The Big Time

I am glad to announce that I passed the PMI-PBA Exam on March 23, 2019 with Above Target rating. It was a journey full of challenges and knowledge gain which finally paid off with a huge success. 

STUDY PLAN

PMI Resources: PMI Guide to Business Analysis & Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide. Those two resources are more than enough. I did not have much guidance as to how to approach the exam so I went through the Practitioner Guide first then went through the PMI Guide which confused me a lot so the First Lesson Learned is to go through the PMI Guide first then fill in the blanks by referring to the Practitioners Guide. Those two resources are more than enough. 

Exam Content Outline: Very Important to go through it in details as it might help you get some clues in the exam. 

PBA Course: I purchased a course on Udemy by John Sipin and it was great. Upon completion of the course and all assignments, they sent me a CoC and I was able to claim 35 Educational PDU's. 

PMI Application: This is my fifth certificate with PMI and it was the first time I get randomly audited but, guess what, I was already prepared so I mailed all required documents to PMI the next day and then 3 days later, I contacted PMI to check if the package was received which they confirmed it was and shortly after they approved my application. The staff was very friendly and accommodating so the Second Lesson Learned is not to worry about the audit if you have all your documentation in order as per your submitted application. 

Study Time: It took me a bit less than a month to study and go through some simulation exams. One month might seem light but I used to study 4 hours a day and 6 hours on weekends in addition to that to took the last week off work to study extensively so it was more of a Bootcamp Personal Plan. At a normal pace, I would say 2 - 3 months (2 - 4 Hours / Day) should be enough considering you are already a PMP & ACP (Both helps a lot). 

Simulation Exams: One great resource for simulation exams was iZenbridge. They have a great questions bank and although the exam questions are very different, still, iZenbridge's simulation exams provides you with great ideas and explanations. It is worth also noting that their fees were reasonable as well (It was about $99 USD for 2 months access). I heard from others about another good resource for simulation exams which is Watermark Learning but I personally never used it. 

EXAM EXPERIENCE

I am going to talk about my personal exam experience (Without going into details or specific questions):

Level of Difficulty: The level of difficulty could be easily comparable with PMP. Out of the 5 exams I took with PMI, this was the most challenging after the PMP. Although the exam was very tough but PMI did a great job putting this pool of questions together.

Exam Questions (General): All the exam questions were scenario based  some of which were short, others were very lengthy (At least 50%). Even the shortest 1 line questions were not straight forward.

Exam Depth: The exam tests your understanding of Business Analysis very deeply beyond any text book. You need to ensure you fully understand all principles, processes, models and so on. Third Lesson Learned: Do not spend time memorizing things but make sure you fully understand everything. 

Exam Language: The language of the questions and answers was not easy at all. You might end up reading the question and answers 3 times. I am fluent in English and yet, I recall having to read lots of questions 3 times so the Fourth Lesson Learned: Read all questions and answers very thoroughly. 

Exam Time: I thought my ACP exam experience in terms of timing was the most challenging but it turned out not, compared to the PBA. It is literally the first time I completely run out of time. I finished the last question 1 minute before the end of the 4 hours and did not have time to review any marked questions so the Fifth Lesson Learned is to Watch your time - Some would think that 4 Hours is a lot but trust me, it is not. Make sure you target around 50 Questions per hour.

Elimination Strategy: You will find it easy to eliminate two answers but very difficult to chose between the remaining two. You need to deeply think of every word in the questions and answers to properly get to a conclusion in terms of which choice is the best. 

Good Luck to all future Aspirants !

Recently, I've seen so many discussions about how increasing your network adds value. Some think its a waste of time, others see it the other way around. In this blog, I will be sharing my personal experience and point of view.

Increasing your Network Connection base is very beneficial in so many ways so for those who are wondering what the purpose is or what's the added value, I would like to give you a brief of how I personally found it useful: 

1. Mentoring / Assistance: In many cases, I connect with people and they send me a thank you message for connecting with them and say that they are new on this platform and wonder how they can start on so I help them out get started here. Some people feel shy or not comfortable taking a first step so why not we take the first step. 
2. Enhancing the Community Engagement: Item 1, leads to enhanced member engagement within this community as soon as they get their head around it and understand how much of an amazing platform and community it is. I feel that everyone of us should have a sense of ownership towards this community.
3. Connecting on other Platforms: In many occasions when I connect with people here, they send me a thank you message and tell me that they are not very active here and ask to connect on LinkedIn and share expertise. I did benefit a lot from so many people.
4. Connecting in Person: In many occasions, I connected with people on person via connecting through this platform and some of them (To be specific 2), we became friends although they are not very active here. 

In summary, Networking has so many advantages of which one of them is Building Relationships. You just need to look at the positive side of things and look whats beyond that number. I am not saying I am connecting with all my connections but I certainly connected with a decent number of people. (If you connect closely with 500 people out of the 100,000, this is a great achievement - This maybe a small percentage but it is certainly a big number). 

For me, it is not about adding connections to show off the number. It is about the whole package of me being a member of this community, leading by example, contributing, helping, connecting, learning and the list goes on.

Thank you for everyone who gave me the honor to connect with them. There are lots of great people out there, so connect with people and start building relationships. 

Network and let your Relationship Ship Sail towards Building Relations ! 

I am glad to announce that I passed the PMI-ACP Exam with Above Target rating. It was an interesting journey and very different than any of the other certifications. I thought to share my journey so that future aspirants can benefit from it. 

Study Plan

• ACP Exam Prep Book by Mike Griffiths: Excellent reference that will help you fully understand every single detail related to the exam and agile projects. I consider this like the PMBOK, a great reference for Agile so I am positive I will always refer to it in the future. 
• Agile Practice Guide by PMI: Not very detailed but contains some good information about process tailoring, pain points and their trouble shooting, flow based vs. iteration based agile. 
• Exam Content Outline: Very Important to go through it in details as it might help you get some clues in the exam. 

Personally, I believe Mike's book is a must to pass the exam. Read Mike's book twice, the agile guide as well and highlight the most important items in addition to the exam outline. 

• Simulation Exams: Solved simulation exams (Whizlab, PM Prepcast & RMC Fast Track). They were all helpful but the exam is way different so do not rely on those simulation exams. They might help you though with eliminating some wrong answers. 

Exam Experience

I am going to talk about my personal exam experience (Without going into details or specific questions):

• The level of difficulty could be easily comparable with PMP, if not more difficult. Although the exam was very tough but PMI did a great job putting this pool of questions together. 
• You do not need to memorize anything at all. All the exam was scenario based questions some of which are short, others were very lengthy (At least 40%). Forget about memorizing - Some might find it hard to believe but it is the truth. 
• The exam tests your understanding of agile very deeply beyond any text book. You need to ensure you fully understand agile and have an agile mindset. 
• The language of the questions and answers is not easy at all. You might end up reading the question and answers 3 times. 
• It is the first time I almost run out of time. I finished the last question 10 minutes before the end of the 3 hours and then went and reviewed some of the questions I marked but could not go through all of them again. Watch your time - Some would think that 3 Hours for 120 Questions is a lot but trust me, it is not. 
• You will find it easy to eliminate two answers but very difficult to chose between the remaining two. You need to deeply think and adopt the agile mindset to properly get to a conclusion in terms of which choice is the best. 

Good Luck to all future Aspirants ! 

I am proud to share with you another recent accomplishment. I passed my Professional Scrum Master II Certification with a score of 91.7%.

Preparation 

1- Follow the same steps (Combined) for PSM I, SPS , PSPO I

2- Read a lot of additional documents and case studies. 

3- Completed some simulation exams such as Open Scrum, Product Owner Open & Open Nexus which are available for free on the scrum.org website. 

4- Read additional two references / books. Those were extremely helpful in passing the exam and they are great books to have: 

     - Scrum (A Pocket Guide) by Gunther Verheyen.

     - Essential Scrum by Kenneth S. Rubin

Exam

1- The exam is 1.5 Hour and consists of 30 Multiple Choice Questions. 

2- Passing grade is 85% which means you need to score 26 correct questions out of 30. 

2- It tests your experience & knowledge beyond the any guide. It is a very tough exam so you need to have experience and know Scrum in depth. 

3- Most questions are scenario based or required in depth analysis. 

4- I found this exam the most difficult out of all the Scrum Certifications that I've completed so far. 

What's Next

On my agenda are the following certifications: PMI-SP, PMI-ACP & LEED GA

Good Luck to all New Aspirants ! 

I am proud to share with you another recent accomplishment. I passed my Scaled Professional Scrum (SPS) Certification with a score of 95%.

I would like to share my journey towards achieving the SPS:

Preparation 

1- Read the Nexus & Scrum Guides and understood everything in details. 

2- Read a lot of additional documents and case studies. 

3- Completed some simulation exams such as Open Scrum & Open Nexus which are available for free on the scrum.org website. 

Exam

1- The exam is 1 Hour and consists of 40 Multiple Choice Questions. 

2- It tests your experience & knowledge beyond the Scrum Guide & Nexus Guides.

3- Lots of questions were scenario based questions. 

4- I found this exam the most difficult out of all the Scrum Certifications that I've completed so far. 

What's Next

I am planning on doing my GPM-b and PMI-RMP Certifications this year if all goes smooth.