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(Please Enable Images - otherwise all the content in images will not be shown)
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October Newsletter
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This month, we added audio summaries to the site.
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Each topic page now features a new “Study Booster” audio summary. They are designed specifically for busy PMP aspirants to reinforce key concepts through passive learning. Each episode offers concise discussions on essential ECO topic concepts. They are perfect for on-the-go listening or as a refreshing break from traditional study methods. Listen to gain extra insights, boost your recall, and stay motivated as you prepare for the PMP exam.
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Managing Exam Stress
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Undercover Mole’s Top 10 Study Tips for Managing Exam Stress
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Undercover Mole is featured in the PMillustrated book and provides exam-taking tips. Today, they are sharing some science-backed tips for managing exam stress.
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Exam preparation can be a challenging time, especially for adult learners, who have to balance their “real jobs”, families, and other responsibilities. Click the button below to navigate to the PMillustrated blog and read the latest article about the most effective strategies to reduce exam stress and optimize your study efforts:
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BS Bull PM Tip
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Sway Stakeholder Sentiment with Subliminal Messaging
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Using the PowerPoint text animation transitions “Appear” and “Disappear” with a transition time of 3 milliseconds is a great way to influence your executives or steering committee without them noticing.
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3 milliseconds is just long enough for the subconscious mind to absorb the message without their conscious mind noticing it on screen.
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Messages such as “The project is fine,” “Give Bully a pay rise,” and “This PM is awesome” are some of my favourites. Just be sure remove the animations before saving to your corporate file store.
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<Disclaimer: Please do not do this; it is not ethical or advised. >
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Behind the Scenes At PMillustrated
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I am often asked how I came up with the idea for PMillustrated and developed the animal cartoons. Here’s the backstory:
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During COVID my two main consulting clients were an airline and a hotel chain. They were severely impacted by the pandemic and let go their consultants, contractors and a large percentage of their regular staff too. So, having been involved with developing the PMP curriculum, the PMBOK Guide and the Agile Practice Guide, I thought I would teach PMP Exam preparation online. I took the Authorized Training Partner(ATP) training and was given access to the official PMP Exam Instructor Led Training materials. However, they were very text-heavy, had very few example deliverables, and were presented in a strange sequence. So, I created the training materials I wish had been provided.
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This meant lots of visuals and example deliverables. Simple explanations, animations, and the ability to navigate the content in any order. Quizzes and badges to track progress and gamify learning. Basically, creating engaging content that would be more fun to complete than reading theory and doing practice question after practice question.
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I had been working with a great illustrator for my blog, Leading Answers, for 15+ years who had also developed all the images for my last two books (Agile Illustrated - which also featured cartoons, and Beyond Agile - which features his images). It's a fun process because he lives in Argentina and while his English is so much better than my Spanish, we have some funny exchanges where I ask for an image of one thing and get back something entirely different. This helps me explain topics better to people who may have English as a second language.
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We sometimes work from my own drawings, a composition of images I find, or just text descriptions. Often, my ideas are too complex to show in one or two frames and he will come up with something simpler, and we go with that. For Task "2.1.3 Support the team to subdivide project tasks as necessary to find the minimum viable product" he had a go at creating an image just from the Task enabler title and initially suggested the following:
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Which picked up on the words "subdivide" and "team" but did not really show finding the MVP unless the goal was to transport the babies someplace. Our collaboration process is back and forth via email and my feedback for this image was:
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The next round of sketches came back with this:
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This was a great improvement and shows what he can do with just a couple of sentences of description. My feedback was:
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This looked good as a sketch and eventually became the image on the website.
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This process was repeated for the 133 enabler images and another 20 times for the mind map poster. It occurred in the throws of COVID, emailing back and forth each day talking about possums, bears and crocodiles. It was a strange time spent between trying to find work and making progress on the illustrations for the website and book. Not sure if the website would ever get completed or if the concept would be a hit or a flop.
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The work was iterative and incremental. The changes on this image are typical, others went back and forth more than a dozen times. The project remains a labor of love that I never expect to recoup the illustration costs on, let alone the time I invested in it, but I feel strongly there should be better alternatives to dry, boring textbooks.
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November Plans
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I will eventually create the final Practice Path for the Business Environment domain and continue developing the sample exams with detailed feedback.
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Until then, I hope you enjoy the site. Please continue to share your testimonials and enjoy studying visually for your PMP exam.
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Hear from Our Satisfied Learners
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Your peers are loving PMillustrated.com! Check out the new testimonials section to read about their transformative experiences and successes. Let their stories inspire your own PMP journey. Also, please submit your own testimonial. Social proof is more important than ever. So, share your thoughts on PMillustrated in the testimonial section.
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Thanks
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Your study to become a certified Project Management Professional is a journey I take seriously, in a fun way. These new features are designed to make your learning experience not just effective but enjoyable and engaging. I can't wait for you to try them out and hear your thoughts.
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Happy Learning and Exploring,
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Mike Griffiths, creator PMillustrated.com
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