When you consider that there are roughly 389,726 PMPs and just 11, 458 CAPMs it’s easy to question the value of the CAPM. In fact, I’m often reminded of the scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off where Ben Stein calls for Bueller. The CAPM just doesn’t have the same sexy allure as the PMP, but that doesn’t mean professionals should toss it aside as a junk certification.
The CAPM is a quality certification for newer project managers. This certification, unlike the Project+, does require the CAPM candidate to qualify for the exam and to provide both educational and work credentials. The CAPM is certified by the Project Management Institute (PMI), a not-for-profit international organization for project managers. Ideal candidates for the CAPM certification are project team members, junior project managers, and undergrad or grad students pursuing a career in project management.
In order to qualify for this certification the CAPM candidate must have:
- At least a high school diploma or an equivalent
- At least 1,500 hours of work on a project team
- Or 23 hours of formal project management education
If you’re thinking about applying through www.pmi.org for the CAPM examination you should think about joining PMI first for $119 and a $10 application fee for new members (so it’s really $129) to join PMI for the first time. Retirees can join for only $60 per year and students can join for $30 plus the $10 application fee. The PMI membership gets you access to some online literature, a monthly magazine, and invitations to ongoing educational events.
The CAPM exam will cost you $300 if you are not a PMI member and $225 if you are a PMI member. Should you, or more likely “a friend of yours,” fail the exam they can retake the exam for $200 if they aren’t a PMI member or they can retake the exam for $150 if they are a PMI member. The PMI exam consists of 150 questions which must be answered within three hours. You have to score at least a 65% on the exam to pass.
The CAPM examination is based predominantly on PMI’s book The Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). The PMBOK, pronounced “pim-bok,” is a dry, matter-of-fact read on the generally accepted processes and approach to project management. The topics that I’ve written all about in the project management shortcut stem from the PMBOK. For the CAPM exam you’ll want to review the PMBOK, as this is where the exam objectives are originating from; have a look:
Chapter 1: The Project Management Framework – 4% of the CAPM exam
You’ll be testing on the purpose of the PMBOK guide, the fundamentals of projects, project management, and the context of project management.
Chapter 2: The Project Life Cycle and the Organization – 4% of the CAPM exam
The project life cycle is unique to every project – how you manage the project life cycle is what’s universal to all projects. You’ll also be tested on working with project stakeholders and the project influencers within your organization.
Chapter 3: Project Management Processes – 11% of the CAPM exam
According to the PMBOK, there are 44 project management processes, and as a CAPM exam candidate you’ll be tested on these processes. You’ll need to know the goals of each process and how the different processes interact.
Chapter 4: Project Integration Management – 11% of the CAPM exam
Project management is full of process interactions. This chapter details how the processes affect one another and how poor performance in one process group can have a detrimental affect on the other process groups.
Chapter 5: Project Scope Management – 11% of the CAPM exam
The project scope is all of the work, and only the required work, to complete the project objectives. This chapter quizzes the CAPM candidate on creating the project scope, its decomposition into the project scope, and how the project manager must protect the scope from change.
Chapter 6: Project Time Management – 11% of the CAPM exam
All projects require time to complete the processes in each process group and to complete the assigned work. This chapter will challenge your understanding of time management, creating network diagrams, schedules, and monitoring and controlling the project work.
Chapter 7: Project Cost Management – 9% of the CAPM exam
Chapter seven is all about the project costs. You’ll be tested on creating project cost estimates and budgets, monitoring the expenses of the project, and responding to cost variances. You will likely face earned value management formulas in this chapter’s objectives.
Chapter 8: Project Quality Management – 7% of the CAPM exam
Project managers have to plan for, monitor and control, and ensure that the project team is executing the project with quality. You’ll be tested on working with quality assurance programs and using quality control processes.
Chapter 9: Managing Project Human Resources – 7% of the CAPM exam
Managing a project involves managing and leading the project team. The CAPM candidate will be tested on team development, managing the project to reach project objectives, and dealing with team disagreements. You’ll also be tested on the creation and execution of the staffing management plan.
Chapter 10: Project Communications Management – 7% of the CAPM exam
This chapter obviously deals with project communications: oral, written, non-verbal, formal, and informal. You’ll be tested on creating the communications management plan, the communications model, and some theory on what makes good communications.
Chapter 11: Project Risk Management – 11% of the CAPM exam
Risk is an uncertain event or condition that may have a positive or negative effect on the project. You’ll be tested on risk identification, qualitative and quantitative analysis, and the seven risk responses.
Chapter 12: Project Procurement Management – 7% of the CAPM exam
Project managers often have to deal with vendors, so you’ll be tested on the procurement processes. This means you’ll need to recognize the procurement documents, their purpose, contract types, and the associated risks with each contract type.
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Hi Joseph,
As a life long project manager coming from a background in construction project management, I view the PMP the same as you do the CAPM.
I teach many advanced project and program management courses and am SHOCKED at the number of PMP’s in my advanced courses who don’t have a clue about cost estimating, applied earned value, PERT, CPM scheduling and a host of other fundamental tools and techniques which I consider ESSENTIAL to have mastered if you want to call yourself a professional.
To a large degree, I blame PMI for allowing/encouraging people like Rita Mulcahy, Cheetah and “PMP Exam for Dummies” and my latest favorite, Cornelius Fichtner’s podcast to “teach to the exam” instead of teaching basic project management and building competency in practitioners.
So what we end up with are people who have crammed to pass exams, then hold themselves out to be “professional” project managers, when far too many can talk the talk but don’t have a clue on how to actually apply what they have learned- walk the walk.
To put the absurdity of the PMP in perspective, would you get on the next commercial airline if you knew:
1) That the pilot had logged 4500 hours of flight time but had never demonstrated that he/she ever successfully took off or landed a plane;
2) That the pilot got his pilots license after listening to a 35 hour podcast or studying books of sample questions for 35 hours;
3) Then took a 4 hour long, 200 question, multiple choice exam, of which only 175 questions actually count, and passed with a score of 62%
And I hope everyone would agree how foolish that is, and yet the PMP has achieved cult status in some companies and in some countries…. A 21st century example of the Emperor and his new outfit…..
Folks, let’s face it- the Emperor is naked and the faster we all realize it and put the PMP in the proper perspective, the faster we can improve on the practice of project management. The PMP was originally created as an entry level credential to see if people from functional departments could be assigned to project teams and not be totally lost. It never was designed to mean that the holder was a professional anything, and if you reflect on the example of the pilot, you can understand why.
To see the relative standing of the various globally recognized credentials benchmarked against the US Professional Engineer license, check this out….. http://www.pmforum.org/library/papers/2010/PDFs/feb/FP-Giammalvo-PMCertsCompared.pdf
BR,
Dr. PDG, Jakarta, Indonesia
http://www.build-project-management-competency.com