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94 of 96 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best PMP Exam Study Book: Self Contained and Comprehensive, July 28, 2006
I've just passed the PMP exam (with flying colors) and I want to share my experience regarding the PMP exam study books with my fellow project managers who are planning to prepare for the PMP exam. On one hand I was happy to see so many PMP books available to help me, and on the other hand I was disappointed to see that most of them were outrageously or unreasonably high priced. However, I ended up buying and reading quite a few of them from cover to cover. Here are short reviews for the top four (in my opinion) of them:
1. This book. PMP In Depth by Paul Sanghera, Thomson Course Technology.
I found this book best among all the PMP books. It's a self contained, to the point, and yet very comprehensive: all the topics (within the scope of the exam) are covered with adequate depth. The material is presented in a perfect logical learning sequence, and there is no hopping from topic to topic: perfect flow. Unlike other books, this book presents the material in order of the process groups (initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing), which is consistent with the way the PMP exam objectives (domains) by PMI are organized. And this is the only PMP exam book that explains the exam objectives (covered in each chapter) in the beginning of the chapter. This way you are always sure which exam objective you are working on, and it makes the exam preparation much easier and free of confusion. This is also a good book for the CAPM exam because it's self contained, easy, and interesting read. All concepts are clearly defined and explained, and the definitions are also listed at the end of each chapter for easy reference. There is a complete practice exam at the end of the book with very detailed answers: why a correct answer is correct and an incorrect answer is incorrect. I found that the practice exam combined with the review questions (and their detailed answers) at the end of each chapter makes enough number of questions to prepare me for the actual exam. I found the tone and difficulty level of the questions very compatible with the actual exam.
Unlike most of other PMP books, this book is very reasonably priced. I recommend this book to anyone who is planning to prepare for the PMP exam, CAPM exam, or just want to learn the basics of project management.
2. The PMP Exam Prep by Rita Mulcahy, RMC Publications.
This is not a self contained book. There are lots of references to PMBOK Guide. Lots of empty pages for you to fill. That said, it is a very good book (or should I call it an excellent collection of lecture notes) if you are either taking a course from the author or from an instructor who is using this book as a text book. There are lots of exercises. I feel that the underlying assumption is that the gaps in the book will be filled either by PMBOK Guide or by the instructor in the course. So, Topics are not covered with enough depth. Also there is a poor flow and a lots of hopping from topic to topic. The presentation of the material is organized around knowledge areas, whereas the exam objectives are organized in order of the process groups. That breaks the exam objective coverage into pieces, and may cause confusion. The book is, in my opinion, outrageously high priced.
Overall, I recommend this book if you are taking a course that uses this book as a textbook.
3. The PMP Exam by Andy Crowe; Velociteach.
This is another good book by its own virtue. At first, it appears like self contained, but then you find that there is not enough depth to most of the topics covered in this book. This is easy to read, but you cannot pass the exam just by reading this book. Also, there are quite a few processes for which some input items, output items, or tools and techniques are missing. This could be very serious if you are only using this book. So, if you use this book, do not count on it alone. The presentation of the material is organized around knowledge areas, whereas the exam objectives are organized in order of the process groups. That breaks the exam objective coverage into pieces, and may cause confusion. The book, in my opinion, is unreasonably high priced.
I recommend this book if you are looking for a quick and easy review of topics.
4. PMP Project Management Professional Study Guide by Joseph Philips, McGraw-Hill Osborne. This is another good PMP book. It covers almost all the topics and some topics in quite detail, actually. However, at places, it is not very compatible with the PMBOK Guide. This is not necessarily a bad thing if you are learning about project management in general. But you need to be careful when you are preparing for the PMP exam. So, do not begin with this book. This also organizes the material along the knowledge areas and breaks the exam objectives into pieces.
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55 of 56 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Read this book before PMBOK....., December 9, 2006
I started with PMBOK for my PMP preparation, after couple of chapters I realized that I need to look for another book to teach me PMBOK concepts in a simpler way. PMBOK is a reference, it's dry, boring and quite frustrating if you choose it to be your first book to read for PMP certification.
Based on the reviews I considered two Books PMP in Depth by Paul Sanghera and The PMP Exam: How to Pass On Your First Try by Andy Crowe. I choose PMP in Depth mainly because it is a self-contained book with topics organized in the order of Process Groups. I am glad I did, I passed PMP at my First attempt. This book helped me to understand the concepts, Rita's book and CD helped with Knowledge gaps and questions.
Positives
1. Self Contained
2. Topics are organized in the order of Process groups (same order in which projects are done) with adequate depth
3. Nice Flow, Easy and Interesting read
4. Exam Objectives in the beginning of the chapter
5. Summary, Key Terms and Things to Remember at the end of the chapter
6. It is not only PMP certification book but also a great Project Management Book
7. ITTO's are explained well with their importance for each process
8. Index, Book Quality and Writing Style
Negatives
1. There are only few questions and the questions are very easy comparing to the actual exam.
Couple of weeks before the exam I took the Full length exam at the end of the book and I scored 94% in my first attempt. Next week I took the full length test in Rita's Fast Track CD and I passed with only 76%.
Apart from one negative mentioned above this is a great book, read this book before you read PMBOK/Rita, Especially if you are doing Self-Study.
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57 of 59 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Rita's or Paul's book?, January 29, 2008
I passed the PMP test today achieving my 11th certification, the most of them are IT related but PMP is a great knowledge asset for any professional, IT or not. Now that I have everything fresh in my mind, I want to share my experience with you: As a general rule for certifications, I always get two books, I fully study one, complete all the questions and then I take all the questions on the second book. In that way, I know the first book gave me all the necessary knowledge. For this journey I got "PMP In Depth: Project Management Professional Study Guide for PMP and CAPM Exams - In Depth" (Paul Sanghera) as my 'primary book' and "PMP Exam Prep, Fifth Edition: Rita's Course in a Book for Passing the PMP Exam" (Rita Mulcahy) as my 'questions book'.
If you don't know it yet, the whole PMP certification is organized around 9 knowledge areas (scope, time, cost, hr, procurement, risk, quality, integration and communication management. Each one has multiple related processes that are applied at different stages of the 5 phases of the project lifecycle (initiation, planning, execution, monitoring/controlling and closing). For example, you plan your costs during the planning phase and you control your costs during the monitoring and controlling phase of the project. Both cost processes belong to the cost management area of knowledge. So Rita's book is organized around this 9 knowledge areas while Paul's book is organize around the 5 phases of a project lifecycle.
I started with Paul's book four months ago (4hs every weekday, 11hs each weekend day). This book is fascinating! (please keep reading), because its organization follows the natural life of projects facilitating the learning process, it clearly shows inputs, processes and outputs for each project task, but it doesn't give you always a clear idea of where you are in reference to the knowledge areas. If the other hand, Rita's book is a complex reference to previous and subsequent page numbers, getting you to jump back and forth to understand how a project actually occurs.
I carefully studied Paul's book, I review every single detail on it, memorized every process (inputs, tools/techniques and outputs) and completed every question as well the 175 questions of his final test. I was confident of my knowledge, so I moved on to complete the questions in Rita's book. Misery! Rita destroyed every single hope I had of passing the test successfully! She made me feel that I have been wasting my time with Paul's book: I failed almost all her questions! It was probably the biggest book-related disappointment in my life, although Paul's book is easy to read, and well organized, it doesn't cover significant areas of the certification that are again and again presented in the test! While going thru Rita's questions I discovered that Paul has missed 2 absolutely essential areas required by the test. Let me tell you which ones: Cost management and communication management. The test has multiple questions related to these areas; if you don't know then you will certainly fail! I can't believe that Paul missed them, I consider that very irresponsible and not fair for students trusting his book.
With this fiasco, I went thru Rita's book and learned the remaining knowledge so my advice to you is: Study from Rita's book! Although it is organized around the 9 knowledge areas and they don't really follow the project lifecycle, but it is the way the test is organized and she covers all the topics of the test. To prove it to you (if you are skeptical and confused with so many light or emotional book reviews) I carefully took notes of the areas that Paul missed (I hope he reads this): Problem solving techniques (expectancy theory, motivation theory, McGregor's XY theory, Maslow's hierarchy of needs, Herzberg's theory and motivation agents), communication channels and formulas, PERT and PERT related calculations, cost estimation (can you imagine running a project without cost estimation?), project manager powers (formal, reward, penalty/coercive, expert and referent), outputs of contract administration, administrative close procedure applicability to each project phase. Besides this Paul's questions are extremely easy, the test questions are an extremely hard compared to them, therefore Paul's give you an inaccurate sense of test preparation level. I have also documented multiple important errata in his book and spent significant amounts of time verifying that they are actual errata. For instance: Paul's makes references to the cost baseline countless times in his book, but cost baseline is nowhere to be found (it is not even in the index), work performance is missed as an output of the directing and managing the project execution in the process chart, but is it cited two pages later; the administrative close procedure is an output of the close project process, he points out what the procedure should contain, but it never says when to execute it as he does it with the contract closure procedure.
It is just a very unreliable book for the test. So my advice to you, PMP student is, start with Rita's book and complete every single one of their questions, they look "too demanding, I can't believe the test is that hard" but the test is hard! Then if you have time and can buy Paul's book go directly to his questions and final test. But please, don't do it the other way around.
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