www.whizlabs.com | © Copyright 2014 | PMI, PMP, PMBOK are the trademark of PMI Page 1

Tips N Tricks - PMP Certification Exam

1. Visit the examination center once before the exam date to determine how long it will take to get there and to see what the examination room appears to be. This is particularly helpful if you are a nervous test taker. Make sure you are there in the examination hall at least 45 minutes before the scheduled examination time.

2. Do not expect the examination center to be serene or quiet. Be prepared for some noise. Many examination centers will have earplugs or headphones available.

3. Once you enter the examination area, you would be given some paper to do your rough work/calculation.

Write down important formulae, inputs/tools, and techniques/output for major processes.

4. Before you start the actual exam, you would have to practice a demo. Concentrate on the demo, especially on areas like how to mark a question for reviews and how to read exhibits/diagrams available

in the question. In addition, watch for the timer ticking away on the right side corner of the demo examination that will be of help to you when you take your actual examination on line.

5. Before you start the actual examination, plan on some test taking strategy that you feel would be best

suited to you. For example, in terms of approximately how much time would you like to spend on each question, how many breaks would you like to take during the exam, etc.

6. Use the entire 4-hour duration of the exam. Many people say that the exam can be completed in 2.5-3

hours, but do not leave early. Spend sufficient time in reviews.

7. Answer the exam from PMI's perspective. By and large, people answer questions based on their own

experiences, which may not be necessarily true from PMI's perspective. Majority of questions on

professional responsibility category fall under this.

8. Tackling questions that have long descriptions: When the description of a question is long, normally the

relevant part of the question is only a few lines. Also, in most of the cases, the relevant part is towards

the end of the question. In such cases, you can either read the answers first and then read the question

OR read the last few sentences and see whether you are able to get the right choice. Of course, if you

have any doubts, you must read the whole question.

9. Mark a question for review if you find it difficult to answer at that point of time. You can come back to

this question later on.

10. If you have already spent some time on a particular question and decided to mark it for review, write a few comments on the paper, which you might need to use so that it will save your time later.

11. Be careful not to handle any computer power cord, which may result in power switch off of your terminal.

12. As you know that you have to write the test on the computer terminal, make sure that you do not

mishandle it. For example, doing anything by which your computer stops working, like putting your leg on the power cord, which may result in power being disconnected and disrupt your examination.

13. In some of the questions, you may find that more than one answer is correct. In that case mark the choice that call for a logical answer.

14. Look for the following terms in the questions: ‘at least,' ‘at best,' ‘most appropriate,' ‘least appropriate,' ‘never,' ‘first,' ‘last,' and ‘most likely'. These words in the question may be directing you to answer the choice in a particular manner. Act on them appropriately. Make sure you read the question clearly and if need be, take a note of these words lest you will end up in answering them incorrectly. Indeed, many

www.whizlabs.com | © Copyright 2014 | PMI, PMP, PMBOK are the trademark of PMI Page 2

questions may call for in-depth understanding of the process of project management and its real-world

application.

15. Remember, accuracy is very important. It is recommended not to rely on guess work. Instead, you should mark the questions you are doubtful about, for review. However, if you are not sure about the

correct answer even during the review stage, you may go for calculated guess.

16. Do not study anything new in the last 2 days before examination. Revise and relax during those 2 days.

17. You may find a few questions to be the distracters. Those are difficult to answer and consume a lot of time. In such cases, mark it for review and answer once you are through with rest of the questions.

18. When you are in doubt over which of the choices is correct then the best way is to take each choice and justify why you feel it cannot be correct. This elimination process is a good way to get the correct choice.

19. You can u se practice test software packages like Whizlabs Exam Simulators to prepare for your exam.

The practice exams will help you bring together the information presented in textbooks, and your experience.

20. You may want to take your winter wear to the examination hall because sometimes the air conditioning is too high, which may make you uncomfortable and hence you may lose concentration.

21. Do not be casual in attempting any question even if you are confident that you have got enough

questions right to get the pass marks. Your aim should be to score the maximum that you are capable

of, and some more.

22. When a question asks you to fill in a blank space, the correct answer may not be grammatically accurate

when inserted in the sentence.

23. Practice a test taking technique and follow it religiously. This may mean “I will take either one break or

two breaks during the entire 4 hours examination” or “after every 50 questions” or “100 questions”

because “I get tired quickly” or “I will answer all the questions as quickly as possible and then take a

break and do the review”.

24. Do not get frustrated during the actual examination. There are questions which cannot be answered even by the best of the specialists in the field. If you understand this, perhaps, you will turnaround with the highest score in the examination.