Customer Reviews

PMP Certification for Dummies

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(22)

 

 

Studying PMP Cert For Dummies will help you pass the exam.

My study group purchased all the books in the category that we can find. None of the books alone will guarantee that you pass the PMP exam. You need to purchase several books. All have gaps and omissions - especially Rita's. All have errors, both in grammar, spelling, and in the technical subject matter. Our ranking from worse to best: ESI's has the most amount of errors (worst), Newell's has next to worst, Kim's is next (her errata list is very long), For Dummies comes in the middle, Rita is better, and Crowe's has the least errors (best, but there are plenty of errors & omissions). Get over the errors and omissions; all have them. In all books, you should easily spot an error. If you cannot spot an error, or are bothered about them, you are not ready to take the exam. Remember these books are review guides, not intro books! You should already know project management.

PM is a young discipline and even the best authorities have conflicting notions about some definitions. Last fall in the official PMI magazine, the cover article was on a billion dollar construction project where the PM flubbed the formulas for EV. He switched numerator and denominator and got all the EV formulas wrong. He would have missed all test questions on EV. No one at PMI Publications caught the error either! Get over error issues. Be able to spot them without being an indignant whiner or you are not ready to take the exam. Enough said here.

None of my study group felt that Rita's book was suitable to self-study. Rita's is a re-cycled workbook taken from her $1,100 training class. If you want to use her book, take her class instead and you get her $ 90 workbook and the $300 Question CD included. Most of the reviews comments are from people who have taken her course, where the omissions can be corrected. Rita's quality section is pretty skimpy and doesn't use charts well. She omits time value of money (PV, IRR) which are still on the exam (I check with PMI). (Kim includes these too; but Dummies explains it better.) For example, Rita and Kim mistakenly refer to process groups as phases of a project. Controlling is a phase? Nope, as Dummies points out, it's a `process'. That why PMBOK Guide calls them "Process Groups".

Kim's CD has 200 questions; For Dummies CD has 300 questions. Rita has no CD in her book, her question CD is $300 extra. Newell and Crowe don't even include a CD. For Dummies is the best value just for the questions alone!

All other PM books are very dry and hard to read. For Dummies is the friendliest and the easiest to spot what is important and where you need to pay attention. They spoon feed you the formulas - ones other books omit. I have several other Dummies Cert books and they are different from the general interest Dummies books. They are only interested in how to pass the exam.

I feel so strongly that this is my first Amazon review. Of all the PMP review books, this For Dummies book helps you think like a PMP. It breaks down what's important and shows you how to under patterns in the questions. The sample questions in the Quick Assessment and Prep tests really make you think critically like a PMP. It raises your abiulity to think like a PMI PMP. By the time you finish For Dummies, you'll be ready for passing the exam on your only try.

Here's why everyone in my study group thinks this is the best book on the category.

Most questions on the CD
Best explainations of questions
Best charts & illustrations
Best insider tips & warnings
Best method of matching up patterns of questions
Best chapter on formulas
Overall best value for your time and money

I was recommended this book by some folks in my local PMI chapter. Based on that recommendation, I was hoping for a more accurate book on the test. This book does a good job of positioning the PMP lifecycle in a logical flow of information. I also thought that the information on the new ethical component of the test was very useful.

Other reviews of this book already mention the large number of errors and ommissions, which really do detract from the overall experience -- assuming that this book would be used in a stand alone situation. If you were only going to buy one study guide, this is not the book to purchase. However, if you are looking at an addition to the study process (in addition to the Kim Heldman book for instance) along with the PMBOK -- then this is a great book to fill in some of the holes.

As with any study guide, the questions & answers reference you back to the specific sections of the PMBOK. Even in the cases where there are errors, you will still be referenced to the PMBOK which will give you the "official" correct answer.

The format is familiar and the book adds value. Just do not assume that reading this book alone will get you past the test.

The author tried to write this book with a "lighter side" style and with more "test taking" strategies than some of the more well established study guides. A good attempt, especially concidering how dry the material can be. But if you are stuggling with how to spend your time and money preparing, I suggest strongly the following:

1) PMP: Project Management Professional Study Guide
by Kim Heldman

2) PMP Exam Prep (4th Edition)
by Rita Mulcahy

After you've completed these two "must reads", you may want to add PMP Certificatoin for Dummies by Gerald Everett Jones as a third pass at the information. But I'm afraid that this publicaiton only fills that limited role.

Get to work on the "must reads" and good luck with the exam.

R.T.

My study group reviewed this book and came to the conclusions that PMP Cert For Dummies has the best formulas, graphs, explanation of Quality and EV of any book you can find for studying for the PMP Cert exam. There is an `everything but the kitchen sink' approach to listing formulas and the quantitative section really is easy to follow. I needed this spoon feeding to get the hang of the math.

Now, I believe I can ace the exam

From a subject matter perspective the book is well worth reading. It is organized in a fashion that makes sense to the reader and provides great introduction to the PMI thinking. I used this as a primer and then was able to better retain the information in the PMBOK and followed up this book with the must read by Mulcahy.
I did find the most disturbing part of the book was no explanation for practice answers. Also the errors of first edition could be helped by an online errata (one existed and then disappeared).

Just got this book for my study group. We have purchased every training book available. PMP Cert For Dummies is the best of the group! More complete, easier to follow. They really delivered on the "For Dummies" promise of being easy to follow. Yet, it's the most accurate and complete of all the cert books.

Besides being the best dollar value, it's got the best tips, tricks and hints on how to beat the exam. It also gives you better ideas of what the exam topics are all about, so you can concentrate your study time. I'm using the MS Project template on the included CD for my study schedule. The tear-out yellow cheat sheet card in the front of the book has all the formulas you'll need to pass the exam. A separate chapter explains the formulas simply for people like me who haven't done anything with math in years.

PMP Cert For Dummies has the strongest info on Quality and process charts. This is a real weakness on the part of the other books.

They provide the best explanations in answering exam questions and help identify various patterns to questions. The other books provide crummy explainations to exam questions. In many cases with the other books, you're stuck researching the answer in PMBOK Guide. In the For Dummies, they provide detailed explainations of all answers. It's a great timesaver!

Forget the other books. Buy this one!

My company sent me to one of those boot camps. It was a valuable experience. But the class workbook was re-cycled as one of the other vanity published `pass-the-exam books'. PMP Cert was a better book because it gave me more material to work with and went into more detail than the class or their workbook. Don't rely on any single source - even the PMI recommends that you broaden your study materials.

This book clearly explained the psychology behind the different types of questions. That gave me a clear time advantage in answering questions on the exam. On many questions which I didn't know the answer right away, I was able to figure it out by identifying the pattern that PMP Cert For Dummies identified. They go in much more depth than Rita's book, which I found very superficial. Explaining the question pattern was enough to make the difference for me in passing the exam.

Get this book just for that reason!

As a working project manager, I needed to get into the mindset of the PMI's test. I didn't need an introductory course on PM. This was a great book for understanding how the test questions work and what material is important. I can figure out a question, from the PMI's point of view and not my company's PM methodology. That was my biggest drawback. Thanks Pete & Gerald for the insights that can help me ace the exam!