My PMP preparation: Average students like me!

 

First of all, I would like to say that I am NOT a studious person at all. I am someone with an average intelligence who struggles a lot to gain that motivation for doing something which requires so much hard work. Maybe that’s why many people will be able to relate to me and might gain some benefit from reading this.

 

I will keep it short and simple.

 

I attended the course at ProThoughts on June 17. Being the person I am, I thought since I have a year to clear the exam; let’s start preparing for July 17. Which I did. For the entire month of July, I read Rita’s book simply because I had just completed the course and everything taught was fresh. My plan was that I will read Rita at least thrice; so during my first reading, I will just run through the book to get a feel of it.

 

 

Then came Aug17. In the 1st week I went on a trek and in the 3rd week, I went to Ladakh. So as expected I lost my tempo and since during my 1st reading I ran through the book, nothing stayed in my mind.

 

Sep17 was a total waste in terms of prep because due to office workload I couldn’t find time to study after office and couldn’t find the motivation to study over the weekends. – I know some of you must be thinking that this review is a waste of your time ;).

 

Being a normal human being I started asking my fellow pro-thoughts mates regarding their preparation, thinking that hearing about their progress I might feel a bit motivated. But they were at par with me only.. which is ZERO.

 

In October ’17 I finally decided that its high time that I start studying if I really want to clear the exam. But being the good old me, I started looking for shortcuts on the internet (Notes, videos, Charts etc.). There I came across a book called Headfirst PMP (twice the size of Rita but written like a comic book) It caught my interest. I read it for understanding a lot of concepts. I got my tempo back. I finished Headfirst in 2 weeks. Then I jumped at Rita’s book. This time, however, I read it slowly, understanding as much as my brain can (MAKING MY OWN NOTES WHILE READING). This was the best thing that I did. Because of my own handwritten notes containing everything that I thought was important and should be memorized, I did not need to look at Rita’s book again. I finished reading Rita book and making my notes in 3-4 weeks (by mid Nov17). That’s when I came across that news that from April 18 Syllabus is going to change. I immediately booked my exam date of 22nd dec17.

 

Now it was ON. I set a target of completing my studies by Nov end and only solve questions from 1st dec17.

 

I memorized my NOTES in and out, memorized ITTO’s (not sure if it works for you), created my own process chart with some tricks showing the flow of some critical inputs and outputs, referred Rana’s Chart (google it). Completed all this by the Nov17 end.

 

From 1st Dec onwards I started solving questions. From one of my friends, I got the Rita exam simulator. I also got the entire question bank of Christopher Scordo and off-course the mock exams given by pro-thoughts.I solved all of the above in the last 2 weeks. Reviewed my incorrect answers (which is very essential).

 

 

I would like to thank Mr. Ashish Sadekar, our tutor who taught us really well. I am sure that ProThoughts will grow even more under his guidance.

 

All the best everyone.