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Project Management Professional
(PMP®) Certification Exam
An Overview
Presented by
Cornelius Fichtner, PMP
https://www.project-management-prepcast.com/
Based on the official information from the PMP® Credentials Handbook
http://www.pmi.org/en/Certification/~/media/PDF/Certifications/pdc_pmphandbook.ashx

2.
Project Management Institute
Project Management Institute (PMI), the world’s leading
not-for-profit association for the project management
profession, offers comprehensive certification programs for
practitioners with different levels of experience.
PMI establishes educational
and professional experience
requirements to attain a
credential. PMP® is one of
the five PMI credentials
available.
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Project Management Institute
PMI’s family of credentials supports the project
management profession and promotes on-going
professional development in various fields such as health
care, telecommunications, education, finance, construction
and IT.
The PMP® credential is not granted for life. In order to
maintain the credential, the holder must satisfy PMI
Continuing Certification Requirements (CCR) and renew the
credential every 3 years.
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Introduction
Initiated in 1984 to recognize an individual’s demonstrated
understanding of the knowledge and skills to lead project
teams to deliver results within the competing constraints of:
 Scope
 Quality
 Schedule
 Budget
 Resources
 Risk
The PMP® exam is usually
taken at one of 10,000 Prometric test centers worldwide.
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Introduction
Timeline of the PMP® Credential Process
Application submission
Window open 90 days
Application completeness review
5 business days when submitted online
Applicant payment process
Cannot schedule exam until you submit payment of credential fees
Audit process
5 -7 business days to process if application is selected
Multiple-choice examination eligibility
1 year from the date of the application approval
Certification cycle
3 years from the date the exam is passed to obtain and report 60
PDUs toward credential maintenance
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Eligibility Requirements
To be eligible for the PMP®
credential, you must meet certain
educational and professional
experience requirements.
All project management
experience must have been
accrued within the last eight
consecutive years prior to your
application submission.
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Eligibility Requirements
Educational
Background
Project Management
Experience
Project Management
Education
Secondary Degree
(High school diploma,
associate’s degree or global
equivalent)
Minimum 5 years/60 months
unique non-overlapping
professional project
management experience
during which at least 7,500
hours were spent leading and
directing the project*
35 contact hours of formal
education
OR
Four-year degree
(Bachelor’s degree or global
equivalent)
Minimum 3 years/36 months
unique non-overlapping
professional project
management experience
during which at least 4,500
hours were spent leading and
directing project*
35 contact hours of formal
education
*Leading and directing project tasks as identified with the tasks, knowledge, and skills in the Project Management Professional
Examination Content Outline. You should have experience in all five process groups across all your project management
submitted on the application. However, on a single project, you do not have to have experience in all five process groups.
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Eligibility Requirements
Example: Number of months of project management
experience
Each month in which you worked on multiple, overlapping
projects counts as one month toward the total requirement.
If a project manager worked on Project 1 and Project 2
simultaneously from February 1 – April 30, the time spent
on both projects will be counted as three and not as six
months toward the total to fulfill the professional project
management experience requirement.
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Eligibility Requirements
Example: Number of hours that you led or directed
project tasks
Consider all of the projects that you have worked on and
identify how many hours you led or directed project tasks.
For this section of the application, if you worked on multiple
projects at one time, all the
non-overlapping hours spent leading
and directing project tasks count
toward the total. Each work-week
has a maximum of 40 hours.
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Eligibility Requirements
You can satisfy the 35 contact hours by demonstrating
the successful completion of courses, workshops and
training sessions offered by one or more of the following
types of education providers:
 PMI Registered Education Providers (R.E.P.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
We recommend: www.pm-prepcast.com
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Examination Information

The PMP® examination is comprises of 200 multiplechoice questions including 25 pretest questions.

Pretest questions do not affect the score and are
randomly placed throughout the examination.

That leaves 175 questions that will be graded.

The examination is preceded by a tutorial and followed by
a survey.

The examination time is 4 hours.
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Examination Information
Examination Blueprint
 The table represents the percentage of questions in each
domain that are included in the examination
Domain
Percentage of
Questions
Initiation
13%
Planning
24%
Executing
30%
Monitoring and Controlling
25%
Closing
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Examination Information
Establishing the Passing Score

The passing score for all PMI exams is determined by sound
psychometric analysis. PMI uses subject matter experts from across
the globe to help establish a point at which each candidate should
pass the exam(s) and the exam point of difficulty. Data that show
how candidates actually performed are cross referenced with the
subject mater experts to ensure that the point of difficulty on each
exam is healthy.

The printed score report along with a pass/fail result lists each
domain with one of three possible proficiency levels:
 Proficient
 Moderately Proficient
 Below Proficient
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Take Action pass your PMP®Exam!

Read the PMI Credentials Handbook and make sure that
you are eligible

Become a PMI Member and Member of your local PMI
Chapter

Sign-up for the Exam

Read the PMBOK ®Guide twice

Listen to the PM PrepCast at www.pm-prepcast.com
and read a PMP® preparation book
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Resources
PMI website:
http://www.pmi.org
PMP® Credentials Handbook:
http://www.pmi.org/PMP_Handbook
PMI contact information:
http://www.pmi.org/About-us/Customer-Care.aspx
To locate Prometric test centers go to:
http://www.prometric.com/PMI
Free PM exam questions:
http://www.free-pm-exam-questions.com
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