Folks,

I'm glad to let this forums know that I have successfully earned the PMP today (6/1/13) with 4 MP and 1BP. I was expecting at least 3 Ps and 2 MPS based on my preparations and mock test result; but anyway a pass is a pass.

Totally I took 3 months of time for preparation with following materials:

1. EdWel boot camp free material

2. PMBOK 4th Edition

3. Rita

Mock Tests:

1. Simplilearn

2. PMStudy

3. HeadFirst

4. TechFAQ 360

5. SkillSoft full mock test

6. Scordio all 18 Lite mock tests

7. Oliver 175

My score in the above tests were between 70% and 90%.

Lesson Learnt:

1. Spend a good time with for study (as much as possible)

2. Join PMZilla and be active. Participating in debates and answering questions posted in PMZilla really gave me a confidence and helped to get clarifications. Especially for the EMV problem, PMZIlla member helped me a lot and that made me familiarize with problem solving skills (I'm not very good in in maths).

3. Take mock up tests as much as possible. The results of the mock up give you a confidence that you crack the twisted questions and at the same time it identifies your weaker areas to concentrate more.

4. Do not worry about the scores in the mock up test but it will set a benchmark

5. I like taking personaly taking notes (writing in a note book is my style) nut it kills time. It used me in the exam. I can visualize the pages from my note book for lot of questions.

6. Define your won strategy for the preparations. Every individual is different.

7. Keep in mind that answering in forum is different from in actual exam. You can refer books here to answer but in the exam :)

8. Hard work will leads to success.....always....

Last Week of exam:

1. Revised PMBOK quickly.

2. Took couple of full mock up tests and was scoring 85+% (but does not matter)

3. Concentrated the bullet points in the PMBOK

4. Revised Quality, Risk and procurement in Rita

5. Spend time on ITTOs. Not memorized but trying to use logical relation to remember them.

6. Glanced Raga 355 tips and Abhishek's Version - Rajesh Nair PMP Notes - Just spent couple of hours on each of them

The Exam Day:

1. My appointment was at 4 PM and I started the exam around 3:30 PM itself

2. Written down all of formulas and the 42 processes.

3. Clicked on the start exam... 1st question was on the no of channels calculation.. wow... I felt so confortable and all the question after that was also very simple.

4. My set of questions were much simpler and easier than the mock exams and I cannot compare the real exam with any of the mock exams

5. I took a lot time initially and I realized I have not even finished after 2 hours. Then I geared up.. still I was at 150 at my 3rd hours. Remaining 50 questions I was not able to concentrate mu because of the time pressure and so I glanced the question and I choose answers. Even though I was rushing, I was able to answer the questions but I think here only I could have made lot mistakes that lead my result to not so good :(

6. I had lot of CV, SV, CPI, SPI questions. I had to use EAC formula for only 2 questions. All the maths questions were very simple but you have find out one the parameters from the given data. I got correct answers for all of maths questions except 1 PV question. I used the PV formula but no answer was in the choice (Definitely I did calculate it correctly). The problems were not complex at all as I have seen in mock ups.

7. There were 3 or 4 CPS questions out of that 3 had diagram and had to calculate critical path

8. There were couple of questions showing the diagram and asking what was that diagram was.

9. Lot of risk, quality, procurement question.

10. I marked around 25 questions and was able to review them with tension of time pressure

11. No question from PTA, Professional ethics and depreciations.

12. Finally, clicked finish exam - white screen for couple of minutes followed by survey. Finished the survey again white screen for 2 minutes.

13. Boommmmmm.... CONGRATULATIONS! wow.... what a relief to see it and I was very excited to see that I passed the exam. When I moved the result screen, it was little disappointment to see 4MPs and 1 BP; but I'm a PMP now :)

14. Collected the report and happily drove back to home. Happy ending :)

I would like to thank the PMZilla and its members - especially to Pawar, Hemanth and Geethika. Also I have to thank to Vijaya for the questions she posted.

I would like to thank to my family for their adjustment of their life during my entire preparations.

All the folks... You can do it... just give it a push and work hard.

One suggestion to the future PMPs: Do not be a silent observer in PMZilla. Actively answer or clarify tha questions or doubts; don’t worry if you are wrong. You will come to know the correct answer anyway but it keeps freshly in your memory and that my help you well in exam. It helped me in exam.

Thanks
Jaikumar ND, PMP (1st time writing PMP after my name :))