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I recently completed the course "Project Management with P3.express" and obtained the certificate. I would like to share this experience with all who are also going to take the course or are already revising for the test.
Why should I pick P3.express?
I’ve been working as a manager in the IT sphere for about 4 years, and until recently I studied everything related to project management on my own: books, articles, forums, webinars, topic channels on YouTube and, of course, my own experience gained during exhausting battles with customers.It took a long time to understand that it’s time to move beyond self-study to professional training, and I started looking for a proper course.
P3.express attracted me through its simplicity and versatility. The system combines the best classical and agile practices that are common in project management and can be used by any team.
I learned about the system and the course itself from Dima and Lera’s channel, which contains lots of useful content for managers.
What I hoped to learn from the course was to fill gaps in my knowledge about project management, obtain solutions to acute problems and gain more knowledge of new features that can be applied to various projects.
What I liked about the course
The Project Startup was probably the most useful unit for me. A lot of questions which I’ve had over my entire career were analyzed in detail at this stage.I would also like to mention the unit about Risk Management, since it used to be a complete unkown to me before, but now I have an understanding of what it is for and how to handle risks during a project.
Relevant feedback also made me feel positive. If I had any questions during the course, Dima Ilyenkov was ready to answer them in the chat, and we even held a phone meeting for about forty minutes and he elaborated on the aspects which were not clear to me.
Why I decided to get credentialed
I made up my mind to take the test, first of all, to give it try and prove to myself that I possess strong expertise in project management. The test made it possible to assess my current knowledge.As soon as I received the certificate, there was a pleasant sense of belonging to a large professional community. Thus, I was even more motivated to refine myself further as a manager, to learn something new.
lt also enables me to take a fresh look at my ongoing project.
How I prepared for certification and passing the test
I played it fair and went through the entire course from beginning to end, conscientiously completing all the practical tasks.In addition, I took notes of lectures in a notebook because it simplifies memorizing new information and helps to structure it in my mind. Besides, it’s easier for me to be guided by my own notes rather than by the manual on the site.
It took about two weeks to complete the course. Every day I watched 2-3 lessons.
After finishing the course, I took a break for a week and then revised the material using my notes.
By the way, apart from the basic lecture each lesson on the course contains links to supplementary materials, including useful videos, articles and books. There really are plenty of them, and if you watch everything, it’ll take too much time, so I saved the most interesting things to my favorites and also looked through them when revising the lectures.
Before taking the main test, I took 5 practice tests (in total, you can take the practice tests as many as 12 times).
Each practice test includes 35 questions and you have about 60 minutes to do it.
These practice tests are of great importance and value because after passing them you can see the results with correct and incorrect answers, with an explanation attached to each question, which clarifies why this particular answer is correct. This is very helpful in understanding the test author’s logic, especially with tricky questions when a clear-cut answer is not obvious.
The "real" test consists of 70 questions, and you are given 100 minutes to complete it. Personally, I used up all the time available when taking the test. I thoughtfully read each question and answer options, trying not to give "rush" answers. At the end, I looked through each question again, and double-checked my answers.
The course covers most of the questions from the test, but not all of them. So, in order to give correct answers to them, you need to be generally interested in project management, read additional materials, books and articles.
I advise you to refresh your memory about project portfolio management, at least in general terms.
It might also be good to distinguish between the following terms: predictive, adaptive, incremental, iterative :)
Also be ready for the fact that in some questions you may think that several options apply and it will be quite difficult to tick the right boxes, here you need to understand the test authors’ logic (as mentioned above, the practice tests will help you with this).
In general, I advise you to take certification seriously. Make sure that no one will distract you for the next 100 minutes (I'd like to take this opportunity to give an honourable mention to my cat), so that you can do the test in a calm and peaceful atmosphere.
Good luck to all!
