chapters. For each section, also answered the questions in the corresponding section of “PMP Exam Practice Test and Study Guide, 7th Edition”. This guide was provided to the particular sitting of the course I was on; the questions in the guide are particularly challenging.
      
      
   4. Took the free sample test at pmstudy.com, which was good practice simply for the fact that you can't jot notes or cross off options on the computer screen. Going through the questions a screen at a time, suffering eye and neck strain, and using a smudgy soft-lead pencil on rough foolscap paper like in the real exam setting was also good practice. (No other writing instuments were allowed in the test centre I attended — mechanical pencils and pens are the work of the devil!)
      
      
   5. Wrote the full 200 question exam in “PMP Exam Practice Test and Study Guide, 7th Edition”. Getting slaughtered on this practice test (well, passing — but barely) was good incentive to study more.
      
      
   6. The aforementioned slaughtering spurred me to memorize the Knowledge Areas/Process Groups table from p. 70 of the PMBOK. To make it easier to commit to memory, I abbreviated it as follows in my study notes... I found it easier to see the patterns:
      
      
      • Knowledge Areas/Process Groups
      
      
      
   7. Pleased with that nice looking chart, and still shaken by the slaughtering, I also outlined each of the Knowledge Areas in similar format. Unlike the charts at the start of each Knowledge Area chapter in the PMBOK, I found that this format made it easier to see patterns (such as which inputs are common to all Process Groups in a Knowledge Area, which outputs from one Process Group are inputs to another, etc.).
      
      While I did not have time to memorize each of these charts, seeing the Knowledge Areas laid out in a concise format made clear the logical relationships between inputs, tools & techniques, and outputs within each Knowledge Area across the Process Groups — so that after a while I could recall the most important parts of each.
      
      
      • Legend
      
      
      
      1. Integration
      
      
      
      2. Scope
      
      
      
      3. Time
      
      
      
      4. Cost
      
      
      
      5. Quality
      
      
      
      6. HR
      
      
      
      7. Communication
      
      
      
      8. Risk
      
      
      
      9. Procurement
      
      
      
      
      
      
6. Got a good night's sleep, walked to the testing centre, wrote the exam, and passed.

A final note: I found that my engineering background helped approach studying for the exam. I quickly fell back into old habits and made use of my university study techniques in solving practice problems, memorizing the relevant formulas and lists, and figuring out which critical areas to focus on so as to minimize time spent and maximize results. If you had a technical education, you may find the same thing.

Good luck!

* “Wrote and passed”: note the past tense. Treat this information as a history lesson: any of the requirements for the PMP designation, the exam itself, etc. etc. may change at any time — which could render some or all of this information useless and no longer applicable. Ensure you are up-to-date on the latest requirements!

** It would have been a good idea to first verify I'd be able to meet PMI's requirements before buying the PMBOK Guide; however, the guide actually contains useful information regardless of whether you go for the designation.