Article originally published at https://medium.com/@nadegeminois/how-i-prepared-for-my-pmp-certification-and-passed-first-time-a40ea1f3a0ec

Recently I studied for the PMP® certification. It was quite a journey of trials and errors, doubts and hard work.

I thought that to avoid some of the mistakes I have made, I would share how I did it at the end and what has worked for me. This is not a magic bullet; it is not a guarantee that you will pass. It is just my own experience and what has worked for me may not work for you.

In this article, I assume you fulfil the requirements to apply for the certification and I will not discuss this part of the process.

Make sure you have time and headspace

I talked about hard work and dedication in the introduction. This is the first thing you need to be able to give. If you cannot afford time on the preparation almost everyday, it will be hard to efficiently prepare.

The preparation is a lot about mindset, so if you cannot be in the right preparation mindset, for whatever reason, it may be better to postpone thinking of taking the certification.

Because if you do, you may find yourself getting fully demotivated because you do not progress as you wish or had planned. Also, learning and preparing every day keeps you focused on the subject.

Doing this I have found that I could see progress regularly. However, it wasn’t the case to begin with because I had to adjust my learning strategy as I went along. Once I found the right material for me, I could focus on going through the process until I felt ready for the exam. It took me a bit over 2 months of preparation.

So, what was this process for me?

Read the books

At the end, the most valuable for me was actually to go through the source material on which you will be tested: the various PMI reference books.

For PMP®, there are three books: The PMBOK Guide 7th edition, the process groups practice guide and the agile practice guide, at the time of writing. They cover about everything you need to know. To get these books, the easiest is probably to become a PMI member and you can then download them for free.

Yes I know it can be daunting to go through over 700 pages of content (roughly, excluding annexes), but it is worthwhile. The best is actually to go through them several times. I did a first thorough reading of all three. Then, I read them again, I think 3 more times at the end. Each time, it becomes quicker because you can focus on what you haven’t fully integrated and skip quickly the rest.

The last time I went through them was 2 to 3 days before the exam, to go over a last time. This last time, it took me about 2 hours to go through all three books.

Take a course or two

Alongside reading the books, I also decided to take an online, self-paced PMP® preparation course. You can find plenty of them if you make an internet search for them.

The good thing is that because they focus on the PMP® preparation, they help you understand better about the preparation and the exam and they focus on what is important for the exam.

I have also found it useful for the downloadable resources that usually come with the courses. It provides an handy summary of the most useful information. I had a set of these (the ones I felt I needed to focus the most on), and was going through these few pages every day. I also went through them a last time the day before the exam.

If you feel a self-paced course will not be the right format for you, you can choose to go for a live course, in person or online. I personally went against this option for several reasons. The first was it is less flexible than a self-paced course to organise your studying. The second, honestly, was a matter of price. However, if you feel you need more structure for your study, this can be an option you want to investigate.

Practice questions

At the end, the exam is about answering questions, so it is a good idea to get ready for that.

Like the online courses, you can find different apps with question banks for you to practice. I would advice to try several as the questions will be different between the different apps. This way, you are exposed to more different types of questions. I used 2 different apps.

PMI itself has some question banks too. I tried the ones coming with their AI tool, PMI Infinity.

I have also used books for practicing questions. Again you can find many books with questions banks.

Aim to answer questions every day. During my preparation, I was doing between about 20 and 60 questions a day.

Take mock exams

This is a must. You need to take several mock exams before the real one; and do well! As an example, I got 86, 88, 89 and 94% respectively on the mock exams I took (all different, no retake of the same one).

The apps with questions, as well as the various self-paced courses come with mock exams. PMI itself also has an exam simulator.

When you take them, be as close as possible to exam conditions, especially if you opt to take the exam online at home.

Two words of caution here:

Whatever mock exam you take, know that the questions will be quite different from the ones in the real exam. Note that it is also of course the case for any question banks you might use.

And second, as I experienced, the real exam has taken me a lot longer! I finished the 4 mock exams I took all within 1,5 hour but it took me a bit over 2,5 hours to finish the real exam. This time aspect is particularly important: you do not want to fail because you haven’t had time to answer all the questions!

Book your exam relatively early in the process

Finally, I made a mistake not to book my exam early enough. I postponed booking it, claiming to myself I wasn’t ready!

Then, when I felt ready, because of other commitments (make sure you have at least half a day free for the exam), I booked it for two weeks later!

For sure, you can book it for the next day or so if you take it online. That was my own experience of booking it but I guess I am not the only one having experienced that.

I think not booking it early left me in my preparation with a missing piece: a deadline. It probably felt particularly strange for someone in project management!

It wasn’t my case but it is especially important to think about the booking if you want to take the exam in a test centre. I chose to take it at home for the familiarity. I also knew I had the adequate conditions of quiet and focused time. Practically, a test centre would have been a long trip for me too.

Last advice

Don’t go alone! This preparation can be a long and lonely journey. So, try not to travel alone. Let people know you are preparing for the PMP® certification. If you can, find one or several study buddies. This is how I began, with someone else. Then life got in the way but that is another story.

With this last advice, I want to take the time to thank all the people who have helped me on the way, sharing such valuable advice and resources to make my journey successful.