All well-managed projects begin with a plan, so too should your studies for the project management certification exam (PMP). The final push towards your certification exam – that period between earning your training certificate and the sitting for the certification exam – is the perfect time to put into practice many of the tools, techniques and habits of mind that you have been studying in the PMBOK® Guide.
The benefit of highly-structured programs, such as those extreme DVD-by-mail fitness programs (you know the ones I’m talking about), is that they guide participants into highly-planned routines. By following the program laid out before you, you are guided through a routine that quickly becomes your new normal, like, for example, what once seemed like an unachievable goal of working out 3 or more days a week quickly becomes a habitual part of your weekly schedule. Someone who couldn’t even fathom wearing workout clothing now plans their schedule around their daily trip to the gym. Someone who didn’t even know who to do a proper push-up or pull-up can now properly demonstrate how to do perform three varieties of each, as well as enumerate on the specific muscle group that each exercise targets.
Hopefully, the same level of discipline can be found in someone who has made it through the gauntlet of the PMBOK® Guide and the Learning Management System (LMS) exercises and is now ready to tackle the certification exam as their final hurdle. Project management and the ideals of the PMBOK are no longer some far-out concept that seems unattainable or a collection of terminology contained in the pages of a fancy book. After completing your formal project management training course, these are now concepts and practices that you can begin to integrate into daily life at work and, perhaps, at home. You can now speak with some authority about the benefits and pitfalls of key PMBOK® processes and ITTOs based on your first-hand experience. You can recognize where the lack of project management and the absence of tried-and-true PMBOK® processes is harming the business at your place of work.
In my opinion, the key to the successful completion of the last leg of the PMP journey lies in the creation and execution of a study plan for the final push towards the certification exam. Just as with the person who has gone through the extreme workout program, the study plan you create for this final segment should be a reflection of what you have learned while studying the PMBOK®. It should demonstrate proper understanding of scope, schedule and cost as well as proper application of other key project management tools and documents.
So, what goes into a study plan for the final push for the CAPM® and PMP® exams? Tune-in for the next edition of this blog, where I will explore the answer to this question and present some best practices for making sure your final study efforts result in a successful outcome.
