Self-Assessment

Are you qualified to take the PMP Certification Examination? As noted in the Introduction, candidates for certification must meet specific qualifications regarding education, project management experience, and training to sit for PMP certification. An application must be submitted to PMI for approval detailing your qualifications prior to taking the PMP Certification Examination. The PMP Exam Self-Assessment will assist you in evaluating your ability to meet these qualifications.

PMP in the Real World

The PMP certification and PMI membership are for project management professionals of all disciplines. Whether your professional experience is in information technology or construction, you are eligible for PMP certification; however, you must prepare for the examination. It is easy to believe that your experience performing project management in any industry will be a sufficient knowledge base for taking and passing the PMP Certification Examination.

This is not always the case, though. The PMP Certification Examination is very structured to the PMBOK and project management processes and concepts as advocated by PMI. PMI specifies an all-encompassing role for project management professions including extensive planning (project initiation) activities and project closing processes. Procurement, quality control, and risk management are also emphasized.

Depending on the size of your organization and your role on a project team, you might not have hands-on experience with all the processes deemed essential by PMI. You might not engage in, nor have experience with, implementing the complete life cycle of a project as outlined by the PMBOK. Comparably, your corporation might use a PMI-modified methodology for project management based on industry experience or even combine PMI tools with other management techniques, resulting in a hybrid model. These approaches can result in successful project implementation in your company, but they will not be effective in achieving your PMP certification. It is imperative that you understand all the PMBOK procedures and the manner in which PMI believes these processes should be practiced to pass the PMP Certification Examination.

Throughout this book, you will be asked to learn and apply PMI’s vision for project management. The PMI answer is the only correct response on exam day. Your experience and qualifications might result in you tailoring the PMBOK and other project management concepts to meet your organization’s needs. You might have valid hands-on job experience to support your preference, but in terms of preparing for the PMP Certification Examination, you need to reorient your thinking in terms of the PMBOK and PMI. The correct answer is the PMI answer. After you successfully achieve your PMP certification, you can resume your tailoring or modifying of the PMBOK and PMI’s framework to meet the needs and goals of your organization and your practice of project management.

The Ideal PMP Candidate

There is no “ideal” PMP candidate. The requirements for the PMP certification allow for a broad range of applicants with a mix of qualifications; however, minimal levels for experience, education, and training must be met. You can apply to PMI based on your hands-on experience in the field of project management or use your educational background to offset less experience in your discipline.

Education and Project Management Experience

Candidates for PMP certification must meet both educational and experience requirements. Candidates possessing a university degree apply under Category One and have a lower threshold for work experience. Candidates without a university degree are deemed Category Two and can substitute years of work experience for the degree requirement. Verification forms showing compliance with these criteria must be submitted with your PMI application for either category.

Applications with a University Degree

Category One is for applicants possessing a bachelor’s degree or equivalent. In this category, fewer personal project management experience hours are necessary, although you must possess a minimum of 4,500 hours of hands-on project management activity within each of the five PMI process groups (initiating, planning, executing, monitoring/controlling, and closing). You must have led and directed specific tasks within all five process groups. This must occur within a minimum of 36 nonoverlapping (unique) months within the last 6 years.

Table 1. Category One

Criteria	Minimum	Explanation
Bachelor’s degree		Or equivalent from a university.
Personal project management experience within five process groups	4,500 hours	Within the last 6 years from the date of application.
Nonoverlapping months of personal project management experience	36 months	Individual months count toward the 36 months requirement once, even if you worked on multiple projects during the same month.
Specific instruction that addresses learning objectives in project management	35 contact hours	Must include instruction on project quality, scope, time, cost, human resources, communications, risk, procurement, and integration management.

Applications Without a University Degree

Category Two allows applicants with significant work experience to submit additional work history in lieu of a university degree. In essence, your extended period of job experience serves as your educational requirement.

In this category, you can use 7,500 hours of project management performance to substitute for holding a college degree. You must validate that this work occurred within the last 8 years, of which 60 months must support nonoverlapping periods of personal project management experience. Your work experience must cover all five process groups as noted in category one. A high school diploma or equivalent and/or an associate’s degree or equivalent are a requirement of this category.

Table 2. Category Two

Criteria	Minimum	Explanation
Personal project management experience within five process groups	7,500 hours	Within the last 8 years from the date of application.
Nonoverlapping months of personal project management experience	60 months	Individual months count toward the 60 months requirement once, even if you worked on multiple projects during the same month.
Specific instruction that addresses learning objectives in project management	35 contact hours	Must include instruction on project quality, scope, time, cost, human resources, communications, risk, procurement, and integration management.

Regardless of whether you opt for category one or two, you must complete 35 contact hours of project management education. This training must provide specific instruction addressing project quality management, scope management, time management, cost management, human resources management, communications management, risk management, procurement management, and integration management within the learning objectives.

Courses, workshops, and training sessions in one or more of the following categories satisfy the education requirement:

• University/college academic and continuing education program

• Courses or programs offered by training companies or consultants

• Courses or programs offered by PMI Component organizations (not including chapter meetings)

• Courses or programs offered by PMI Registered Education Providers

• Courses or programs offered by employer/company-sponsored program

• Courses or programs offered by distance-learning companies

Experience Verification

To document your qualifications, you will be asked to complete an experience verification form as part of your PMI application. For the training component, you will document your training by providing the institution name, the name of the course attended, the dates of attendance, and the contact hours earned. You should save any document related to the course, such as a completion certificate in the event that you are randomly selected for an audit by PMI.

For your work experience, the experience verification form will ask you to note the project title, your role on the project, the approximate number of hours spent working in each of the five process areas, the project start date, the project end date, and contact information for the company where the work was performed. You will also be asked to summarize the deliverables you managed on the project and provide contact information for each project.

Prior to starting your experience verification form, compile all relevant information. Your résumé, work records, time-management tools, and related documentation will be essential to detailing your professional experience. Any work breakdown structures and resource allocation spreadsheets detailing the time you spent on each process area can be particularly helpful. Be thorough in your explanations of your work experience. This will be beneficial if you are selected for an audit.

For your education component, you are simply asked to name the institution from which you graduated, your field of study, and your date of graduation. A photocopy of your diploma or transcript should suffice if you are asked to verify your degree as part of a PMI audit.

Testing Your Exam Readiness

The more experience you have responding to PMBOK-type questions, the greater your likelihood of passing your PMP Certification Examination. You should take one of the practice examinations in this book prior to beginning a course of study to gauge your strengths and weaknesses. This will enable you to develop a study plan in conjunction with this book to target your vulnerable knowledge areas.

After you have completed your initial study plan and read this book in its entirety, take the second practice exam. Evaluate your results. Did you do better than the initial test? Have your strengths and weaknesses improved?

Have your strengths and weakness changed? Study your responses to the questions that were incorrect. Are there any patterns evident in the questions you missed? Did you debate between two answers, ultimately opting for the wrong answer? Did you pick answers that appear correct but are simply not the best answer by the standards of the PMBOK and the PMI? Based on this analysis, go back and revise your study plan, concentrating on those areas where you need more knowledge and improvement.

Take your practice examinations under testing conditions. This is a key factor for success during your PMP Certification Examination. When you take a practice test, do so in a quiet area at your desk or dining room table free of distractions. You do not want to be interrupted by the doorbell, phones, email, or your dog during this time.

Set a timer on your watch to ensure you are complying with the time requirement. Based on your time trials, you can train yourself to take more time with each question, or less as the case might be. You can make sure you are saving ample time to review your answers. Most importantly, you will be able to alleviate some of the nervousness and pressure you will feel on exam day by orienting yourself to the conditions under which you will be taking the examination. You will also have more confidence that you are monitoring your time and moving through the exam at a proper rate of speed.

With each practice exam you will see improvement. However, be careful when taking the same practice exam more than once so that your improvement is not based simply on memorizing the answer for that specific exam. Two practice exams are offered in this book, and you can purchase additional practice examinations through the PMI bookstore on the PMI website.

Pretest

To end the Self Assessment section, we recommend that you answer the following questions. These questions are intended to help you measure your knowledge of fundamental project management concepts and techniques. If you don’t score well on these questions, we recommend reading some books on fundamental project management or spending some more time on the job to gain the fundamental knowledge you need to begin your pursuit of the PMP exam. Some fundamental project management books are cited throughout this book in the “Need to Know More?” sections of each chapter as well as in Appendix B, “Additional Resources.” Answer these questions:

• Do you know the difference between a project charter and a project plan?

• Do you know the difference between initiating and planning a project?

• Do you know the difference between backward pass and forward pass to find the critical path in your project?

• Do you know when scope verification is performed?

• Do you know how to develop and utilize a WBS?

• Do you know when to apply a change control system?

• Do you know how to use schedule network analysis?

• Do you know the difference between earned value and planned value?

• Do you know what a Gantt chart is?

• Do you know when to fast track a schedule or when crashing would be the better option?