So this coming week, I’m back to school — five-day, 8-5 boot camp training for my PMP (Project Management Professional) cert. I’ve actually been managing projects and programs (and managing project and program managers) for a decade or two, but enough of the jobs I’m trying to get (and not doing so) seem to want that official “PMP” showing up on the resume that it seems necessary to do something about it.
I’m managing to do this via some federal grant money administered by the state through the county workforce centers for technology and engineering professionals who need (re)training to qualify for jobs in the current market.
I’ve been in company training courses a lot of times, but this is really the first Serious Training that Has A Big Test at the End that Actually Means Something since I was doing teaching credential work back in the (mumbleearly90smumble). So I’m feeling mildly stressed about the situation (more because of the certification test that will follow, as it seems to rely mostly on regurgitation of words and lists and stuff like that, rather than actual conceptual understanding, which is where i tend to do better).
Still, it’ll keep me out of trouble and off the streets. And be almost like a real job. 🙂
I also get a week-long ITIL Foundations class out of the deal (with certification testing, too), later in May. Oh, boy!
Best wishes and have fun!
+Susan Starks
Have fun. Hell, you could probably teach the class.
Feel free to commiserate with +Stan Pedzick
So the week of classes was long and fire-hosey, but also informative and educational, and I ended up at a 70.5% on the final 4-hour test exam, which is apparently a good score and the instructor encouraged me to take the test ASAP.
So I went home and put together the application, which includes all sorts of documentation about 4500 hours of project management over the last 8 years, which I was able to piece together / SWAG / hypothesize … but all in a way that I felt was ethically defensible. Finished the application, felt powerful, hit Enter …
… and was informed that my submission had been selected for a random audit … so I need to provide documentation for my BA, and also get all the managers I identified for those projects to verify that, yeah, those were certainly the hours I worked on the projects. All via snail-mail.
Sigh.