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Am I ready for PSM1?

Last post 10:32 am June 2, 2015 by Manas Bhardwaj
19 replies
08:05 am February 14, 2013

Hi community,

I started totally fresh with scrum 2 weeks ago. We need a PSM1 at work and I get asked if I would like to learn this.

So I started reading the guide, all sites mentioned in other posts here and which I could find on the web.

I am still reading stuff, and since 3 days I do several open assesments here and free tests at testtakeronline.com.

All with more then 95%.

What do you think? Am I ready for doing the PSM1 assesment? I mean, with the above knowledge about me, is there any good chance I could handle this assesment with the first try?

Or would it be better to spend 20$ at testtakeronline for the package with 350 questions?

Any comment would be very appreciated! Thanks!


Cheers,
Thomas


05:08 pm February 14, 2013

It would be better to let your skills bed down with experience. I'd say it takes at least a year working on a Scrum team to provide a suitable grounding for PSM I.

It's certainly possible to cram for the exam and pass it in a few weeks, or even a few days, but is that really the goal your employer is setting you?


11:27 pm February 14, 2013

I made myself not clear sorry. I am already working with scrum, as a part of the development team since 9 months or so. Starting fresh should mean with the guide and the other stuff that is to learn. Sorry english is not my native language.


08:06 am February 15, 2013

Be Agile!

Do the exam, inspect it, adapt it ;-)

I didn't do the testtakeronline and passed it as well.

Goodluck!


11:08 am March 3, 2013

Ready? i do the Asset test always 100% and miss the real Test with 84% and 82%.

Good Luck!!


01:36 am March 5, 2013

Hi,

I cleared PSM 1 few days before without any course ( as there was no course available in North India). I study Scrum Guide regularly for 15 days and go through articles available on net.

Apart from this , i had around 2 years of experience as Scrum master which helped me in clearing this test.


12:13 pm March 5, 2013

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your answers. I already passed PSM1 at the first try with 90% a week ago :)


03:23 pm March 23, 2013

Did you hang out with testtakeronline.com? Or you didn't need it?


09:25 am April 6, 2013

You know when you're ready when you do the open assesment without reading the multiple choice questions and you can give the answer. It's a good excercize to get your lean compass pointing north. The actual PSM I exam has some of the open test quests and also alot of questions you havn't seen before.


12:25 pm April 6, 2013


Posted By Ahmad Adel Gad on 23 Mar 2013 03:23 PM
Did you hang out with testtakeronline.com? Or you didn't need it?


I did, and it helped a lot :)


11:33 am May 8, 2013

I cleared PSM-I with 94% today.
I worked on scrum with my previous employer and I think its one of the most wonderful thing in the world.
Looking forward to appear for PSM-II soon.


03:44 pm May 9, 2013


Posted By Amit Malik on 08 May 2013 11:33 AM
I cleared PSM-I with 94% today.
I worked on scrum with my previous employer and I think its one of the most wonderful thing in the world.
Looking forward to appear for PSM-II soon.



Congrats Amit. I would like to hear your PSM I Exam preparation and materials which you have used .

Looking forward to hear from you soon...

Best,
Krishna


02:34 am February 18, 2014

Could you please send me useful material to prepare for the exam? I have passed a lot of online tests and read 10 times the Guide. Thank you for your help! for contact migenkova@gmail.com


10:39 am June 3, 2014

I had previously worked agency side on agile web projects as a PM and then moved to working client side. I didn't take a course but did spend months attending a local scrum user group to get into the scrum vibe and way of thinking. I took the open assessment many times over and often over the months and kept reading the guide. I also bought a book from Amazon which was a complete waste of money.

The best bit of prep I did was to discover the unknown being the actual PSM1 exam! Once I had exposed myself to that, the fear and uncertainty was removed and my thinking was then finely tuned to pass the second time. The exam did accurately assess my strengths and weaknesses which you can't really deny.

Have to admit that the fire lit up in my belly after the first attempt and I become very focused on this and not a lot else at work in the week or so leading up to the second successful attempt after the first go. Also I took it the second time at work on a quiet Friday afternoon on the spur of the moment. Much better than building it up for something at home and a big deal over the weekend I would say.


09:46 am January 22, 2015

Thanks for all who contributed on this and similar threads. I'm happy to add my experience.

1. Attended in-person 2-day courses Intro to Scrum, Product Owner, Scrum Master from http://www.agilesparks.com/
2. Learned Agile Coaching by running our coaching team using Scrum, and learning for ourselves and when coaching software development teams with regular reference to http://scrumtrainingseries.com/
3. Transformed 10 development teams to Scrum over a year's time
4. Read Ken Rubin's Essential Scrum
5. Read this and similar forum threads
6. Spent maybe 3 hrs/day x 2 days re-reading The Scrum Guide, taking all the Scrum.org open assessments, with multiple runs of the Scrum open assessment until I was at 100% repeatably. I took advice from forum posts to read about burndown charts to make absolutely sure I hadn't missed anything about them. (I hadn't -- they're pretty simple.) Also took testtakeronline's free PSM1 prep test several times -- good for the tricky multiple-selection question format of the real test, and a wider variety of questions. And the http://webgate.ltd.uk/scrum-aide-memoir/ was helpful as a final review.

With that, I passed the PSM1 test on the first try in about 40 minutes with a score of 95%.

Extra notes about taking the test:

Be very aware that as soon as you've answered all questions, the "dangerous" FINISH button becomes active. Make sure NOT to click it by reflex, but rather to leave lots of time to review questions before finishing.

The bookmark feature was useful and sufficient for me. I bookmarked any question where I was not sure of my answer, and went back and reviewed just those. I don't think I changed any of my answers, but it was comforting to review those. I did NOT review questions that I had been sure of first time 'round, because my experience is usually one's first answer is the right one. The bookmark table was also useful for highlighting one question I'd forgotten to answer -- probably double-clicked "next" by mistake earlier. I was able to click the question number, answer it, and continue with my review.

After I had reviewed all bookmarked questions, I looked again at the remaining time, decided I'd done the best I could, and clicked "FINISH".

Result: 95% (means 4 questions wrong out of 80).

The breakdown it gave me showed that my performance matched my actual work experience: I got 100% in the "Scrum Theory and Principles" and "Coaching & Facilitation" categories, which makes sense for my having been an Agile Coach!

Questions welcome!

Tom Harris
www.talkaboutquality.com


01:23 pm March 24, 2015

Passing PSM is not easy. There are many classroom courses.
But there are some options to get certified without attending in classroom courses.
I tried one and I good an excellent grade with 5 day preparation.
There is one PSM I Self Study course which I think is one of the best. I could pass my exam with guide of this course. It includes everything you need.
Their Agile/Scrum trainers also will be available to answer your technical questions while you’re studying.
http://mplaza.pm/product/psm-exam-p...elf-study/
Also you can find some free Material related to PSM in their website.
If you need more help send me an email.
Regards,
Rouzbeh


02:45 pm March 25, 2015

> I recommend...1)Take a PSM self study course. http://mplaza....psm-exam-p...elf-study/

Said by the guy who works at MgmtPlaza. Sir, your deception is unprofessional and disgraceful. I'm ashamed for you.


02:46 pm March 25, 2015

Literally a sales guy for MP... lol.

https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=152491927


04:56 pm March 26, 2015

I've written about passing the PSM I test here:

http://agileanswerman.com/question-how-do-you-pass-the-professional-scr…

TL;DR = Get some experience as a scrum master, study the scrum guide daily (seeking to UNDERSTAND the artifacts, practices and roles), know the agile manifest inside and out, and finally practice using the open assessment.

Good luck!

Ryan Ripley
agileanswerman.com
@ryanripley


10:32 am June 2, 2015

There is no ready-made formula for success in any field and same applies here while you try to attempt get the certificate for Professional Scrum Master.

However, the PSM1 is not very difficult on it's own. I have written my experience here:

http://manasbhardwaj.net/pass-professional-scrum-master-psm-certificati…


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