It provides clear and complete explanations of the PMBOK 2000 core concepts without the fuzziness or verbosity that characterizes the PMBOK. It also contains exercises and practice exams to help you prepare, and gives tips on what to study, including material that will be on the exam that is not covered in the PMBOK.

What I like about this guide is the lack of fluff, the focus on learning the exam and the preparatory advice that is given.


An essential book - but not the only book to pass the exam   October 21, 2003
 16 out of 18 found this review helpful

Hi,

This book is good from exam point of view. The cost of others calling this "great" is probably $1000+ for some 3-day classroom courses either with Rita or with cheetahlearning etc. Passing the exam only with the help of this book is impossible.

This book covers the key points for the exam. This book keeps reading more interesting and easier. But number of practice questions are very less (only 30 questions from each chapter. Passing only with this book is impossible. The highlight of Rita's book is the time and cost chapter - she has done a great job in those two topics.

Remember PMBOK IS the bible. Other book that you might want to consider is from ESI. I bought their practice exam guide. When you compare Rita's book with ESI's practice exam guide, ESI has 40 questions on each topic and one set of 200 questions exam as in the real exam. ALL of ESI's questions are directly from PMBOK. Believe me they are hard to answer. If someone scores over 75% in ESI's practice exam, they will score 80% in the actual exam.

From my friends' circle, all who passed the exam - including me - either attended an expensive course or bought an expensive CD for practice exam. I bought Rita's PM Fastrack - very expensive one - VERY USEFUL. Lot of PMBOK study+PM Fastrack = my success.

Hope this helps


Overhyped   December 29, 2005
 15 out of 17 found this review helpful

The tips in this book are useful, but the book has many problems:

-incomplete or dated coverage: I took the test this morning (I passed) and I would estmate that close to 10% of the questions were on topics that got no coverage at all or dated coverage.

-errors: although the website states that addenda are published, there are mistakes and omissions in the book that no corrections have been published for yet.

-marginal presentation: I did not feel the book was organized well. Furthermore the index is quite poor. It took longer to use than it should have.

-pompous attitude: While I didnt remove any points for this I think if you are going to continually mention how PMs should be fired for project failure or mistakes you should at least get the content of your book correct.

-too much crosselling: again no points removed but it is annoying .

If you can live with the errors in the book add a star. The tips are useful but I don't think it comes near to living up its hype.


Good book, but did not live up to the hype   April 24, 2006
 15 out of 15 found this review helpful

This book was recommended by many members of my local PMI chapter. However, most of those people took the test prior to the PMBOK 3rd Edition and the publication of the 5th Edition of this book.

I bought this book, the flashcards, and the FASTrack software. Based on feedback from people that took the old version of the test after using Rita's book, I did not study the PMBOK itself very much. I think this was a mistake.

I passed on the first try, but I scored 10% lower on the actual test than I did on the PMP simulation in FASTrack taken 2 days before the test. Additionally, the areas I scored poorly in did not correlate with the results of the FASTrack simulation.

There was subject matter on the test that was not covered in the book (or was covered in very little detail). In a few cases, the book particuarly mentioned that a term was usually just an incorrect choice on the exam when I had it as an exam question.

I do recommend this book but I do not recommend it as a stand alone study aid. Be sure to cover the PMBOK thoroughly and, in retrospect, I would buy an additional study guide to ensure any gaps in information are covered.

As you read the reveiws about this book, ensure that they were submitted AFTER the publication date of this book. Based on my experience, I suspect the previous version of the book was better aligned with the actual test than this one.


Outstanding   June 21, 2006
 15 out of 15 found this review helpful

First of all, please understand that PMP Exam has no finite definitive subject matter boundary (I mean, it can be based on anything and everything in the context of project mgmt) which means the more books you read the better are your chances because there is really no single book that can cover all of project mgmt topics in detail, if it did it will run into several volumes, so essentially each of these books try to focus on topics that they believe are most relevant and give you the best shot at exam preparation in the shortest time possible, anyway obviously some books are better than others in this.

For example, the topic of Point of Total Assumption is not mentioned in PMBOK or in Rita Mulcahy's book, so if these are the only 2 books you referenced for preparation and you never came across this topic in your regular profession then chances are you will not know this topic, so what?, (you may be thinking) that's one question right?, wrong; the exam may have none or on the other hand not one but chances are several questions just on this topic alone. Incidentally this topic is covered in "THE PMP Exam: How to Pass on Your First Try" by Andy Crowe, PMP, this one also mentions EVA which is not there in Rita's book, but Rita's book for example has the topic of PERT Variance which is not there in other books, on the other hand none of the 3 books above mention the "Achievement Theory", you will find it in "PMP: Project Management Professional Study Guide" by Kim Heldman.

None of the 4 books above address some of the topics in detail like for example "Risk Probability" or "Break even point" or "Split Orders", you will have to refer the book on "Preparing for PMP Certification Exam" by "Michael W. Newell, PMP, ENP" for these.

Your preparation also depends on how much time you have actually spent managing projects and in which industry environment, obviously the exam would be easier for those who have been there but on the other hand if you've been a project mgr for too long then chances are that you have picked up some wrong habits and you will answer questions based on your instincts and personal experience as opposed to PMP recommended practices, so this may or may not work to your advantage.

I guess I am diverting, so enough about exam preparation (I spent roughly 3 weeks) and the actual PMP exam (I passed in my first attempt and did reasonably well) but getting to the crux, should you invest in this book ?, my recommendation would be "Yes", this prepares you best for the exam (It will reference PMBOK Guide by page numbers and in my opinion PMBOK is one other book that you need to read, don't skip because no other book comes close to capturing all of the inputs, outputs and tools & techniques of each process in a comprehensive pictorial fashion), the practice test questions are challenging, situational, long & wordy and will make you think & analyze.

Andy Crowe's book is an easy read, nicely captures all of the relevant information, the questions can be made more challenging though. I did not try his website "InSite" that comes with the book.

Kim Heldman's book (I am referring to the previous edition, don't know about the latest) is again another good book but it's not in the format of the other books, it's not arranged by knowledge area but by project mgmt processes. This may take some time getting used to but it is a good book.