The Project Management Professional Certificate (PMP®) is the most prestigious project management certificate globally. If you have at least 3 years experience in project management, this is your primary choice for certification. More than 8,333,000 people worldwide hold such a certificate.
This certificate is issued by the Project Management Institute (PMI), an American non-governmental professional project management organization. PMI provides standards development, research, training, publications, networking, conferencing and project manager certification services. You can find complete information on the certification and project management certification certification process in the Project Management Professional (PMP®) Handbook.
What are the prerequisites for PMP® certification?
There are requirements for prior experience and for project management training:
For undergraduate or undergraduate applicants – at least 3 years / 36 months in the last 8 years, a unique, non-overlapping professional project management experience, with at least 4500 hours of project management and direction
For applicants with secondary education – at least 5 years / 60 months in the last 8 years a unique non-overlapping professional project management experience, within which at least 7500 hours of project management and direction
35 hours of project management training
You do not have to have experience as a project manager! You must have experience in “leading and directing projects”. PMI defines the roles in which you can gain such experience:
Project Contributor
Supervisor
Manager
Project Leader
Project Manager
Educator
Consultant
Administrator
Other
You can also demonstrate experience with some / any of the other roles (except Project Manager), as well as other relevant roles outside this list (“Other”).
So lets find out what is the PMP certification exam like?
What is the PMP® Certificate Exam?
For Bulgaria, the exam is held at one of the Pearson VUE test centers in Sofia. It consists of 200 questions with 4 possible answers. Only one of the four answers is correct. The total duration of the exam is 4 hours. 25 of the questions are not evaluated as they are used for PMI test purposes. The minimum score for a successful exam is determined by psychometric analysis individually for each exam, depending on its complexity (according to unofficial information, the threshold is on average 62%). Understand about some of the best project management online certification programs.
How is the certification process going?
The certification process proceeds in the following 6 steps:
The exam fee is paid directly to PMI and is $ 405 for PMI members and $ 555 for non-members.
How do we maintain our PMP® certification?
The PMP® certificate is renewed every 3 years. For this purpose, it is necessary to collect 60 Professional Development Units (PDUs) within this period. Points (PDUs) are aggregated into two areas: Education and Giving back to the Profession.
The Education field may include training to expand and upgrade technical, leadership, strategic, and business management skills. According to PMI, there is an ideal combination of technical, leadership and strategic business management skills called The PMI Talent TriangleTM. Therefore, training should be in these areas.
Technical project management: Knowledge, skills and behavior related to specific areas of project, program and portfolio management.
Leadership: Knowledge, skills, and behaviors that help organizations achieve their business goals.
Strategic and business management: Knowledge or expertise in a sector or organization that improves performance and leads to better business results.
- Giving back to the Profession are activities that enable you to use and share your knowledge and skills to develop your profession. Giving Back is an optional way of collecting PDUs, which in this case should not exceed 25.
How to collect PDUs?
There are many ways to accumulate PDUs, for example:
Education (1 hour of study = 1 PDU)
- Teacher-led courses or trainings, either in-person or online. This includes training for registered PMI training organizations, PMI educational events, online training, academic education through programs accredited by the PMI Global Accreditation Center (GAC), courses from other providers.
You can collect PDUs with our free trainings:
Scrum Fundamentals Certified (10 PDUs)
Six Sigma Yellow Belt (8 PDUs)
- Organization Meetings – Meetings, activities and local events related to the profession.
- Online training or digital training – self-directed training online or through different digital formats.
- Reading – self-read certification books, articles and more.
- Non-formal learning focused on structured discussions.
Giving back to the Profession (1 hour work = 1 PDU)
Practical work related to project management.
Creating content, such as writing books, study materials, blog posts, articles, and more.
Presentation of a presentation on topics related to the profession.
Sharing knowledge, such as mentoring and training.
Provision of voluntary services to non-governmental organizations.
Reporting on Professional Development Units (PDUs)
Accrued credits (PDUs) are reported to the PMI system through your profile at pmi .org. In order to maintain active certification status, you need to record your PDUs and complete the renewal process before the 3-year cycle has expired.
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