A project manager is anyone who has the responsibility of the planning, execution and closing of any project. The Project Management Professional certification is one of the most recognized certifications for project managers. PMP is an internationally recognized professional designation offered by the Project Management Institute.
The exam is based on the PMI Project Management Body of Knowledge ( PMBOK). In order to sit for the exam you must have a bachelor’s degree, at least 4,500 hours of experience leading and directing projects and 35 hours of formal project management education; or a high-school diploma with 7,500 hours ( 60 months) of project management experience as well as 35 hours of formal project management education. The exam’s frame work covers five major project management process groups:
- Initiating
- Planning
- Executing
- Monitoring and controlling
- Closing
How many answers do you need to get correct to pass? Unfortunately its not that simple. The PMP exam is now based on “psychometric analysis”. Each question is rated on how hard/easy it is. The harder the question the more the answer is worth so, the minimum number of correct answers needed to pass the exam is determined by the the difficulty of the actual questions.
Want to test yourself against the exam? Try the three sample questions below:
A) The project manager meets with the project team to review lessons learned from previous projects. In what activity is the team involved?
- Performance management
- Scope identification
- Risk identification
- Project team status meeting
B) An accepted deadline for a project approaches. However, the project manager realizes only 75% of the work has been completed. The project manager then issues a change request. What should the change request authorize?
- Additional resource using the contingency fund
- Escalation approval to use contingency funding
- Team overtime to meet schedule
- Corrective action based on causes
C) The project manager develops a process improvement plan to encourage contiguous process improvement during the life of a project. Which of the following is a valid tool or technique to assist the project manager to assure the success of the process improvement plan?
- Change control system
- Process Analysis
- Benchmarking
- Configuration management system
Answers below:
A) Risk Identification B) Corrective action based on causes C) Process analysis
More information on the PMP exam and registration can be found on the Project Management Professionals website.