Project Management Professional PMP®

If you are a Project Manager, a lot of people are depending on you. You are responsible for the project scope, project schedules, project budget, and ultimately the project performance and success or failure. Many project managers end up as the project managers because they were project team members that were successful and it seemed wise to "promote" them to project managers. Project managers that were technical people at one point and ended up as the project managers often understand the technical aspects of the project and even what it means to be a contributing project team member. However, knowing how to work in a project does not automatically qualify one to be a project manager. The best part about this arrangement is that hope is not lost. Good project contributors can become good project managers, but it requires some significant work and training.

First of all, the Standish Group, a research and analysis entity, studied IT projects and found that up to 75% of them failed in some way, from being over budget, to not completing in time, to the project being out right canceled before completion. The culprit of the failed projects? Project Management! They lumped the failures into the following categories:

The following list the primary causes for the failure of IT projects:

* Poor planning
* Unclear goals and objectives
* Objectives changing during the project
* Unrealistic time or resource estimates
* Lack of executive support and user involvement
* Failure to communicate and act as a team
* Inappropriate skills

But, as I stated earlier, the person responsible for these things is the project manager. The project manager is the one that needs to have clear goals and objectives, who needs to manage scope, and communicate to management. He is the only one that can make a difference in most projects.

If you are a current project manager, and you really want to change the risk and outcome of your current projects and future projects you need to get PMP® certified. Will becoming PMP certified solve all of your project problems and guarantee a successful project outcome? Of course not, but it will improve your chances of having a successful project when you apply the Project Management principles and processes. Assimilating the PMP materials takes some time, but is well worth it. Project success rates increase dramatically, and the tools for managing the project performance will delight you as a project manager, and create that opportunity to really make a difference.

Below are some of the best resources to get trained on the PMP principles without attending a very expensive boot camp or week training. I would suggest a boot camp or on site training if you have the time and resources, there is little that can compare to a hands on training, but the following resources will be the next best thing.

Get it on a Cast!

You need a course that conveniently goes with you on your iPod. It is a video course that can be watched or listened to any time. You'll know the feeling of complete freedom when to plug into this course, it lets you enjoy learning while commuting or when waiting in line, and pretty much anytime, anywhere you are ready for it. This will be the PMP exam prep tool that will really make a difference in concept absorption and retention, because you can listen to it again and again. Cornelius Fichtner hosts the PM-PrepCast. He has helped a lot of people along the way to earning their PMP credentials, he has made the training more convenient than anyone else in the industry, and he is PMI approved for 35 contact hours from his training! Get your PMP exam preparation from a real pro, and rack up those contact hours to boot.

Start With a Map

You won't get to your destination without a good map. The PM StudyCoach® is the map map you need of the PMP exam and specific weekly instructions about what to study and how to study it? There is an incredible product called the PM StudyCoach®, that is a PMP Exam Roadmap and a 10 week study program. It has step by step study instructions for preparing for the PMP exam. This is the product that will focus your study time and make it very effective. With a PMP exam roadmap you will be able to spend the time on what is important.

Repetition And Information Distillation

Everyone knows that a key to effective learning is repetition. If you want to learn something in a natural way, flash cards are the right thin. Flash cards let me prepare for the exam in a way that will jump randomly around the PM body of knowledge. There are two sets that I would recommend. The Hot Topics Flashcards For Passing the PMP and CAPM Exam s by Rita Mulcahy or the PM FLASHCARDS by Cornelius Fichtner, both are excellent resources and are comparable in number of cards and quality.

The Printed Word

There are few replacements for a good exam preparation manual. I have experienced many of those manuals over the years. From a standpoint of easy to digest and most focused on the PMP exam, I would recommend the PMP Exam Prep, Sixth Edition: Rita's Course in a Book for Passing the PMP Exam, based on the PMBOK® guide v.4, by Rita Mulcahy. I think she has the best approach for teaching the material, although at times, in her manual, she irritates me by snubbing most other PMP exam preparation materials--she is still right on the money with PMI-isms and what the PMI seems to think is important about the test.

Take A Lot Of Sample PMP Exam Questions

The PMP Exam is mostly application questions, rather than pure knowledge regurgitation. What that means is that many of the questions are situational and require not just knowing the material, but applying the material to real world scenarios. The sample exam questions out there present many of the same principles from different application angles. Take apart the exam questions, and try to determine why each of the "wrong" answers are wrong. The methodologies employed in the sample test questions will mimic the actual questions and will give you an idea of where to spend more time studying. Remember the PMI assumes you are working on a Large Project, and that the Project Manager is "large and in charge." Those two perspectives will help focus the sample questions that you get a chance to take. There are a lot of free questions out there, spend a little time with them, but I would suggest a good software package that has sample exam questions on the computer in a random fashion, just like the exam. This type of exam training is invaluable, because it is so much like the actual test. I would suggest PM Fastrack Exam Simulation Software for the PMP Exam: Version 6 by Rita Mulcahy. It has more than 1000 sample questions that are pretty well focused for the PMP exam. Or get the best value in PMP exam simulation software with a>. It has 6000 sample questions for $49.95.

Download a Free 50 PMP Question Demo Now

Schedule Your Study Time

Most people do best when they eat at regularly scheduled times and sleep at regularly scheduled times. Studying is really no different. Set aside a time every day, or most every day for study time. Your body will get used to cracking the books at that time of day, and you will find that it is easier to pickup where you left off if you condition yourself to study every day. It is amazing what you can accomplish with a little bit of daily effort, which accumulates over the weeks and months into something quite formidable. Invest in yourself and discipline yourself to study every day. You owe it to yourself, your family, and your employer. The PMP training will make an incredible difference in the success of your projects. That is why employers pay, on average, 15% more to PMP certified project managers. You have the skills, now get the training and watch your projects get on schedule like never before.

Here is to your success on the PMP exam and beyond.

PM PrepCast



PM Formulas

For some great help studying the PMP formulas



Flash Cards

The best set that I have found is 1,750 PMP flash card from PM FLASHCARDS.



Study Coach

A project is a temporary endeavor that has a definite beginning and a defined end. It also creates a unique product, service or result.

The definition of a project is very important for the PMP exam. Not all work can be defined as a project. Work that is repetitive in nature is classified as operations. For example most sales, maintenance, and continued production of products would be classified as operations. They are a continual endeavors, and have no definite end. Work such as creating a help desk, implementing a certification process, or building most anything is generally classified as a project. You know when the work of creating the help desk or something tangible begins, and it is also possible to determine when it should end.

Some of the questions on the PMP exam will purposely put in answers that would be correct for endeavors that are on going, that would be primarily an operations task, but would not be correct if it were applied to a project. So keep the definition of a project in mind when taking the PMP exam.

This definition of a project is a PMI-ism, a perspective that is important to the PMI. It is estimated that 40% of those that take the PMP exam and don't pass it, fail because of not being completely familiar with the PMI-ism. For a great tool that will help prepare you for the PMI exam, and that is full of PMI-isms, I would suggest the PM FLASHCARDS®. developed by Cornelius Fichtner. They are a deck of 1750 cards developed around the central concepts of the PMP exam from the PMI perspective.

You can know exactly what you need to study to pass the PMP exam. How can you know what to study? By taking sample tests that let you see where you need the most work. Read How To Know What To Study To Pass The PMP Exam, and get started with really preparing to take that PMP test.

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