PMP Exam--Project Management Professional

Project managers can gain official certification as a "Project Management Professional" by completing the certification requirements laid out by PMI, the Project Management Institute. To become a "Project Management Professional", aka PMP, one must fulfill coursework, educational, and experience requirements, as well as take the PMP exam. The PMP exam is a 4-hour multiple choice exam with 200 questions.

Registering for the PMP Exam

In order to even register for the exam, you must apply to take it by submitting proof of your eligibility to PMI. There are 2 standards of PMP eligibility depending on your educational level.

No Bachelors Degree: 60 months worth of experience managing (non-overlapping) projects, and 35 hours of formal project management education taken at an approved school or training program.

Bachelors Degree or Higher: 36 months worth of experience managing (non-overlapping) projects, and 35 hours of formal project management education taken at an approved school or training program.

Once you have submitted your application, it will be reviewed by PMI and they will issue you a testing permit to take the PMP exam. See the PMI Handbook for more discussion. The testing fee is $405 for members of PMI, and $555 for non-members. The retake fee is only $275 for members and $375 for non members.

PMP Exam Administration & Structure

The PMP exam is usually administered computer based testing format, CBT. Unless there is no computer testing within a reasonable distance, you can arrange to take the paper based PMP exam. For computer based testing, you will be given a confirmation number that allows you to schedule the test at a Prometric Testing Center. You can take the test at any time or date that the testing center is open. You will need to bring your ID and the PMP testing permit that PMI mails to you. The PMP exam permit is valid for one year and you can take the exam up to 3 times during the validity period.

There are a total of 200 multiple choice questions on the exam and they have 4 answer choices each. Of the 200 questions, 25 are unscored experimental questions or control questions. You won't know which PMP exam questions are control questions, so approach every question as though it counts.

Since there are 240 minutes of testing and 200 questions, this works out to 72 second per question; just a little over a minute. The questions will test your knowledge of facts and terminology used in project managing, the basic principals of risk management, budgeting, and other aspects of managing complex projects. There are analytical and computational problems as well. Here is a break down of the exam by question type:

Initiating: ~11% of exam, or 22 questions
Planning: ~23% of exam, or 46 questions
Executing: ~27% of exam, or 54 questions
Monitoring and Controlling: ~21% of exam, or 42 questions
Closing: ~9% of exam, or 18 questions
Professional Responsibility: ~9% of exam, or 18 questions

You are allowed a 1 hour break during the exam.

PMP Exam Scoring

The PMP exam is scored on a qualitative scale, not a quantitative scale. If you correctly answer at least 137 of the 175 real questions, you are granted a "pass." If you miss more than 38 of the 175 scored questions, you will not pass.

Additionally, you will receive qualitative scores for the 6 different subdomains of the test. The 3 qualitative scores are "Proficient," "Moderately Proficient," and "Below Proficient." They should give you an idea of the areas in which you can improve your knowledge.

A Note on Completing 35 Contact Hours of Project Management Education

According the the PMI handbook, you can obtain project management credits from the following types of institutions and programs:

• PMI Registered Education Providers (REP's)
• PMI Component organizations
• Employer/company-sponsored programs
• Training companies or consultants
• Distance-learning companies, including an end-of-course assessment
• University/college academic and continuing education programs

Some PMP training courses include PMP exam prep. If you are planning ahead for the exam and you have not yet completed the 35 hours of coursework, you should look for project management courses that cover test taking strategies.

PMP Exam Questions

[1] How many paths are presented in the activity diagram?

(a) 5
(b) 4
(c) 3
(d) 1


[2] What is the critical path?

(a) ABC
(b) DBC
(c) DE
(d) FGH


[3] What is the float of activity E?

(a) 6
(b) 5
(c) 4
(d) 3

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[4] A project manager spends ___% of her time communicating.

(a) 25
(b) 40
(c) 75
(d) 90


[5] What is the logical flow of any project?

(a) Plan, Initiate, Execute, Control, Close
(b) Initiate, Plan, Control, Execute, Close
(c) Plan, Initiate, Execute, Close, Control
(d) Initiate, Plan, Execute, Control, Close


[6] The Pareto Principle works according to the ___ rule.

(a) 75/25
(b) 80/10/10
(c) 80/20
(d) 90/10


[7] Which of the following is not necessarily true of the Project Charter?

(a) It is created by the Project Manager.
(b) It includes a schedule of high-level milestones.
(c) It designates external assumptions and constraints.
(d) It designates the Project Manager.


[8] You are a project manager for a construction project. You meet with all of the project’s stakeholders to discuss their requirements. Which of the following is an invalid requirement of a stakeholder?

(a) There can be no more than 10% schedule variance on the project.
(b) The construction's quality must fit within organizational metrics for quality.
(c) The project team's work quality must be better than on their previous project.
(d) The budget must be within 7% of projected costs.


[9] Three team members of the project you manage have mutually conflicting opinions on how to handle a quality control issue. You ask the youngest member to explain her side of the conflict and present a possible solution. Afterward, you inform the other two team members that you've heard enough, and have decided to go with the solution offered by the youngest member. This is an example of

(a) Compromise
(b) Smoothing
(c) Forcing
(d) Withdrawal


[10] You are managing a project for which EV = $21,000, PV = $20,000, and AC = $22,500. Which of the following is true?

(a) The project is ahead of schedule and within the budget.
(b) The project is ahead of schedule and over the budget.
(c) The project is behind schedule and within the budget.
(d) The project is behind schedule and over the budget.


[11] Which of the following is not usually considered an element of the cost of quality?

(a) prevention costs
(b) maintenance costs
(c) appraisal costs
(d) failure costs


[12] Matt is a PMP who uses PERT analysis to determine the average duration of Activity A. The most likely duration is 20 days, and the optimistic and pessimistic forecasts are 14 days and 32 days respectively. What is the PERT estimate?

(a) 20 days
(b) 20.5 days
(c) 21 days
(d) 22 days


[13] A construction project team estimates that a hotel renovation project will cost a certain amount per square meter of floor space, plus a certain amount per room unit. This is an example of

(a) parametric modeling
(b) bottom-up estimation
(c) analogous estimation
(d) cost aggregation


[14] You are the project manager for an advertising project and your team is considering the possibility of outsourcing some of the work. There is a 10% chance that the outsourcing will cost the project $5000 in delays and rework, there is a 10% chance that the outsourcing will cost the project $1000 in delays, and there is a 40% chance that the outsourcing will save the project $15000 in in-house development costs. What is the EMV?

(a) -$6000
(b) -$5000
(c) +$5000
(d) +$5400


[15] You are using straight line depreciation to estimate the value of a piece of machinery after 3 years. If the current cost is $3000, what will be the value after three years assuming that the machine's life is 8 years.

(a) $1800
(b) $1875
(c) $2000
(d) $2250

[16] Compromise is generally considered a ______ solution.

(a) win-win
(b) win-lose
(c) lose-lose
(d) permanent


[17] According to the project plan, your team is scheduled to receive software components from a vendor today, and a regular payment is due to that vendor by tomorrow. Your project team receives a note this morning informing you that the software delivery will be delayed by 10 business days. What is appropriate course of action?

(a) Delay the payment by 10 business days.
(b) Immediately find a different vendor.
(c) Conduct a meeting with the vendor to resolve the delivery issues before making the payment.
(d) Make the payment as scheduled, and reschedule the project plan.


[18] What is the order of events during the Closing process?

(a) obtain formal acceptance, release team, record lessons learned, close contract
(b) record lessons learned, release team, obtain formal acceptance, close contract
(c) obtain formal acceptance, record lessons learned, release team, close contract
(d) obtain formal acceptance, close contract, record lessons learned, release team


[19] More than 50% of the conflicts that occur during a project are caused by:

(a) priorities, schedules, resources,
(b) budget, defects, personalities
(c) technology, money, personalities
(d) stakeholders, defects, technology


[20] Jim is a tall man and an excellent engineer. Based on this, executive management feels that he will be a good project manager, and so they promote Jim to Project Manager. This is an example of

(a) Halo Effect
(b) Maslow's Heirarchy
(c) McGregor's Theory of X and Y
(d) Herzberg's Theory

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answers:
a, a, d, d, d,
c, a, c, c, b,
b, c, a, d, b,
c, c, c, a, a