“The PMBOK guide is quite overwhelming.”
“I stared at the guide for MONTHS.”
“ It is a journey that I started a while ago and just could not get it done.”
“I spent A LOT of money but struggled & lost interest quickly”
“While preparing my CAPM Certification exam, I took sooooo many courses and at a moment, I was feeling very scared to take the exam.”
“I was feeling nervous”
“I started studying for my CAPM 2 months ago and while I was making headway I was feeling a little insecure when taking practice exams and second guessing my answers.”
“I was inconsistent and procrastinated a lot……”
“I lacked structure, I failed my practice questions, so I pushed back my exam because I was unprepared”
We all go trough this. I know, I failed exams multiple times, just for the record, 1 x CAPM, 2 x PMP.
You need clear targets
To pass the CAPM exam, you cannot simply learn every page of the PMBOK guide. Instead, you have to understand the big picture and the relationship between different domains.
Preparing for the CAPM® Exam requires time and focus. This can be a challenge especially when you are so busy at work that you need to “steal” time to study. And it gets even harder if you don’t know where to start and how to best prepare. Wouldn’t it be nice to have someone guide you through the process?
Someone who has a proven plan?
There is an unlimited amount of advice within the Project Management community concerning what to study and how to prepare to successfully pass the CAPM exam, including scores of good reference books and commercial exam prep courses available. Regardless of the approach and sources of information you decide to use, there are three basic musts:
“But, what exactly I need?”
You need to have learning material:
books, coursesm bootcamps
Validation of Learning:
mock exam practice simulator
Study Plan/Study Guide:
to guide you to pass the exam
Here are the challenges:
- Understanding critical concepts
- Availability of study time: This is the most common problem for the majority of the folks. Dedicating time on a daily/weekly basis for 2 to 3 months including weekends is challenging.
- Selecting the right simulator: This is a huge challenge on its own. Everything comes at a cost, hence selecting the best simulator depending on your budget.
- Number of Mock exams: Quantity matters in this case. We recommend attempting the minimum of 2-3 full exam simulations. Target for 80% passing rate. This way you will prepare how to use the four hours effectively.
Goal: Is to be structured and organized
Where do we get started?
Answer = Latest Exam Content Outline
Why?
It has everything we need. It will explain how many questions we are going to have in each area and also, it will explain what type of questions will be on the exam.
This is a “killer” combination.
Okay, so we know what to expect now, but what’s next?
Here is my formula for preparation.
- We read the latest exam content outline – here is the link to PMI website
- Learning cycle – the idea is the following, we complete our reading or online course in a 4 weeks period of time. Very simply cover all modules only once. Remember, the goal is completion and not perfection. At the end of the day you will learn a lot while preparing but through the CAPM Exam Content Outline we know what to expect. If PMI says, there will be 15 questions covering an area there will be only 15 questions.
- Validation cycle – Let’s start doing questions to check how much we understood.
Plan we can stick too
If you starting the preparation just now, this is for you.
Learning cycle
Duration: 4 weeks
Validation cycle
Duration: 4 weeks
Create a study plan.
Define when and for how long you will study. This is a project itself. Here it is, right there, the one-million-dollar question, how long does it take to prepare for the CAPM exam? It requires thinking about your life and work commitments to see how you can prepare for the stage when your knowledge is at its highest peak.
We highly suggest that you treat your CAPM® certification like a personal project.
Three main pillar of successful preparation:
- Reading – set your daily/weekly targets
- Questions – super important, build confidence in advance
- Mindsets – understand concepts and how they interact with each other