If you have landed in this page, a big
congratulations. As it means that you
are planning/planned or doing your CPMAI Exam Prep. The beginning of all things is small!
I am super thrilled and excited to share
that I have cleared my PMP- PMI- CPMAI on my first attempt on 18 Jan 2026. Ticking off one of the items in my bucket
list this year!
If I can do it, You can definitely do
too! Read through to know why!
10 things I did to clear CPMAI in
first attempt!
1. Step 1 Tentatively plan a week when
you want to achieve this certification.
I have put together a self-goal to achieve this in 90 days starting
beginning of Nov 2025. This gave me
enough time to carefully plan my study timetable without impacting my work or
personal life. Draft a weekly plan on what you want to finish and try to stick
to it with a threshold of 10% variance.
2. Step 2- Go through the preparatory
course to get a high level view of the free course in PMI - Free Introduction:
PMI Certified Professional in Managing AI (PMI-CPMAI)
3.
Step 3 is to register for the
CPMAI course study and exam in the PMI.ORG.
And start the course which is around 22 hours of study of the concepts
in detail. Make notes of the core
concepts and visual boards for reference.
4.
Step 4 - Go through the Summary after each Module in
detail. I copied that to a separate Word doc that I can refer back before the
exam. Now mark the concepts that you
need some guidance or clarifications and any terminology that you are not able
to understand
5.
Step 5- Find a mentor. I found Sanal Mathew John, my colleague and
well-wisher ready to guide me and I am lucky I had chosen his expertise without
second thoughts and his Master class in Udemy and Practice Tests. Whenever I felt stuck,
either theoretically on the courseware or emotionally on the motivation levels,
he was there to push me and guide me appropriately
6.
Step 6 - Complete the CPMAI Course study in 30-45 days
maximum, without diluting further. I
prepared the list of questions / clarifications I needed at this stage for
review with my mentor
7.
Step 7- Master Class - I attended the 3 hours online master class by
Sanal. He explained the concepts briefly
covering the entire course ware in 3 hours, in smaller chunks of info to
grasp. It was a like a ready reckoner
and refresher to the 30 hours of PMP modules before I started the Mock Exams
practice
8.
Step 8 - Now decide on the date of the exam- Go ahead and fix with the nearest prometric
testing center. I chose a weekend
afternoon so that I can balance with my work.
And morning gave me sometime to quickly review the concepts before the
exam and also have a good night of sleep.
Also the day before the exam, I had one to one session with my mentor,
to get a clear understanding of the areas I was not sure. This helped me to feel more confidence
9.
Step 9 - This is the most important stage. I took up the Mock Exams of Sanal,
practice sets 1, 2, 3 in practice mode.
Mock 4 was the difficult level, but I challenged myself to do it as it
will give you indepth understanding and testing of the concepts. Mock 5 was closer to the new ECO (Exam
Content Outline). This gave me
confidence that I am aware of the concepts.
Next I did all the mocks once again in Exam Mode to test my preparedness
with timer on. Trust me it was not easy
the first time. But I kept redoing the
mocks to improve my speed in attempting the exam, getting more familiar with the type of exam
questions, learning tricks and tips like
knocking off the incorrect answers first, first read the question in ask for
lengthy questions, trying to memory map
on the concepts, with examples Sanal explained in Master class. Above all staying focused for 120 questions,
without distraction was achieved by practice.
Sanal told me that I was prepared when I scored 80% in the mocks. But I
pushed myself to get minimum 95% in all the mocks before I finally felt ready
for the exam. Version 8 did not have
much of technical questions except for 4 or 5 algorithms basics.
10. Step 10. Finally the day
arrived. Eat properly, sleep well the
night before (I went off to sleep by 10 pm),
do some breathing exercise to wade away stress and meditation to bring
in a good focus. Tell all your prayers
to feel faith intervening. Two days
before the exam I went on a digital phone detox mode, keeping calls bare
minimum for family emergencies, not
getting distracted to news or festivities around, and keeping my mind
calm. It was important to tell your family to support you and keep distractions bare minimal. I went to the Centre almost an hour early,
took the ID card without fail, digital
copy of the PMP Pearson VEU testing center appointment, in comfortable clothing
and water to have in a break.
1.
During the exam, mark the
questions for review if you are not sure.
2.
Strikethrough the answers you
are sure are not applicable.
3.
Highlight the alternative
closest answer that makes you thing
could be the answer.
4.
Keep an eye on the timer only
once in half hour. Just focus on the
questions and answering.
5.
Once you finish all the
questions answering once, take a quick short break and have some water. Come back and click on the review questions
list and go through. Here is the trick. 90% of the times, the answer you gave first
time could be the right one. So think
deeply, evaluate clearly before you change the answer at this stage.
6.
Once you are done, atleast 10
mins before the timer goes off, be brave!
Just go and click the crazy Finish Button. 30 seconds before the exam result will be the
longest 30 seconds ! But Alas, the
screen flashed saying- Congratulations!
I closed my eyes, in gratitude to Almighty, Parents, My husband (who waited outside the exam centre for full time just to assure that he is with me in this journey) , my sisters and dear daughter and son in law (my lucky charms) and especially my mentor Sanal Mathew John and my first PMP mentor Krishnan Vadivel who pushed me to pursue Project Management 25 years back!
I called my cousin and happily shouted ‘Athaaaaaa, naaaa passs ayitheyen!” - Crazy me
Now on -If I can do it, You can definitely do! - Why So?
1.
I am going to be 50 this year. When I first took up PMP, almost 15-16 years
ago, I was young, focused and with great memory. With age comes wisdom, but also equal
challenges – with memory draining, focus no longer on 3 hours movies but
limited to 30 seconds reels and this is definitely time consuming compulsory
study hours to do. But I realized, age is
just a number. If you have a strong will
and focus, you can surely do it!
2.
My health is a challenge. After the left MCA occlusion that almost
paralyzed me in 2022, and having week right limbs, disturbed right eye vision,
brain fog has become a regular thing.
To survive this journey without major headaches, or brain going blank
after a certain amount of study stress, was not easy. But meditation, chanting and motivation from
the best mentor I had, kept me going.
3.
Diabetic condition. It is quite tricky when you have diabetic
challenges but once you sit through practice exams, and tune your body and mind
to align, you can definitely do this despite any physical challenges you may
have.
4.
Motivation - From someone who was a Global Program
Director of a Data Office (yes, you heard it right- I was a Data Evangelist and Data Governance
Expert in my last work – as part of Strategy and Transformation in ATOS and to be going back to being a Project
Manager (the role I did almost 18 years ago) is no easy task emotionally. It needed courage, wisdom and acceptance
to reality. AI is new and it is time to embrace the change. Being egoistic of the past is not going to
help you. Being prepared for the future
is the key. I had to actually unlearn,
relearn and continuously keep learning in this process. Just stay focused on why you want to do
this. Just be sure that no learning is
going to go waste.
5.
Typical DIKUW pyramid of
life -
Data (all your years of experience),
Information (understand the impact of the data you have), Knowledge ( what all you need to know), Understanding ( relate what you read to the
live examples around you) and Wisdom ( the final point of making the best of
everything you learnt) will make you
achieve not just this goal but anything you want to achieve in life!
Wishing you all the very best!
