Becoming a pilot is a frightening prospect. In a role where a single mistake can, literally, be fatal, it is little wonder that most of a pilot’s early training is done safely on the ground. Thanks to flight simulators, today’s pilots are very familiar with what to expect before they ever take off. Any skill takes time to perfect and simulation allows skills to be developed in a safe environment.

This is precisely the rationale behind Velopi’s PMP^® exam simulator. Part of Velopi’s well proven Blended Learning Solution, the PMP^® exam simulator provides the student with several 200-question exams that have the exact same question breakdown as the real thing. These exams serve two purposes: Firstly, they offer the PMP^® exam students plenty of practice questions to test their project management knowledge and to become familiar with the style of questions that feature in the PMP^® exam. Their second purpose is to allow students to experience what a four-hour, 200-question exam is like.

For most of us, we have never sat a four-hour exam before. The longest school and university exams are three hours, so this is very much a step in the dark. Thanks to Velopi’s PMP^® exam simulator though, you can experience this without anything (namely your certificate in project management) being at stake.

The clever PMP^® exam students will use the simulator to study themselves, as well as the PMP^® course materials. Two questions need to be asked: How long does it take you to answer the 200 questions? And how long can you maintain concentration? The first question can give you a lot of confidence. If you are finishing the simulated exams in around the three hour mark, you can take a very calm approach to the actual exam – you will have plenty of time on the day. However, if the time runs out on the simulator, then you need to work on speeding up your thinking. Are you loitering over questions you do have answers for? Are you taking too long reading the questions?

Most of the PMP^® exam questions can be answered within a minute. All that is required is a careful read of the question and an equally careful review of the multiple choices. If you are taking more than a minute to answer these questions, then it is likely that you are not familiar enough with the materials – more study is required. Some of the questions will require you to draw out network diagrams and use a calculator. These will take longer than a minute, but the easier questions should give you enough time to work these through properly.

The other important aspect of the PMP^® exam is your own endurance. We are often advised to ensure that meetings are limited to two hours, because people lose concentration after that. Similarly, we lose concentration in long exams. Just like marathon runners hitting “the wall”, PMP^® exam candidates will find it hard to concentrate after a certain point. Learn when this happens to you. Whether it happens after 50 questions or 100 questions depends on you. The important thing is to recognize the symptoms and take a break at that point.

What you do on the break again depends very much on you. Some people like a drink or a snack. Others do stretching exercises or yoga. For other PMP^® exam candidates, closing their eyes for a minute or two is all that’s required. Whatever is needed, do it and be sure to do it on the day of the PMP^® exam. Thanks to the Velopi PMP^® exam simulator, you will be able to sit the actual PMP^® exam knowing that you need to take a break after every hour, or after every 75 questions.

In our next article, we will explain the simulator in more depth. In the meantime, please visit our training page for more details. We run our project management courses in Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Galway. If you cannot find the information you need on the web-site then please contact us directly.