PRINCE2 certification: anyone done it?

Devrij

Devrij

Devrij

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My gf wants to start a new career in Project management and has been looking at getting PRINCE2 qualifications to help her move in the right direction. Has anyone here done this themselves?

She's looking at e-learning courses she can do from home, and they range in price from £1.5k to £200, and I'm kinda wondering what the difference is when surely it's just the same syllabus and exams? She found a site called Knowledge Train that seems legit which is a lot cheaper than Reed's courses. Is Reed really expensive or is this Knowledge Train site a cheapo option to be avoided (I suspect the former)?

It's still a lot of money for us even if we went the cheap option, hence me asking you guys for advice(who I trust more than the mumsnet thread where we found the link :eek:)! Anyway, I'd love to hear your experiences/advie if you've done anything similar.
 
For £1500 you can get an instructor lead class so I wouldn't want to pay that much just for some e-learning!

Does she have any previous pm experience, is she after the practitioner or just the foundation?
 
Her best bet is starting a career in or around the area and working her way towards it. Maybe she has experience here anyway? If she shows she is keen in the industry and making progress she will get a PRINCE2 course off the firms back.

Personal experience - Had a basic 1 day overview and it blew my mind to be frank, swings and round a bouts.
 
I am a Prince2 practitioner, and it doesn't open the door to life as a PM as I stupidly thought it would...but I think people do take note, as it's not the easiest qualification to get.
 
Thanks guys. She's going to do the foundation and practitioner, and although she doesn't have any specific PM experience, she does have a management diploma and management experience she's hoping to leverage towards a PM position in the future.

What's the "entry level" equivalent for people starting off towards project management? IE, where do you start when you don't have the specific experience a business wants? Is there an Assistant project manager role she could use to get her foot in the door for instance?
 
You would normally start off as a project assistant, project support, project admin etc, but if she has management experience I wouldn't bother with that.
 
TheDean said:
You would normally start off as a project assistant, project support, project admin etc, but if she has management experience I wouldn't bother with that.
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Thanks, she's currently lead admin for the accounts dept in her business so project admin might be a good starting point if it turns out she needs more industry experience.

Thanks everyone for the feedback, and Lorraine (the other half) says thanks as well. It sounds like some cheap e-learning and exams and some entry level experience will be the way forwards for her.
 
My GF just finished doing the practitioner course. It's apparently not bad, just cramming loads for 2 or 3 days then a multiple choice exam at the end. There are generally mock exams to do in the evenings etc...
 
Just did the course a couple of months ago led by Q&A instructor.

Being a techie my main aim was to get the foundation bit. Its allot to take in over a week long course! - After 2 days we sat the foundation exam - which was pretty easy.

Another two days of battering over the head with a 20kg manual I was forced by work to sit the practitioner exam - God alone knows how I passed it!!! - It was rock hard (I ran out of time at the end and just blind ticked my way through a load of stuff lol!!)

Defo something worth adding to ones CV ;)
 
Dont accept the first quote from training companies. They will have some corporate folk on there paying full whack and if they can fill up any empty places at the last minute they will accept a fair discount! Latest price list from one company:

PRINCE2
Foundation - 2 Days - Course rate - £455
Foundation & Practitioner - 5 days - Course rate £725

I wouldnt expect to pay more than £450 for the practitioner.

As has been said, it wont get you straight on the PM ladder, but it's a requirement of some places so is a tick in the box. Not sure if i took the same course as some though, as i found it a bit of a doddle for the full lot.......... (same with MSP, MoR, ITIL V2/V3 etc)
 
Hi mate

Am a PRINCE2 qualified practitioner and also a contract Project PM.

Its worth it but experience is the key. As said above, you want to apply for Project Support, PSO, Junior PM, Junior PMO, Project Admin etc then get a few contracts under your belt and bobs your uncle. £500 per day ;)
 
Devrij said:
My gf wants to start a new career in Project management and has been looking at getting PRINCE2 qualifications to help her move in the right direction. Has anyone here done this themselves?
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Probably better to first get some experience working on projects within the domain she wants to work in rather than doing a 2 day course learning a small bit about how to manage them.

Also, in general, with things like this you're probably better just buying the relevant book(s) and simply paying for an exam.
 
dowie said:
Also, in general, with things like this you're probably better just buying the relevant book(s) and simply paying for an exam.
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TBH the PRINCE2 book/manual i have from the exams is very good.

Its all common sense stuff though:D
 
I've been managing projects in an IT setting for a while now and it's difficult to recommend Prince2 as a way of opening doors to this kind of career. I've got practitioner but what i find is that you are often led by the amount of structure that a customer is willing to buy into. If Prince2 is treated as a library of techniques that you can dip into depending on the size of the piece of work then it's much more useful.

I'd look at getting the foundation course, perhaps volunteer to manage some work packages on other projects and build up to PM that way. I'd also personally look at building up experience on structure and ways of thinking ahead of Prince2. If you have a solid foundation of structured thinking and a methodical approach to breaking down a problem then you're in a lot better position if the Prince2 approach doesn't give you what you need.

/ramble
 
PRINCE2 won't do anything to 'get' you a career or open doors. It's just a certification to have if you want to progress higher on PM, kind of a 'validation' stamp that you do know what you're talking about.

If she has the option to study it and just pay for the exam then do just that. The whole teaching/course/whatever is pretty much 99% verbatim telling you what's in the book. There's no trick or secret in studying, you just need to learn the lot. So save your money, study alone the book and go take the exam.

More than anything though, starting with PRINCE2 without any experience is useless. You need to have some work experience so you can get your head around the ideas and rules, otherwise it's a wholly theoritical construct that will be foreign to your gf. You need experience first!
 
Going on the full course at the start of October (thanks work!), which is handy as I have 3 years experience and my previous employer kept fobbing me off whilst sending people who had no involvement in projects on the course. :rolleyes:
 
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