A big congratulations to Perry Simpson who recently passed the Project Management Institute’s Certified Associate of Project Management exam after participating in Cheetah Learning’s 3 day CAPM accelerated prep course.
Perry is the Director of Government Business Development for The
Corporate Research Group in Ottawa, Ontario, Below he shares his reasons for pursuing the certification and what he learned in that pursuit.
Why did you want to get the CAPM certification?
As a member of the management team for a company that’s revenue
is entirely generated from consulting on government contracts, I noticed
that an ever-growing number of RFP documentation was requiring all team
members to possess not only a university degree, but a professional
designation as well. One of the government Standing Offers our company
had won was specific to project management, and as luck would have it,
the Associate Vice President in charge of our Project Management
division was Mr. Frank Townson, PMP and Cheetah Instructor. Frank was
aware of the need for professional designations and recommended the CAPM
certification to the President of our company. As part of a select
group, I was asked to participate in Frank’s CAPM course. Were I to
attain the CAPM certification, my billable per-diem would more than
double. Obviously a strong reason to pursue the designation!
What did you learn by preparing for the CAPM exam “cheetah style?”
Personally, I learned that I had the ability to retain the
copious amounts of information with which Cheetah’s CAPM course
inundates the student, and the tenacity to put in the after hours effort
required to achieve the CAPM designation. I was able to take in enough
information from the PMBOK, in it’s entirety, to enable me to pass the
CAPM exam, and in only 3 full days of classroom instruction. I also
learned the benefits of taking different learning styles and combining
them for maximum memory retention. The MP3 players with PMBOK
terminology definitions, the memory mapping, the use of timed exams to
train you to work well under pressure, the tracking tool to enable you
to understand which questions you were confident with and which you
weren’t so you could go back and verify your responses, the test taking
tips which were instrumental, etc… To get all that and more into the
heads of the CAPM students in only 3 days is a daunting task, and Frank
Townson did an excellent job!!
How do you anticipate the CAPM will help your career?
As mentioned above, the CAPM has enabled my name to be added to
Standing Offers and contracts that require a professional designation,
and increased my value to my company. PMI’s designations are in demand,
whether it be PMP or CAPM. CAPM has taken my career to the next level
in it’s evolution.
Thank You Perry and Best of Luck In Your Career.
