Passed the PMP Exam: AT/AT/AT

I got my PMP exam results on Saturday afternoon (2/22), and I’m still in shock—I scored AT/AT/AT. Not going to lie, I almost cried when I saw the preliminary printout after finishing the exam. That Friday afternoon marked the culmination of nearly a year of work toward the PMP, along with a whirlwind of life changes along the way.

This journey really started back in April 2024. I had just been laid off from a great consulting gig. Luckily, I saw it coming, so by the time I got the official news, I was already deep into interviews for several jobs. But with nine years of PM experience, I knew the PMP was becoming more and more of a barrier to entry for job seekers. Having recently earned my Scrum Master certification, I knew I had to go after my PMP to stay competitive.

I took a PMP prep course through KnowledgeHut in May 2024, paid for by the new job I had just started in April. Since I’d had a great experience with them for my Scrum Master cert, I figured it was a safe bet. Boy, was I wrong. The instructor was all over the place, more concerned with his review scores than actually teaching the material. If my job hadn’t been footing the bill, I would’ve asked for my money back. Honestly, I felt less prepared for the PMP exam after that class than I did before. 

Still, I was committed to passing. I mainly relied on Third3Rock’s notes, struggled through quizzes on Study Hall (averaging a brutal 50%—yikes), and reviewed flashcards on Quizlet. When work slowed down after the summer, I had a little more time to study during the day.

Unfortunately, that work slowdown led to my second layoff of 2024. In October, my company cut 25% of its workforce, and I was once again out of a job—without my PMP. As I started job hunting in the toughest tech job market in years, I noticed more and more postings requiring or strongly preferring a PMP. The job search was brutal—I made it through the final rounds at eight companies only to come up short each time.

Thankfully, my state has a solid worker displacement program, which gave me a bit of breathing room. With more time on my hands, I doubled down on the PMP. In December 2024, I took an in-person course through Project Management Academy. This time, the instructor was excellent, and I got to network with my classmates. I also forced myself to schedule the exam right after this class, rather than dilly-dally. Having a goal and end date was super motivating. I also earned my Certified Scrum Product Owner certification in January 2025 (the easiest cert you’ll ever get) through the same organization, which was a great complement to my PMP prep since it deepened my Agile knowledge.

During this time, I re-upped Study Hall, repurchased Third3Rock’s notes (since updates had been made), and watched the videos I linked below religiously. I also downloaded Pocket Prep and made sure to answer the free question of the day without fail.

Outside of project management, I’m also an amateur actor— community theater, not Hollywood (Kevin Feige isn’t calling me anytime soon). In October, before getting laid off, I auditioned for a show that started rehearsals in December. The show turned out to be, as we say in the Midwest, “interesting.” Rehearsals were five nights a week, with a complex script to memorize.

My days became a relentless cycle of job searching, networking, PMP studying, and memorizing lines. I was busier than I had been in over a year and had basically no social life. My final Study Hall scores? 69% and 69% (nice). Then, two weeks before my exam, I got the offer for a job I had been trying to land for years.

In the final stretch, my old mentor from my first-ever PM job reached out with some invaluable exam advice:

• Take the day before the exam for yourself—you need a mental break.
  When you sit down for the test, do a brain dump on the scratch paper they give you. It’s a great reference point.
• Flag any questions you’re unsure about, but don’t overthink. If you’re confident in an answer, it should take less than 30 seconds. This matched my Study Hall stats—my correct answers averaged 25 seconds, while incorrect ones took about 40.
• Last week, everything came together: I opened my show, signed the offer letter for my dream job, and passed the PMP exam.

Test Experience Summary:

• No math on my exam, just one question about CPI vs SPI
• Very heavy on agile, mindset, cannot stress these enough
• There was also a question about where the spike was in a burndown chart
• PearsonVue people were actually nice. The lady at the desk was so happy for me when I got my preliminary results.
• Questions were a combo of what was in Study Hall and a lot of the questions Andrew Ramdayal wrote
• DM also warns you about a lot of questions where there are either multiple good answers or you’re left figuring out which is the least crappy answer
• 6 drag and drops; wish I had studied those more. I had started David McLachlan’’s drag-and-drop video but wasn’t able to complete that video.
• Finished with over an hour left of time. I was answering questions on Study Hall within 25-35 seconds. Learned how to decipher the BS in a lot of questions quickly thanks to Andrew Ramdayal’s videos.
• 10-minute breaks were crucial. Gave me a chance to walk a bit, get water, use the bathroom, and mentally reset. I really wish I had brought food.
• Wore blue. I am not above being superstitious
• Took myself out for a beer at my favorite brewery afterward

I want to thank the PMP subreddit community (/r/PMP) for all the encouragement, success stories, and study material recommendations. I hope my story is helpful—or at the very least, a decent read.