Eugene Whalen
Project Manager| Hexagon Manufacturing Intellegence
Cranston, Ri, United States
I'm one the "lucky" ones who passed their PMP the first time and thought I could share a bit of advise:
By its very definition, this is a project. Treat it as such. Use the processes to plan and execute and learn.
1. Write a charter. What is the goal? Pass the PMP exam, obviously. But what else goes into the Charter? Write it, revise it until, it succinctly addresses as many of the output items as appropriate.
2. Identify Stakeholders. Well, you are one, that's for sure. But what about friends, family, your employer? Is PMI a stakeholder? Create an influence/control matrix.
3. Create Project Management Plan. There are numerous websites where you can download free templates. Pick one as a starting point and modify it as the project requires. Remember, this is a living document that needs to be maintained throughout the project so keep it current.
4. Create each of you knowledge area plans. You know what they are but I would be very mindful of your Stakeholder Management and Quality plans. Your circle of family, friends, and colleagues can be a tremendous asset. But they have to be kept in the loop. Don't try and do this alone. Don't rely on practice tests as a measure of knowledge; few are like the actual exam. Use them though as a quality metric and measure them against your milestones.
5. Do create a WBS. Every project, regardless of size gets one. Your project is no exception.
6. Create a schedule. No one is a ever going to say, "Build that new office building when you get around to it." You set a completion date in your charter, right? Now work to it. Take into account family vacations, work trips, holidays, etc. These things will not go away and you will need to manage around them.
7. Cost management. A friend once said to me, "There are few problems that can't be solved with an injection of capital." But, if you're like me, there is no open checkbook. Plan what the exam prep and exam fees are going to cost you and include an hourly rate for yourself. It will be needed later for calculating cost and schedule variances.
8. I already touched on Quality but will say this about risk. The world isn't going to stop because you're preparing for your PMP exam. Perform qualitative and quantitative risk analysis. Be sure to show this to someone close to you. The aspects that you will most likely miss pertains to you. Once done, you'll have to go back and revise your PMP.
9. Hold kick off meeting(s). Because your life is probably made up of two to three worlds—family, friends, and work—you may have to break this into multiple discussion. Get your stakeholders on board and supporting you. I even had by dogs' support. In the evening, when I'd walk her, I would talk to her about some aspect of project management. While I don't think she was terribly interested, she was a good listener and it was helpful for me to articulate certain subjects.
Now that you're through the planning phase:
10. Study, study, study. Did I mention you'll have to study? I didn't say memorize though, did I? You either get the paradigm of project management or you will struggle with the exam questions. I have a masters in engineering and still found this to be one of the hardest exams I've ever taken. You will need to know the concepts and material well enough that you can quickly discern if the problem is asking about scope management for example, or is there really a communications problem. At 1:20 per question, you can't spend a lot of time pondering.
11. Track your hours and use them to calculate earned value. The hourly rate doesn't matter. It's more about are you putting in the time? Use your test prep questions as a quality gauge. Are you at 75% when you said you would be on your schedule? If not, do you need to re-baseline? One thing about test prep questions: Your knowledge will increase and your score will grow quickly. Don't get discouraged if you're plateauing. Use the missed questions to guide your study areas.
Take and pass the exam!
12. Close the project. Don’t forget to go through and finalize everything. Thank your stakeholders. Put your study materials in a place where you can reference them in the future. In the unfortunate circumstance that you do not pass, use your PMP as a lessons learned.
I hope this helps. Good luck!
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