Kuldeep Kumar, PMP – 1 Goal, 2 Pages of notes, 3 Study aids, 4 Weeks plan

pmp lessons learned kuldeep-kumarI feel very proud of reaching my PMP goal on the very first attempt. Following is brief account of how I achieved it.

pmp kuldeep kumarPMP Study resources I used

My 4-week plan

  • Week 1 and 2:
    • Study Head first PMP thoroughly (targeted 1 chapter every day).
    • Complete all exercise from the book with each chapter.
  • Week3:
    • Studied appendix from PMBOK to go through Acronyms. Basically to revise definitions of all important terms in PMBOK.
    • Practice creating Process chart and write all the PMP formulae (once every day, to achieve writing all of this within 15 minutes)
    • Revised from Shiv’s notes to quickly go through entire syllabus.
  • Week4:
    • Practices 5 full length PMP practice/mock test (one every day).
      • 1 from Head first PMP book.
      • 2 from Exam central website.
      • 1 from Kim Heldman software.
      • 2 from KnowledgeWoods mock tests (earned my 35 PDUs by attending KnowledgeWoods training and they provided 10 full length mock tests).
    • Did not studies anything a day before the exam. (It was Sunday and I spent some quality time with family to relax myself.)

What worked for me

  • Above study plan worked perfectly for me, expect few things which I will mention in the next section.
  • I booked early morning timeslot (8:00AM) for my PMP exam on Monday. I reached at Prometric test center at 7:00AM avoiding traffic and stress which traffic would have created. Plan to reach early to your test center.
  • Relaxing a day just before the exam helped a lot.
  • Revising important definitions from PMBOK acronyms was a great idea.

What did not work

  • Tried mugging up ITTO, and finally at the end of first week realized that it’s hard to remember. Then I started understanding what comes when and why; also how to create input for next process. Hence, my suggestion is don’t try to mug ITTO rather correlate between processes.
  • Doing mock from Kim Heldman software was something which thrashed my confidence when I saw the result was just 55%. I suggest not continuing with anything which demotivates you. Like in my case it was this mock and I immediately stopped attempting more mock from the same resource.
  • I earned my 35hrs education in July 2015 and wrote my PMP exam in 4th January 2016. This was a mistake on my side. Don’t delay your exam as I did. It was very hard for me getting into PMP ‘feel’ after a long break.

Specific study tips or advice for PMP students

Create your own notes.

I created 2 pages of notes for complete PMP schedule, which helped me revise important terms and formulae in the last week when I was attempting mock tests.

Thanks and good luck!

Kuldeep Kumar, PMP

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{ 2 comments… add one }
  • Eliel February 3, 2016, 2:45 pm

    Hi Shiv. I guess the community is in general waiting for updates on the new questions for the exam since PMI has made put the changes in place on 11th january. It would be nice reading anything related. 25% of questions have changed and nobody has brought such matter to the table in order to discuss or let us know….

    Thank you

    • Shiv Shenoy February 23, 2016, 5:54 pm

      Hi Eliel,
      Sorry for the late reply. This one escaped my attention from amongst a ton of span comments. Just today I have published an interview of someone that passed the NEW PMP exam.
      Bottomline – pick up a course material from REP (make sure it’s updated for latest syllabus) and use my Kindle book for the plan and everything else.
      Since PMBOK is not updated by PMI this time around, the only source for updated content is a course or book by REP (remember their content is certified by PMI).
      Hope this helps,
      Shiv

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