What To Expect On Your Actual PMP Exam Date

In this instructional video, the presenter walks viewers through everything they need to know for the day they sit for the PMP exam. The content covers mandatory documentation (PMI authorization letter and two IDs), the process of receiving a booking code and scheduling the exam, and practical logistics such as wearing layered clothing, bringing snacks, and using the center’s lockers. Viewers learn what materials the testing center provides—two blank sheets, a pencil, and a Windows‑based calculator—and how to use a brain‑dump effectively. The video explains the pre‑exam computer tutorial, navigation tools (mark for review, submit), and emphasizes that each candidate receives a unique, randomly ordered set of 200 multiple‑choice questions, making copying impossible. Key test‑taking strategies are detailed: answer every question (no negative marking), spend no more than one minute per question on the first pass, flag uncertain items for later review, and use later questions to uncover earlier answers. The presenter highlights common pitfalls such as double‑negative wording, situational questions where all options seem plausible, and irrelevant information in long prompts, offering concrete tricks (e.g., ask “what is the next best thing to do?”). An example scenario illustrates the situational‑question approach. The video concludes with a promotional call to join a free, live PMP training course that promises to help candidates achieve certification within six weeks.
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Hello and welcome everybody. In this video, I am going to cover what you can expect on your actual PMP exam. So you've been studying for a month and now it's your exam date. This is exactly what you can expect when you're going into your testing center. So first of all, they're not going to allow you to take the exam unless you provide your authorization letter from PMI plus 2 pieces of IDs. So make sure you bring these with you to your actual testing center. Now, once you submit your application to PMI and they approve it within 2 to 5 business days in general, it could take as many as 10, but usually it's between 2 to 5 business days, they will give you a code and you can use that code to then go to the testing center and book your exam time. So be sure just to include that letter from PMI saying that you're eligible to write your PMP exam with you when you're walking into your testing center. Another tip is to wear layered clothing. You don't know the temperature in the room. You don't know if it's going to be cold or too hot for you, so it's good to wear layered clothing so you can always take layers off if you're too hot and wear more layers on when you're too cold. Now, at the exam centers, you're usually not going to be given anything to drink or eat. However, you can bring some snacks with you when you can take some time to have a drink or Or eat some snacks. So you can walk out of the exam room at any time to take a break, and it's good to just refresh yourself because it is a 4-hour-long exam and you may be hungry or thirsty during this exam. So just be prepared for that beforehand by bringing a snack. When you walk into your testing center, you'll be given 2 blank pieces of paper, a pencil, and a Windows-based calculator. You cannot bring any of your own stuff into the testing center. They will have mini lockers for you to store all of your purses and other valuables, and you can pick it up once your exam is over. So these 2 pieces of paper, you can use that to do a brain dump before your exam. Some people really find this helpful. It's not mandatory. There have been people who passed their exam without doing this brain dump, and there's other people who swear by them. So the reality is that they're both right. You know, you could have a brain dump and it could really help you, and for other people, they just think it's a waste of time. So know what works best for you. And remember that if you do decide to create a brain dump, to draw it out at least 10 times before your actual exam so you know exactly what you want to include on your brain dumps and you get down to under 10 minutes into drawing it. Okay. And then the last thing is that you'll be given a Windows-based calculator. With this calculator, you can calculate anything that you will need for your exam. On the PMP exam, you will not be given complex math problems. All the math that you need to do just involves adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing, so nothing more than 5, uh, grade 5 math level, and you'll be given a calculator to do that. You can also use one of the pieces of paper that you're given to write down down all of your formulas. And before your exam starts, you will be given some time to go through a computer tutorial that's going to show you how everything works, how to go to the next question, how to mark the question for review, how to submit your exams, etc., etc. So you'll be given about 10 to 15 minutes to go through this tutorial. And when you're going into your testing center, there could be other exams going on at the same time. So the person next to you could be writing writing a completely different exam. The person next to you could also be writing the PMP exam as well. Even if the person is writing the PMP exam, you cannot copy off of them because what happens is as soon as you press start, what the system does is it randomly generates 200 questions and it pulls these questions from PMI's database and assigns them to you in a random order. So that means that Probably no one on this planet has gotten the exact same PMP exam in the exact same question order, so the chances of that, it's so slim, it's almost impossible. So the person next to you most likely has a completely different set of exam questions than you have, even though you're both writing the PMP exam. So don't even try to bother to try to copy them or anything like that. Another tip is that there's no negative marking, so make sure that you answer every single question even if you're not sure where the answer is. Take your best guess. You still have 25% chance of getting that question right. All 200 questions on the PMP exam are multiple choice, and every single multiple choice will have 4 possible choices, so you will always have at least a 25% chance of answering that question correctly. And if you're not sure about the answer for one question, mark it for review and then go on to the next question. On your first go-around, don't spend more than 1 minute per question. And sometimes the correct answer to the question that you may have missed or didn't know the answer to could be given away in another question. So another question could actually have the answer to a former question. That you have seen on the exam. So don't be surprised when you see this and use this to your advantage. So if you get stuck on something, don't linger on it for too long. Put something down, put your best guess down, and then mark it for review. Go through the entire exam and then review those questions that you're not sure about over again. Another thing PMI likes to do is to use double negatives. They just try to use really confusing wording to try to trick you up. So watch out for things like that. So they could say things like not false. You know, they could have just said true, but they don't. So watch out for these double negatives. And then also, you may run into situational questions where they give you a scenario and then ask you what's the best thing to do. In these kind of scenarios, you could really do any of the 4 choices that they have listed, and they could all be correct. So in these cases, the best question you can ask yourself is what What do you do first? Now let me give you an example of what I mean by this. So here is a sample question. Sally, your developer, tells you that the activity you've assigned to her will be delayed. What is the best thing to do? And you're given 4 possible choices. Number 1 is you can reschedule your project. Number 2 is you can notify your project sponsor. Number 3 is you can inform your customers that the project is going to be delayed. And number 4 is that you can call a meeting to discuss the situation and alternatives. Alternatives with your team. So if you think about this in real life, you can really do any of these 4 things and it would still make sense. And this is why the PMP exam really tricks up people, because sometimes in questions like these situational questions, all 4 answers, depending on how you argue it, could be correct. However, when you get into situations like this, you will have to ask yourself, what is the best thing to do next? So even though the question doesn't say what is the best thing to do next, you can ask yourself that, you know, what is the next best thing to do? And then that will put into context and that will help you decide upon what is the correct answer in this case, which is number 4. Number 4 is to call a meeting to discuss the situation and alternatives with your team. So when you see situational questions, best advice I can give you is to ask yourself, what is the next best thing to do? When they're asking you questions such as, what is the best thing to do in this case where all the answers could look correct, just add in that extra word for yourself. What is the best thing to do next? That's actually what they're implying, but they're just not explicitly saying that in the questions. So use this trick the next time you see situational questions. And then the next thing is that in the other questions that you may be given, you may be given irrelevant information. So you have to be able to read long paragraphs that are your question and be able to decide what's important and what's irrelevant. Pick out the important information and use that to help you answer the question. PMI does this because Sometimes in real life you'll be given irrelevant information and you have to be able to identify that, and that's why they're testing you on this skill. So not all of the information that you'll be given on your exam will be relevant, and be able to identify what's relevant and what's irrelevant. Okay, so I hope you found these tips super helpful. I would like to help you get your PMP certification in the next 6 weeks. Sign up for this free class. You have to go to this class. I'm going to give you way more value than what you just learned in this video during this free course where you'll learn how to get your PMP certification in the next 6 weeks. To sign up, just go to www.exampm.com/free. I will also include this link in the description below. Just click on that link and sign up. We've got a couple times coming up in this next week, so be sure to join us. for this free live training. And I'm going to show you how you can obtain your PMP certification in the next 6 weeks. These techniques will work whether you are taking your exam on your first try or you're retaking it for the second or third time. You have to join this training. I promise you, you're gonna walk out learning something new. So thank you so much for joining me today on this training. I hope you learned something new and I can't wait to see you again in a future lecture.
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