18 PMP Mindset Principles

hey what is going on this is Muhammad with certified with ease helping you get certified with ease and in this video I'm going to talk about 18 PMP mindset

principles that will tell you the answer to the question before even reading the question itself okay now before we jump into these mindset

principles I want to talk about something really important the PMP exam 80% of it is situation based they're going to ask you

three questions either what should the PM do what should the PM have done or what should the PM do first or next so they'll give you a situation and they'll

ask you one of these three questions this is 80% of the exam the other 20% you might have drag and drop you might

have a calculation you might have uh a chart you have to analyze but 80% of the exam is situation based meaning that if

you can Master 80% of the exam you will pass the exam on the other hand if you don't Master 80% of it you fail the exam

so it's very important that you understand how to approach these situation based questions because the

PMP exam is a standardized exam it follows a certain pattern and because it follows a certain

pattern you can develop rules AKA these mindset principles that will help you solve or answer these exam questions and in this video I'm going to talk

about 18 18 principles that have helped myself that have helped all my students pass their exam okay

so have these principles here after this after watching this sign up to our free weekly sessions where we'll put these principles into action by solving real

PMP past exam problems okay so without further Ado let's jump into it right now excuse me number one always discuss investigate analyze or ask before

deciding on a solution okay so basically the PM should always take a step back any time there's a situation a problem and impediment an obstruction

something that affects the project the PM before deciding on a solution should take a step back discuss with the team discuss with the stakeholders gather

more invest uh gather more information by investigating analyze the information on hand and then make a sound decision

okay so this principle is number one because it appears the most so really understand this principle and apply it all right number two never settle for

delays or extra costs however extra cost proceed delays okay so this is a very common theme you might see an answer that says that you know what it's okay

that the project is delayed or it's an option in the question that says that this specific answer will delay the

project by two weeks but it's fine because of ayz never settle for delays you never want to settle a for a delay in a project and the reason being is because

I won't get too technical but the reason being is because the more delay the project is the more costs are going to add up you have to pay people more you have to pay your employees you have to

pay your stakeholders you have to pay the contractors and because of that there could be more risks and whatnot never settle for delays however extra cost will precede delays okay so we're

not going to jump and do this right now if you want to know more about how extra cost proceed delays sign up for our free sessions but just remember that extra

costs if something costs you um a certain amount and if you pay that amount you'll avoid or mitigate the delay then that's fine okay so that's

number two number three be a servant leader okay so this is a very important Concept in PM um an easy way to remember this is be like a mother be like a

caring mother nurture encourage um develop your team develop your your your your team members your stakeholders and whatnot okay so number three be a servant leader is like being like a

caring mother number four value is gold so you'll see in your PMP questions sometimes the pm has to make a difficult

decision between let's say option A and option b pick the solution that offers the most value value is obviously

subjective depending on your project your company whatever it may be however you want to choose the most value the most value valuable decision um between

the two basically so value is gold value is a keyword if you see value the keyword value in the answer obviously read it don't just

select it right away but it's a good it's a it's a good uh indication that's the answer okay five root cause analysis and MVP or demo are your weapons okay

now you're going to see root cause analysis A Lot in your exam and MVP and demo a root cause

analysis allows you to pinpoint the root cause of the problem when you see root cause analysis or minimum viable product MVP or demo in your question or your

answer I should say those key those are key words that indicate that that's most probably the answer now I'm not going to dive into the technicalities as to what why it's the answer or how do we

actually know it's the answer we're going to discuss that in our weekly session so if you're interested again please sign up there's a link uh below this video okay number six any change will go through a change request process

very very important for predictive at least okay and there is no change request process for agile okay now change management is one of the hottest

topics on the exam just understand one thing any time your scope your budget

or um your uh your schedule is affected by a change it must go through a change request process for predictive okay so you'll see in your

answers perform a integrated Change Control process or submit a change request those are good answers when there is a change that affects the scope

the budget and the schedule okay seven your team members are the experts not you make every decision with them very very important the PM is simply a

manager at the end of the day and the PM is simply the manager at the end of the day your team members are the ones that are actually doing the heavy

lifting so speak to your team members make the decisions with your team members because if you don't you won't have anyone else to go to there are the

experts eight the PM makes a decision itions and handles the issues no running to sponsors management or HR all right now you'll see a very common theme

on the exam that anytime there's a problem one of the one of the one of the answers would be you know go to the sponsor speak to the sponsor speak to

the HR speak to um the CEO speak to the CFO you could eliminate that answer right off the bat especially when they say go to the sponsor it's a very common thing they'll say go to the sponsor okay

okay oh sorry note the exam will mention project sponsor many times only go to the sponsor when there is a problem with the budget example money is running out okay the project

sponsor is someone who funds the project or at least finds the funds for the project so it would make sense to go to the sponsor when the budget is

depleting all right number nine everyone directly or indirectly involved is a stakeholder and must be added to the regist it doesn't matter who they are if they

are a if they if they have some kind of pool on the project they will be added okay so for example let's say you want to build a building um or a bridge and

you are affecting the local community around and they start protesting they become a stakeholder at that point and they must be added to something known as

the stakeholder register number 10 no matter if the project is completed or terminated the closing phase must occur this is for predictive okay sometimes

when you're working on a project the company might decide to terminate the project um all of a sudden even if they decide to terminate the project in the

middle of the project you must jump to the closing phase and formally close the project meaning sign off and on all the contracts release all the resources all

that kind of stuff so the closing phase must occur number 11 in a predictive project your plan is your map constantly refer back to it so you'll see on your

on your PMP exam uh answers um uh if if it's a predictive project you'll see that anytime there's some some sort of problem let's say it's a risk

problem in the answers you'll have that the PM should refer back to the risk management plan the plan will tell the PM what he or she needs to do next okay so it's very important that if there is

a problem and if the answer indicates that you refer back to a specific plan that there's a good indication that's the answer okay number 12

predictive project keywords so how do you know it's a predictive project well you have some keywords the Change Control Board if they mentioned that in the question you know it's a predictive project or Change Control process agile

project keywords Sprint iteration scrum daily standup backlog Canan product increment product owner/manager okay 14 when you or your team have no

clue on what's going on AEM is what you need or you can refer to past projects in the Lessons Learned register

okay now initially we mentioned that the PM should consult his or her team when making a decision because they're the experts however it could be possible

that your team might not even know what's going on if that's the case a subject matter expert in the field is basically what you need or if

the past similar project has been done before refer back to it in the Lessons Learned register you'll learn more about the approach that is required 15 when

transitioning from predictive to Agile introduce agile concept slowly for example using a pilot project or Inception deck so you'll see that um a lot of the topics on the exam focus on

hybrid so you'll see this transition between predictive and agile the best way to introduce something is to introduce it slowly

because predictive is a u is a culture um and then changing that culture from predictive to Agile can be can be a very problematic thing especially for the employees especially for the

stakeholders so you want to introduce things slowly okay so when your question when you're when when you receive a question that says how should for example the team

proceed introduce Concepts slowly pick options like pilot project or Inception deck all right 16 agile projects are

self-organizing what does this mean meaning that teams are in charge however the PM can still step in to manage and resolve conflicts okay

so if you have a question on the PMP exam that indicates that you have team members that are you know that are

butting heads basically and you're dealing with an agile project the PM does not need to step in right away the PM should take a step back and let these team members resolve the issue unless

things get really out of hand right because aile projects are self-organizing 17 an aile project will always need consistent feedback from the customer okay now this is a part of the

Agile development cycle which again we're not going to get into technicalities in the small training video if you're interested please click on the free training weekly sessions that we have however

an agile project thrives it thrives it survives it it um it develops because of customer feedback

okay why because agile projects are there's a lot of uncertainty as opposed to predictive projects so we need customer feedback to guide us okay so in your exam you might receive a question

that says or an answer that indicates that um for a situation like this we should have a representative from the customer's end

that's a very good answer especially to receive constant feedback or we should have regular workshops with the customer that's a very good answer because it allow us to receive constant feedback

okay so look for those answers when it comes to this specific situation 18 never immediately reject a request or an opportunity especially from a client

so you're going to see a good amount of answers that that have that where the PM is told to just ignore someone's suggestion or ignore a request never do

that never never do that consider it take a step back the PM should always consider suggestions and uh complaints that are coming in and use them and

acknowledge them to push the project forward so if you see something like this on number 18 never uh where the PM rejects a request or an opportunity you can eliminate that right off the bat

okay so that was a quick summary of the 18 mindset principles I'm telling you this right now if you know these principles don't memorize it if you understand these principles and you

practice with them you will at least be able to eliminate two out of four answers on the PMP exam right away right off the bat that will save you a whole

bunch of time remember one of the number one reasons why people fail the PMP exam is because of time the besus scenario and this happened a lot lot of lot of times to

myself to all my students is that once they've mastered these principles they're able to just look at the answer and know that for example the answer to this question is C now

obviously read the question analyze it break it down but they're able to get the answer like this okay now this comes with practice everyone and I want you

practice these principles as much as possible so because of that we are offering free weekly PMP question sessions where we're going to take these

principles and answer as many PMP exam questions as possible on a weekly basis so if you're interested in that please register click on the link somewhere

around this video or below this video there'll be a small button and join us join us to practice and finally get PMP certified so you can stop studying for

this exam all right take care hopefully you enjoyed this video and it was a benefits have a great rest of the day take care