After making the decision to work towards the APMP qualification by self study, we now had to start. By forming a study group we aimed to help each other through the process. During the first session we discussed our aims as well as agreeing to aim to take the exam in August at the earliest. Our approach was to meet every couple of weeks having reached an agreed point in the study materials.
Our progress after two further sessions has been erratic with each of us going at different paces and having different expectations as well as preferred learning styles. The bigger problem seems to be ensuring sufficient time is found to do the study, test questions and case study examples. When we started two weeks ago the recruitment cycle was fairly quiet due to the Easter holidays and the end of the financial year. During the last week the number of recruitment assignments has stepped up making the challenge of prioritising study and income generating activities even greater.
For individual reflections on the journey to date see below:
“The largest challenge for me so far has been getting my mindset back into studying and allocating time to do this. I have found the content so far, interesting and anticipate the next challenge to be mapping up various aspects of the core content to specific projects I have managed – bearing in mind there was no such PM structure to my projects, it has been a learning curve. The terminology does tend to differ from OGC methods so I am also now learning a third PM language!” From Nicola
“Relating the content to specific projects from my experience will definitely be one of the biggest challenges as far as I’m concerned and will take some delving into the memory banks. In terms of learning the material, having done an APM qualification previously this isn’t posing too much of a problem thus far but fitting into the APM’s ‘Worldview’ as whole could be a challenge. There have already been a couple of instances where I have thought to myself ‘Well this isn’t how I’ve done things previously…’ but to be honest I just think it’s a case of adjusting the mindset slightly and will probably become easier over the course.” From Gary
“For me the preference is to gain an overview of each section, using the quick questions to test my knowledge. The more in-depth questions I will leave to form the basis for my final revision. I have covered some of the material previously but feel the challenge will be in matching the APM terminology”. From Michael
So we’re three weeks in and I must admit I was quite looking forward to being a student again (having left all that behind at university some gulp 15 years ago!) but the reality is a little different to what I was expecting. I’ve not had much practice recently at learning things rote – yes I know the APMP is different to other courses like PRINCE2 which has often been condemed for being heavily based on rote learning but there are still aspects to APMP which require 
memorisation – so I’m going to have to find the technique that work for me. I’ve already started with the silly little rhymes on post-it notes but I’m not sure if it really works well for me (I keep forgetting the rhymes!). Our first proper study group last week (“proper” because everyone came to the table having done their homework unlike the week before!) turned into a chuckle about the case study in the self study guide. The case study focuses on a company called “Whirlwind Bikes” and in each chapter there are specific questions about the case study. We started talking about the examples we might use in our actual exam as the guide states that we should reference projects we have worked on in the past. One of the group piped up, “I think in my example I’ll use; when I worked at Whirlwind Bikes….” Oh how we laughed! 
I guess the lesson learnt here is that we’re going to need some humour to get us through the next few months, that and lots of tea & biscuits.
If you have any project management study tips to share, leave a comment and let us know, your thoughts would be greatly appreciated (and tested out by the study group)
