Rita Mulcahy's PMP Exam Prep: Rita's Course in a Book for Passing the PMP Exam 7th Edition

Having just passed the PMP exam on December 28, 2012, I can give you a fresh perspective based on my use of this book for passing the exam. I am the project manager for awareness campaigns, but my knowledge of PMI's thoughts on how to go through project management were not overly developed prior to studying for this exam. So I would say I was starting from the beginning for the more detailed processes like risk management. I used Rita's book and the PMBOK Guide exclusively for four months. My study habits included reading through Rita's book fully once and taking the chapter practice tests, reading highlighted portions of the book the second time around and repeating some of the exercises in each chapter, and the third time around skimming each chapter for my problem areas and retaking the practice exams. During my second go through the book I also read through the 4th edition PMBOK Guide. The PMBOK really helped me with inputs and outputs and Rita's book is great for those of us who are trying to get better in project manager and pass the exam on the first try.Overall, I really don't have any cons for this book because I didn't look at any other books and I passed and passed WELL. The woman printing my results at the testing site told me she was impressed. I was surprised (re: overjoyed), she administers these tests every day and didn't really seem like the cheerleading type. However, please note the following are NOT INCLUDED IN BOOK: Rita does not include quality/grade and accuracy/precision, so make sure you get that knowledge. I did a quick google search online when I realized that was missing (from my online course) and I was fine after that. I loved the content, her conversational style, and thus, I actually ENJOYED studying on the train, during lunch and home. I spent approximately 4.5 hours a day on this book from September - December (with a few skipped days to enjoy life) and left no exercise incomplete. I also took three practice exams the week of the exam (I don't recommend this, but I was rushing) not affiliated with this author and that definitely tied everything together for me. I scored 72 on the first exam, 68 on the second, and 77 on the third practice exam. It helps!Key Points:1) Do the practice exams. The hardest one turned out to be Communications for me and that's my actual job field! I scored in the 50s the first time on that particular chapter and the 80s the second time. I scored in the 70s and 80s with a couple of high 60s on the other chapters the first time around. I was scoring in the mid- to high- 80s by my last read through the chapters and PMBOK Guide.2) Memorize what she tells you to memorize3) Take practice exams not affiliated with Rita's product. I didn't buy fast track - there are plenty of good free exams online. This was the tipping point I believe for helping me see how draining a four-hour test can be if you're not used to sitting that long.4) Don't read everything out there. I think it's unnecessary and can be confusing. I trusted the author when she advised against that and I think it helped me focus on her book and the PMBOK without worry (I get sidetracked very easily).5) Do ALL of the exercises in Rita's book and really try to understand why you got the questions wrong in her practice exams and commit those reasons to memory. It really helps you understand the PMI way of thinking for the exam.

One thing I want to say before my review is that I am a master procrastinator and have always waited till the last minute to cram before an exam. This was the case when I was both an undergrad and graduate student and is the case more recently when I took my PMP exam. I only gave myself 2 days to really study so I really had to be careful what prep material I used for my cramming. I chose Rita's book because I have heard good things about it from others who have used it in the past to pass their exams so I decided it would be my prep book of choice. In fact, because of my very short time frame, I only used this book and only very briefly referred to the PMBOK. So in two days, I read this book from cover to cover and made sure I did all of the exercises after each chapter. I also memorized all the PMI processes using the flashcard-like cutouts in the book (very effective). That was enough for me to pass the PMP exam with proficient and medium proficient on each of the five process groups.So here is my overall assessment of this book. If you are looking to just pass the exam this book will do it for you if you read it carefully and do all of the exercises. Does it cover everything in the PMBOK? No, it does not, but it does give you enough info to just pass the exam. If I had more time I would have reviewed all the various inputs and outputs in the PMBOK as the Rita book does not go into that much detail about each one. But then again, overall goal of the Rita book is to get you to understand the concepts well enough so you can pretty easily make an educated guess (that is, at least eliminate two out of four answer choices). In other words, it does not ask you to rely on memorization (though there are some needed) but more on understanding concepts that the PMP exam will most likely test you on (Note that on my exam most questions did not ask straight up memorization type questions but were questions that required an understanding of the concepts in the PMBOK).Oh if you can afford to get Rita PMFastrack v7 DVD then you should get it. I believe it is sold on her website as Amazon does not have the latest version. The reason I say to get this is that this had practice PMP exams that were the most true to the actual exam. If you can consistently get over 70% correct on her practice exams, then you are definitely good to go on the real one. But even if you just have this book and the PMBOK, I think that is really all you need.Good luck everyone!