Ananthanarayanan K S PMP Exam Journey: Passing with Infocareer | #successstory #2024 #pmp

You know, my name is Ananta. I have about 15 years of experience. Now, contrary to a lot of people maybe seeing this video, my, my first job. From my first day of my first job itself, I've been a project manager. I interviewed for an engineering position. But due to some difference between the job posting and the. Actually when I got to the interview, they realized that I'm not very suitable for that role that they wanted. So. But my resume had one project management course in college. And incidentally the professor also happened to be one of my references. So when I, when, when my manager called and my professor gave me a glowing reference, they asked me to be a junior project manager. That's how I started. So all through my life I've been a project manager. I came to info career in 2017 wanting to take the exam. And funnily, that was not the first time. I had wanted to take the exam quite a bit earlier in 2009, 2010 itself. I've been a PMI member since 2006. That was the first time I became a member. But for whatever reason I. I could not do it. I. Probably because of myself. I don't blame anybody else for it. And then I was working in a smaller company and there was no, not a lot of focus on certification. And you know, I. And I was, I was working there for almost 10 years. Towards the end of that tenure, I thought getting a PMP will help me, you know, move ahead in my career. I wanted to switch my job and all that. So that is why I actually came to Info Career. But then I had some personal issues at that point and my work was not. My work was very, very, very hard in terms of occupying my mind a lot more than time. Work was occupying my mind a lot. So I was not able to do what you said. And that's why at 2017 I dropped it. But now in 2021, I actually had some time and I realized that my mind was pretty clear in terms of what I wanted to do. At the same time, my mind was also free enough for me to, you know, put better effort this time. So again, that is again because of me. And I think, I think that's what made me come back and talk to you, sir, and start the process all over again. And because I had the academic experience before, I did not really need to take the training class, but I had already taken the 30 to 36 hours of 30, 35 hours of training program that you had organized in 2017 over the four course of, I think four weeks, three weeks so I just joined the Reimagine PMP program and I actually followed every instruction that was given as part of the program. So that, and the Excel sheet tracker that Infograrer gave me was a great help. So I was able to spend two hours, at least two hours every day. In between, I had some other issues. So I, there was a little bit of delay. So because of how structured the program was, I was able to get back on course once again and I completed the actual class, I mean the, the actual lessons over the space of I think 45 days now. One of the things that I did was I know Shekhar sir told us to spend two hours as early as possible in the morning. I, I tried to do that. I was able to, I think mostly able to do that. But what I also did was I, whenever I used to take my evening walks, I was always listening to training videos, the training videos on my phone. So like, like previously I used to listen to podcasts. Now over the period of this 45 days, I was literally listening to the training videos over and over again. So that was what I did and I think that helped me a lot. One of the things, towards the end I realized that the exam was always going to be. The exam format has changed, a lot of agile questions are going to be there. So I actually took one more week to go back and refresh the Agile portion of the training program once again. That I think has helped me quite a bit. Plus I, I should, I should also say that the last one week just before the exam, whatever interaction that I had with you, Shekhar sir, that like that was a game changer to me because prior to that, whatever the IC leave exams I took, I didn't like your, your, your class lectures. During the, doing the lectures, you used to say that some tests, the marks might come down. So it's not, it should not be a big deal. But I, I think four or five tests through the entire cycle, four or five tests, my marks, I failed. That was, that was in the back of my mind. But listening to you in the last one week, taking that mock test though, and getting your feedback about it, that I think was a game changer for me. And that is probably the best part of the entire program, the interactions. Even though, even though this was. The reimagined PMP is intended for people to work independently and listen to the videos, write practices and move on. One of the things that I want to tell people, other people in the program is to talk to you, keep in touch. Even if, even if Everything is on track. I think talking to you, I think would be a great exercise and that I think everybody should do. So like I said, the program was very structured. It helped people like me, you know, sit, spend time. It was very informative in terms of what to do and what not to do. I think those are the things that really helped me in the program, really helped me clear the exam, not just clear it. I think I made above target and all the focus areas. So I think that helped me a lot. So I think it's a well, very, very well rounded program in the sense that it has, I think it has a little bit of everything for everybody. Like for example, in my case, right. Even though I worked for 15 years, the kind of profile, the company profile, employer profile that I worked with, I didn't have a lot of chance to look at contracts, for example. So those kind of things were extremely new for me. But it helped me gain that knowledge. Right. So it is not. So what I liked about this program is it's not geared towards the IT industry, which is where a lot of us work in. It's, it's very well rounded in that way. It, whatever we see in the program, whatever we have learning the program is applicable to a whole bunch of industries and not just the IT industry, which is, which is what a lot of people focus these days. So I think that's the good part of this program. So even if, so what I, what I, what I want to tell people is even if you go through this program and see that some of these things are not what you need to do or what you have been doing on a daily basis, I think we should focus on those areas. Even, even not just because it's for the, for the exam, but because it helps you, you know, get a well rounded experience. Your knowledge is also rounded. It fills a lot of gaps in your experience with the knowledge. And in the future, when you get into those situations, you will have the knowledge to, you know, fall back on. Even if you don't have the experience, it will not look new for you. So I think that's what helped. That's what is a great thing about this program. I don't give a lot away about the coaching calls because I think those have to be experienced and I'm pretty sure it will be geared towards a particular person's, you know, situation. But hearing those strategies as close as possible to the exam, I think that helped. And actually during the exam I thought, see, typically I'm, I'm, I'm someone when it comes to exams and interviews, I, I get tensed a bit during those but in this case it was, I was pretty blank because it didn't seem new. The exam did not seem new because I've seen it before in the practice test. In fact, the practice test a lot harder than I, I think the actual exam was so that way, that way that, that was so it was through the exam it was pretty blank. And from my experience, whatever I heard in the, in those coaching calls at particular the last one, the last, the day of the exam, just before I walked into the exam, the coaching call I had with you sir, I think that went a very long way towards calming me down because if my, the first hour of my, the first part of the exam, right. It took a lot more than the one minute per question, you know, thing that have been ingrained in my mind through the, through the entire course. Right. But hearing you in just before the exam kept me calm and I was able to re, I was able to tell myself that okay, this is something that I just heard. I, I, this is not unexpected, whatever the first hour of the exam, it is not unexpected so I can catch up. So I, so that kept me going and to be honest with you, because of all the practice I actually finished the, the entire set of questions about 40 minutes before the entire three hours. In fact the last section I actually went through every single question all over again because I had enough time to do it. So I think all of that is because of that. The, the, the last minute or the last few days of coaching calls that I had because I was, it didn't, it didn't seem new. I was expecting that to happen so that those, those I think are a great help and I, I urge everybody to take those calls seriously. I don't know about how other people do it, but I think this sounds like the right way to approach this exam. Whatever training that we are getting from you, I, I, I, I'm going forward. I'm trying to see how I can get an agile certification and when I talk and I, I've not, I've not come, I have to talk to you about sir, I have to figure out how to get that, make that happen. But when I speak to other people who have gone through a jail problem, they're saying oh, just spend two days and then just go write the exam. And I don't know if that's the right way to do it. I have to have to talk to you and find out. But sure this is, and I've told a bunch of people who are also thinking about taking the test. That info career is the way to go.