A PMP certificate is basically certification in project management issued by the PMI (Project Management Institute). Project managers across the globe use PMP certification as a professional credential to indicate their project management prowess and education. Though widely used by IT project managers, the certificate is also designed to help engineers, architects, and designers since all these roles warrant a solid level of project management expertise as well.
To obtain PMP certification, there are a couple of requirements: a mix of experience and education and having successfully completed the PMP exam. Therefore, getting a PMP certificate very early in your professional life is not possible. The amount of experience needed denotes that you should have held some position of leadership and responsibility for four years or more before you could enroll for a PMP course.
PMP certification requires either five years of experience in project management or a postgraduate degree. People with a degree can get away with three years of project management work experience. All experience should have been documented, with support and reference letters from managers or supervisors who could validate the applicant’s role in a particular project. All applicants should finish 35 hours of different courses in project management.
There are certain tasks and skills that should be a part of the applicant’s work experience for the experience to be deemed acceptable as project management hours. PMP certification programs offer an extremely detailed list of the requirements and would deny any experience that fails to conform to PMP standards. You should, therefore, go through the list of requirements to ascertain if your body of experience is acceptable.
The PMP exam comprises 400 multi-choice questions and the exam is conducted four times every year in different locations across the world. The examination is four hours in duration, which means you theoretically get a minute to answer every question. The exam is normally held in an auditorium or a large hall. The application fee is different across locations and should be paid beforehand.
To help you with your preparation, there are courses offered by different private schools and educational institutions. The courses are usually quite expensive – could be anywhere between $1,500 and $5,000. If you’re keen on a preparation course, choose a course from an institution that’s known for its high pass percentage. If you do not clear the exam, you may retake the course from the institute – for free or for a fee.
