One question confuses many people is that after signing up for the PMP certification exam, they should take self-study or institutional training? I summarize the advantages and disadvantages respectively and share my experience with you.
Table of Contents
1. Pros and Cons of Self-study
The advantage, obviously, saves money. Apart from PMP exam cost around USD607, you may spend USD30 to ask someone to register for you and USD28 to buy some materials including PMOBK, coach books and electronic materials. This is the total. Without taking training courses, you can save near USD311.
There are several disadvantages of self-study. One is that you have to select the institution that registers for you and to find relevant materials yourself. After you pass the exam, you also have to do the re-certification yourself, consuming quite a lot of time and energy.
Second, it is hard to learn the knowledge by self-study. Students with weak learning ability should think it twice before self-learning. PMBOK is not that easy to understand.
Third, there is the risk that you may find an unreliable institution so that your time and money are wasted. Also, you may fail for the first time. The cost for makeup exam is about USD389 which is a much expense.
2. The Pros and Cons of Signing up for a Class
The downside is to spend more money. In general, the offline PMP certification training class will cost you several hundred dollars. The online ones are cheaper ranging from USD 311 to USD 622.
The upside is as follows:
It is more convenient. There are teachers helping you solve the problem of registering for the exam, finding paper and electronic materials, and conducting re-certification at later stage. You can also accumulate PDU freely.
High PMP exam pass rate. The average pass rates of PMP training classes are very high. Some famous institutions can reach above 95%. It is reliable. You can follow the training class and do corresponding exercises after you have studied each chapter to ascertain your learning effects. You can consult teachers all the time when you are confused.
3. Experience Sharing
To make you better decide, I share mine and my friends’ experience with you. We all passed the PMP exam and got the 5A result within 2 months. The only difference was that I learned by myself and they joined in SPOTO PMP training courses and practice SPOTO PMP test .
The reason for choosing self-learning was on the one hand, to save some money. On the other hand, I had already passed A Construction Division and Registered Fire Prevention Engineer exams which have low pass rates, so I thought I could pass the PMP certification exam. Then, I searched for many materials and guidance and finally determined to learn by myself.
My friends are busy working in daily life and seldom read books while reading. Considering the registration already costing them a considerable amount of money, they could accept spending more to receive training.
You can take a comprehensive judgement based on your conditions. The one suits you the most is the best.