1. Qualifications for the Project Management Professional (PMP) exam
The requirements for sitting for the Project Management Professional (PMP) exam are 3 years of project management experience and 35 hours of project management education; however, that project management experience must have been gained within the past 8 years. (That is, assuming that you have a four-year college degree or higher in terms of education; if you gave the equivalent of a high-school diploma, then the experience requirement goes up to 5 years.)
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Reason for not qualifying for PMP |
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1. |
No project management experience |
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2. |
Not enough project management experience (< 3 years) |
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3. |
Not enough recent project management experience (> 8 years ago) |
So how do you become a project manager if you don’t qualify for the PMP?
2. Certified Associate in Project Management
There is another certification sponsored by the Project Management Institute (PMI) called the Certified Associate in Project Management. This covers the same material as the PMP exam in terms of scope, i.e., the contents of the PMBOK® Guide, but not in terms of depth. The PMP not only tests your knowledge of project management principles in theory, as the CAPM does, but it also tests them in practice by using situational questions.
If you find yourself in one of the three categories above, then you may qualify for the CAPM exam if you have 23 hours of project management education. A seminar put on by a local PMI chapter would certainly qualify. There are online courses you can take, or you can go to a local community college, or even a state college or university to take a course in the principles of project management.
3. What will the CAPM qualify me to do?
You will not be qualified to manage a project yourself; that is the function of the PMP certification. However, you can be an Assistant Project Manager, because you will have enough knowledge of the PMBOK® Guide practices in order to be able to a valuable asset to a project management team.
Then, after you gain the requisite experience, you can go for the PMP exam.
For those who have no experience; i.e., those who have just completed a course in project management in college or who have studied something else and want to get into project management, this certification will set you apart from those who may just have an associate’s degree or bachelor’s degree.
For those who have some experience, it will set you apart from those who have the same experience as you do because it tells your present or prospective employer that you are aiming towards the PMP exam in the future.
For those who have project management experience, but for whom that experience is not recent, it gives you an advantage in that tells your prospective employer that you are “up-to-date” in terms of your project management knowledge.
4. How else can I help my career towards being an Assistant Project Manager, and someday a full-fledge Project Manager?
Here are some of the things you can do to improve your skills that will set you apart from your competition:
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Activity |
Explanation |
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| 1. | Join PMI | There should be a chapter of the Project Management Institute. Join it, go to chapter events and meet Project Managers! |
| 2. | Join LinkedIn Groups | There are many LinkedIn groups that are related to Project Management. Join them and take part in the discussion! |
| 3. | Join Toastmasters | Toastmasters will improve your communication and leadership skills which every Project Manager must have! There may be a Toastmasters club supported by the local PMI chapter which was created for Project Managers or those who want to become one! |
| 4. | Social Media | There are people who are experts in the field of Project Management whom you can follow on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, whose blogs you can read, or whose podcasts you can listen to! Or you can take the ultimate plunge and create your own blog and write about Project Management yourself! |
| 5. | Networking | You need to go to networking events, either those that are project management-related (like the ones put on by PMI local chapters), or general ones. You will run into people who are project managers who may be valuable assets to you in your job search if you are in transition. And if you are working, you may find people with whom you can trade ideas about how to improve project management in your organization. |
If you do any, or preferably ALL of the above, you will enter the world of Project Management in some shape or form. Yes, opportunities may come to you by accident, but you will be more “accident-prone”, if you know what I mean, if you are actively within the field of those who are working in the profession.
So if you don’t qualify for the PMP, but you don’t want to give up your dream of being a Project Manager, you don’t have to–just use the CAPM as your stepping stone to success!
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