PMP Exam Prep Simplified: Based on PMBOK® Guide Sixth Edition Paperback – February 19, 2018

I took the PMP the first time and was a hair away from passing. For my second attempt, I relied solely on this book to fill in the gaps. I did not read the PMBOK, but I work in a project management setting so I got quite a bit of hands on experience. Yes, there are grammar mistakes in this book. BUT this book really knits together a lot of concepts that you'd miss studying on your own. The exam tips are very helpful and it reads SO MUCH BETTER than the PMBOK. The author genuinely knows his stuff. Once you're done studying, get your hands on as many practice questions as you can and answer them. Really take the time to understand why you got something wrong. The PMP's questions are tricky and you can convince yourself quite easily away from the right answer.My tips:1. Memorize the Process groups and knowledge area table by writing it down every day. In the beginning, you'll have to refer to the book. But by the end of the 2nd week, you'll have the whole thing memorized. After it's memorized, write down the table 3-7 times per week to make sure you don't forget. THIS WILL HELP YOU2. Read this prep book carefully3. Make flashcards of all the equations (provided in the last chapter of this book). Do these equations every day until you've memorized them. Keep doing them for maintenance until your test date.4. Re-read this entire prep book and make short outlines for EACH process5. Take the practice exam in the book. DONT write on the book, use a separate sheet to write your answers so you can use the test again later.6. IF this if your first time, find a full practice exam on the internet and take it like it was the real test. The more you can do, the better.7. Pass this god forsaken test8. Profit

You have to study for this exam so don't think there are any shortcuts. If you're not committed it's better you wait until you know you're willing to sacrifice your evenings and weekends completely. Know that when you go online to other PMP guide sites and use the phone apps, they are trying to sell you their app and they will make sure you fail their practice tests so you buy their service. I recognized it quickly and need something with a structured approach to learning. This book is enough.I also suffered from falling asleep rather quickly from reading the PMBOK. I naturally gave up and then a few months later a friend recommended this book to me so I made this purchase. 6 months later I was a PMP. I probably could have done it in 4 but life and work can get in the way depending on how much you juggle. I may have over done the studying but I wanted to know this stuff end to end.Yes, if you're looking to pass the PMP, this book is what I would recommend that you only need. It lays the foundation in the first few chapters, tells you exactly what to memorize, what to simply understand and then it starts to drill in each knowledge area. I loved the chapter end questions. SO helpful. It's a great way to quiz yourself, find explanations if you got it wrong and know where you need to study more on.A side note. If you're like me and you don't have a photographic memory, you need to go through the book 2-3 times at minimum.My exact steps to success was....to read and highlight the chapter, go back and make notecards for term/process(I made about 40 per chapter), take another day to memorize the notecards, and then immediately take the chapter exam quiz and move to the next chapter. You'll notice a trend in the learnings as you get further in the book, a bigger picture will start to form and you'll understand how everything is connected. When you read it a second time, you'll comprehend stuff you overlooked the first time, take the quizzes again, finish the end of book practice test, and go take the PMP exam. Done.

I read the PMBOK Guide (6th Edition) approximately 6 times, scribbled down notes, created flash cards and even downloaded an app on my phone to practice answering 10 questions on daily basis.However, and with all of the above written out, the PMBOK Guide (6th Edition) was hard to follow in most cases. Especially after a long, tedious day at work. The LAST thing on my mind were the cost formulas or the different risk analysis methods.This is where PMP Exam Prep Simplified: Based on PMBOK® Guide Sixth Edition came into play! It was extremely easy to read -- the PMBOK Guide was written by a group of intelligent folks, but it didn't have to be written in such a complicated manner! The author of PMP Exam Prep Simplified: Based on PMBOK® Guide Sixth Edition did an excellent job of simplifying complicated terminology and the 'Exam tips' in every chapter were highly valuable.Plus, the book made sure that I understood the difference between certain project documents and management plans. It even reiterated the difference a couple of times across multiple chapters. The quizzes at the end of each chapter were super helpful as well. Some of the questions, however, were poorly written and only made sense after reading the descriptions of the answers.This brings me to the ONLY con I have -- poor grammar. In some cases, the sentence structures didn't make sense. I'm not an English professor by any means, but I had to re-read a couple of sentences a handful of times just to understand what the heck they meant! In other cases, words were misspelled or missing a period, so it'd look like a giant run-on sentence.Overall, the book gets (4) stars, and it helped me pass my PMP Exam!Now, I wish the author would write another book on Program Management.