To prepare well for the PMP® exam, you must familiarize yourself with its structure and questions. In this article, I’ll help you better understand what you need to prepare for and expect.
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The PMP® Exam Questions
The PMP® computer-based exam consists of 180 multiple-choice questions, and you can take it on any Pearson Due testing centre.
PMP® Domains:
1. People (42%)
2. Process (50%)
3. Business Environment (8%)
The PMP® exam is divided into 3 domains. The exam is a pass or fail exam, and you will know whether you passed immediately upon exam completion. If you passed, you will receive a certificate in the mail within weeks. You will receive a digital certificate within a day or two.
Topics you need to grasp include: Scope, Time, Cost, Quality, Human Resources, Communications, Risk, Procurement, Integration, and Professional Responsibility. The average test preparation time is around 35 hours to learn about each section and practice the questions.
Free PMP® Exam Questions:
Here are example PMP® test questions to help you understand the type of thinking to master before taking the exam.
1. Time
You receive the duration estimates below while developing a project’s schedule. The sponsors want to cut down a couple of weeks. Which activities should you choose to shorten to minimize the total project duration?
| Activity | Estimate |
| Start – S | 2 |
| Start – T | 9 |
| Start – U | 14 |
| S – W | 4 |
| T – S | Dummy |
| U – X | 1 |
| T – X | 10 |
| W- End | 8 |
| X – End | 1 |
A) W-End
B) Start-S
C) T-S
D) T-X
2. Cost
You’re responsible for documenting the technical aspects of a project. After running for two months, the project is 30% complete at a cost of $53,000. The overall project budget is $90,000, and the duration schedule is six months. How would you rate this project’s performance?
A) Over budget and behind schedule
B) Over budget and ahead of schedule
C) Under budget and behind schedule
D) Under budget and ahead of schedule
3. Scope
What should you do if the project stakeholder wants you to add scope to the project, given that your sponsor said this wasn’t part of your responsibilities when signing the charter?
A) Make changes if you’ve already made enough progress.
B) Check if you have extra cash reserves that allow this change.
C) Reject and don’t add the scope.
D) Discuss matters with your sponsor.
4. Quality
Preventing non-conformance to requirements entails quality costs; the total costs invested in the process. A failure cost could be internal or external. Failure cost is also called:
A) Cost of poor qualityB) Cost of non-complianceC) Indirect costsD) Sunk costs
5. Risk
During a construction project, the cement supplier runs out of supply. What’s the optimum way to deal with this situation?
A) Transfer the riskB) Apply the contingency response strategyC) Find a workaroundD) Refer to the risk register
6. Resources
The assumption upon which the Theory X management is based is:
A) Workers need guidance because they aren’t motivated by nature
B) There’s a relationship between profits and meeting the project’s milestones
C) Quality circles are responsible for quality improvements
D) Poor working conditions are responsible for absenteeism
7. Communications
There’s a new data center being built and for which you’re holding a meeting. It’ll be large and complex. You’ve counted the stakeholders, project team members, and vendors to be 52. To convey the project’s importance and difficulty, how many communication channels do you tell them are established on the project?
A) 52
B) 2625
C) 2704
D) 1326
8. Professional Responsibility
Your company’s receivable department made a mistake that you notice on an invoice being sent to a client. The mistake includes overbilling hours for the previous month, but the customer won’t because you’re responsible for reconciling invoices. The best way to respond would be:
A) Ignore the issue because it’s not your problem
B) Do your best to cover it up because the customer won’t know
C) Tell the A/R department to correct the error
D) Tell the customer that the invoice he’s going to receive has a mistake they should resolve with the A/R department
9. Procurement
You and the procurement department are deciding whether an item should be bought or leased for an upcoming project. If the item costs $2,000 and $50 for running for a day, and you can rent it at $150 per day. How long would it take for the lease price and purchase price to become equal?
A) 40 days
B) 30 days
C) 20 days
D) 10 days
10. Integration
You’re working for the Walk Fast Shoes project, and you’re documenting the boundaries by adding to the project charter. The best source of information during this stage would be:
A) Standard guidelines
B) The sponsor of the project
C) Multiple stakeholders
D) Knowledge based on past projects
Answers
1. A: The path “Start-T, T-S, S-W, W-End” has the longest duration, serving as the critical path. To reduce the overall duration, the project manager should minimize the time needed for this path. Based on that and the available options on the critical path, you should reduce W-End’s duration.
2. A: Since less than ⅓ of the project has been completed, the project is behind schedule. It’s also over budget since there’s ⅔ of the project left to go, and more than ⅓ of the budget has been spent.
3. C: Reject the change since the sponsor didn’t ask for the scope as part of the project.
4. C: Cost of poor quality.
5. D: Find a workaround. This is similar to a contingency response strategy but considers that the risk was unexpected, and there were no planned responses prior to it.
6. D: Workers require management to reach productivity as they’re unmotivated by nature.
7. A: The formula for communication channels is N(N-1)/2, with N referring to the number of people involved. Therefore, the number of communication channels would add up to 1326.
8. A: The best way is to handle the error yourself before the customer is aware of it.
9. B: The calculation:
Let D = number of days.
150D = 2000 + 50D
Therefore, D = 20 days.
If the item is needed for more than 20 days, purchasing it would be cheaper.
10. C: The project sponsor.