Good evening everyone,

I wanted to share a few details of my preparation activities and hindsights as part of the lessons learned of this "project."

I've worked as a PM off and on for about 13 years.  I completed several PM related classes over that time, including two boot camps conducyed by my local PMI chapter (PMBOK 4, PMBOK 5).

I read Andy Crowe's (PMBOK 4) and Rita's (PMBOK 5) prep books, and used a book of practice questions by Seam Whitaker. Of these, Rita's was by far the most helpful in preparing, while Whitaker's book was a great supplement to Rita.

Online, I used examcentral, pmpforsure, and oliverlehman.com, all free for the most part.  Of those, examcentral had by far the most accurate questions. I also watched several of Richard Kraneis' videos on Youtube for memorizing the 47 processes, as well as his technique for performing a formula brain dump.  Extremely helpful.

My exam prep consisted of reading Rita for 60-70 minutes three to four nights per week, taking the chapter exam immediately afterwards(30-40 mins), then taking the Whitaker practice questions for the same knowledge area (30-40 mins), and finally scoring and reviewing any wrong or iffy questions.  I regularly acheived between 76%-86% on the first pass.  One extra note of advice - It's very important to do the exercises Rita gives you.

During the gov't shutdown in October, some coworkers and I formed a study group.  I could only attend 25% of the meetings, but those proved beneficial to us all.  We used Rita as the core knowledge and activity source.

For the last 3-4 weeks, I used the PSA PMP 5P test prep app on my phone.  It has drills for recalling processes by process group and knowledge area, as well as a very good drill for ITTO's by process.  The formula drill is OK, but you have to type in the formula based on their syntax which can be frustrating the first few times.  Two decidedly great things about the app is the price ($6-$7 for Android), and its ability to read you the definitions, acronyms, and formulas while you drive, cook, or are otherwise occupied.

Reading others' experiences also helped and often served as affirmations which helped my confidence tremendously. I hoped to pass along the favor by sharing my activities.

Overall I spent about 13 weeks preparing for the exam.

Good luck everyone, and let's all send positive thoughts and whatever resources we can to the people of the Philippines as they cope with this latest tragedy.

v/r

CN