PM Postcast

In order to gain PDUs, I started my knowledge gain process by listening to PM Podcast.

Episode:226
How to Recover from Mistakes and Keep the Project Moving

Project Managers are often not afraid to make mistakes and are resilient and know how to come back

5 Common Mistakes:

1. Preparing an Ambitious Schedule

2. Ignoring Problems

3. Failing to Share Accountability with Functional Managers

4. Failing to Understand what Stakeholders and Sponsors want to hear

5. Not Fully Understanding the Requirements

How do we learn from our mistakes?
1. Acknowledge.

2. There are three steps in acknowledging a mistake - Triple 'R's - Release, Review and Reset.
We have to acknowledge a mistake in the project. Just accept it. This is 'release'.
'Review' is the mistake with questions like - Why and where did we go wrong?
'Reset' - Move forward with the project.

Final note:
We all make mistakes. Develop a strong mind. This comes through practise and experience.



Episode:222
Customer-Centric Project Management

We review the project in the end to assess the success. This is also called Post Mortem.
This is a retrospective way and is traditional. But, it is a bit late to do anything to a project. This helps only future projects.

What is an alternative? Continuous Review - Work out on a monthly basis. Do engagement with stakeholders (mainly customers and sponsor).
Examples:
1. When you call customer support center, things start with a wait(music). End of the call, you evaluate the support service instantly.
2. In a restaurant, it is good for host to ask the guest, 'Is everything OK?' in middle of the meal rather than in the end.

My Road to PMP exam

I had bought the PMP Study guide in August 2011 and had decided to read and take the exam within the next six months. Fortunately, I got an email in November (2011) that there is a training session in December for PMP. I registered for the training session without any hesitation.

Training sessions by Knowledgewoods was helpful. It gave me the right platform to read and prepare for the exam. Training was over by mid December. I booked the exam date (Feb 6 2012). Preparation for the exam started.

Jan 2012 - Reading and revising began. I didn't feel like looking back and didn't rethink about changing the exam dates. Just wanted to finish this as a project in one go. By Jan end, I had reached a point of taking tests and quizzes. By exam date, I was confident that I can face the exam. Finally, passed the exam!

Revising for PMP exam

Assuming that you have read all the 9 knowledge areas, revision and practise tests will begin with 30 days left for the exam.

1. There are few free online questions. Feel comfortable in answering them within a stipulated time.

2. Recognize the topics that you need more attention. Also, you might feel that you are getting confused and things are getting mixed up. Focus on such topics and get things sorted out immediately.

3. Revise topics (Inputs-Tools-Outputs [ITO]) in random order. This will ensure that your memory is not messing up and is able to recollect the right key words.

4. Initially, spend 4 hours to run through ITO. End of your prep work, you should aim to run through ITO within 60 minutes.

5. Sitting for a 4-hour long exam is stressful. You might not get time to do a complete practise test at home. Try taking as many 1-hour tests. Try increasing the length of the duration. With work-office-home (hectic life), if you take a couple of 4-hour long test, it should be sufficient. Make sure you score 70% and above in each of the tests at home.

Start reading for PMP exam

For those who have planned to read for PMP, it is always good to know "what to read?" and "how to read?". Here are some ideas on getting started to reading for PMP.

1. There are 5 process groups
1.1 Initiating
1.2Planning
1.3 Executing
1.4 Monitoring
1.5 Closing

2. There are 9 knowledge areas
2.1. Integration
2.2 Scope
2.3 Time
2.4 Cost
2.5 Quality
2.6 HR
2.7 Communications
2.8 Risk
2.9 Procurement

There are few topics on ethics and professional conduct that you need to know for the exam.

The above process groups in combination total up to 42 processes. There is a definite pattern for each of the 42 processes. There is input, tools and techniques, and output.

Start to read about each of the above knowledge areas. Most of the books have chapters dedicated to each of the knowledge areas.

Focus on 1 knowledge area per day and read about all the knowledge areas within 15 days. Keep revising the topics read the previous day.

Write your own notes and visualize each process clearly.

At the end of 30 days, you should be able to recollect the inputs, tools, outputs of any given process.

This will bring you to a stage where you are 30 days away from the exam and have started to revise and take practise tests.

Kick-off for PMP

Those who intend to take PMP, I think you have made a good decision!
Below is some information for you to proceed in achieving your goal of taking PMP certification.

(Refer www.pmi.org for complete and latest information)

1. Why do you plan to take PMP?
a. To learn and know more about Project Management
b. Better Marketability

2. Are you qualified?
In general,
a. If you hold a degree and have 5-6 years of work experience in relevant field.
b. If you have 7-8 years of relevant work experience and don't have a bachelor's degree.

Also, you must have 35 PDUs of classroom training.

3. How to take PDUs/classes?
Any Registered Education Provider (REP) can conduct classes and you may attend them.
There are a few Professional Training institutions (Knowledgewoods is one of them)across India providing classes during weekends.

4. Which books to read?
There are many book to refer. You may search any of those online.

5. How much time is required to prepare for the exam?
2 months is sufficient if you can read daily for 2 hours.

6. How will the questions be? How long is the exam?
Sample paper online: here. Exam is 4-hours duration and has 200 questions.

7. How much does the exam cost?
It costs around Rs. 35K (around 10K for classroom training and 25K for examination registration)