Appendix A

Looking into PRINCE2 Qualifications

The PRINCE2 qualifications are at two levels: Foundation Certificate and Practitioner Certificate. The Foundation Certificate concerns basic knowledge of the method and how it fits together, and Practitioner Certificate indicates that the holder is able to apply PRINCE2 to a project. Of the two, the Practitioner Certificate has more value and is increasingly recognised worldwide. The Foundation Certificate is of very limited value, because it doesn’t show any proficiency in using PRINCE2 and in fact the Foundation syllabus doesn’t cover all of the method. You need to pass the Foundation Exam before going on to take the Practitioner but if you do them on a training course you can do them both during the same training event.

Choosing PRINCE2 Training

Although the Practitioner Certificate is an indication of practical knowledge of PRINCE2, it is only that. Unfortunately, many qualified practitioners know little about using the method effectively, often because their training was focused on how to pass the exam rather than use the method well on projects. Many practitioners learn about PRINCE2 structure and documentation and return to their organisations to set up a very bureaucratic, form-filling application of PRINCE2 and have no real idea about adapting the method to suit different project needs.

If you want to go on a training course to back up the information that you gained from this book, select your training company with great care. Choose one that covers the practical and flexible use of the method on projects, with tutors who have good experience of using PRINCE2 on projects rather than just general project management experience. That way you get a thorough knowledge of the method and also the confidence that you can go back and use PRINCE2 on your projects, use it well and make the method really pay for itself. That’s very different from theory and ‘exam cram’.

Accreditation is a minimum standard, not a uniform standard, and a common misconception is that all accredited PRINCE2 training courses and training companies are the same. In fact, course objectives, standards, and the practical experience of trainers in actually using PRINCE2 vary significantly.

Looking at Sample Papers

Sample papers are available from training organisations but not past papers. Unlike many exams that run once or twice a year, the PRINCE2 exams run about once a week. Writing 50 or more complete papers each year would be a huge effort, so the questions in the pool are re-used. The PRINCE2 exam boards don’t release the past papers because the past papers are also the future papers!

The Foundation Exam

The Foundation exam lasts one hour and comprises 75 multiple-choice questions. Of the 75, five will be new questions being checked out by the exam board. They don’t count, but you won’t know which five they are. The pass mark is 35; so 50 per cent of the 70 live questions. The exam is closed book, which means you can’t have help or refer to the PRINCE2 manual. Wrong answers aren’t penalised; they just don’t score a mark. A good strategy if you don’t know the answer to a particular question is to guess. With four options, you have a 25 per cent chance of hitting the right answer.

The exam doesn’t have trick questions as such, but the wording of some questions can be rather tricky, so read each question very carefully.

A typical Foundation question looks like this:

What is the name of the PRINCE2 product that may be used by a team member to inform the Project Manager of a problem?

A. Risk Identification Form

B. Issue

C. Checkpoint

D. Problem Report

In case you’re wondering, the correct answer is at the end of this Appendix.

The Practitioner Exam

The Practitioner exam lasts for two and a half hours and is also in multiple-choice format. However, the multiple-choice question styles vary – such as matching questions where you match items in one column against answers in another – and aren’t just the classic multiple choice like the Foundation exam.

The exam contains nine areas of questions, each on a different part of PRINCE2, so a paper doesn’t test all the method. Each area is worth 12 marks, so the paper has a total of 108 marks. In this exam, the pass mark varies to even out slight differences in the standards of the different papers. It will usually be between about 50 and 55 per cent, so you have to score 60 or more to be safe. This mark is across the whole paper; in other words, you don’t have to pass each of the nine sections and good marks in one area can compensate for weaker marks in another. Most of the questions are based on a project scenario that the paper provides with the questions. The scenario outlines a project and may have supplementary information that you need to use with specific questions. Some of the questions may be about the nature and structure of PRINCE2 itself, not the application to a particular project, such as the reasoning behind the PRINCE2 roles and responsibilities.

The Practitioner exam is open book, so you can take your PRINCE2 manual into the exam room. However, that means only your manual. You can’t take in any added sheets or sticky notes, though you can use tabs as a fast index to help find sections quickly.

Table A-1 shows a sample question in the ‘matching’ style of multiple-choice questions.

Column A lists a number of items of information. For each one, please select the PRINCE2 management product in Column B that would contain that information. An item in column B may be used for more than one answer or not at all. No marks are deducted for wrong answers.

Table A-1 Sample question
Column A	Column B
1. Proximity	A. Business Case
2. Method	B. Exception Report
3. Investment appraisal	C. Issue Report
4. Timescale	D. Risk Register
5. Decision	E. Quality Register
6. Expected dis-benefits	F. Highlight Report
7. Options
8. Impact analysis

You can find the correct answers at the end of this Appendix.

Staying Up to Date

The Practitioner qualification is valid for up to five years and you must take a top-up exam between three and five years after your last exam. However, the good news is that this top-up exam isn’t a full-sized Practitioner exam, but just one hour long and one-third the size of the initial Practitioner exam – three sections instead of nine.

Getting Qualified and Locating Exams

You can only gain the PRINCE2 qualifications by taking the exams – unlike the membership requirements for some of the professional project organisations there is no ‘project experience’ route to PRINCE2 Practitioner. APM Group Ltd currently administers these exams on behalf of the Office of Government Commerce, the UK government body that owns the PRINCE2 method.

Accredited training providers for PRINCE2, such as Inspirandum Ltd (www.inspirandum.com), can run exams for their clients in open (public) courses as well as for ‘in-company’ events. But you can also take exams arranged directly by APM Group Ltd. APM Group has a number of offices in different countries and you can find out more by visiting its Web site at www.apmgroup.co.uk. APMG are always very helpful so do contact them if you need any assistance with booking into one of their open exams.

Getting Help with the Exams

Exam guides are available including one from TSO called ‘Passing the PRINCE2 Examinations 2009’ and a more substantial one that includes strategy advice as well as revision and practice questions called ‘Passing Foundation and Practitioner’ that is available directly from Inspirandum (www.inspirandum.com).

Answers to the Sample Questions

Foundation: B – Issue

Practitioner: 1D, 2E, 3A, 4A, 5C, 6A, 7B, 8C

On the Practitioner answers, you may notice that A was the correct answer for a number of questions while F was not the correct answer to any of them. This follows the information in the question that an answer in column B may be used more than once or not at all.