Filling the PMI-ACP Exam Application Form – Job Experience Description Sample

In the PMI-ACP® Certificate application form, candidates are requested to include details of their project experiences in Agile (and traditional) projects.

PMI-ACP® applicants must have:

• at least 2,000 hours working on project teams within the last 5 years; AND
• at least 1,500 hours working on Agile project teams or with Agile methodologies within the last 3 years.

In addition to the project title, duration, company, sponsors/managers/supervises/etc. and the role in the project, PMI-ACP® candidates are required to include a description about each individual project included in the PMI-ACP® application in around 1000 characters.

This posts a bit headache to the applicants, especially if the applicant is not a PMP holder. Does PMI require a long essay with detailed descriptions of everything about the project? Luckily NOT.

But PMI will ask the applicants to rewrite the job descriptions if not considered satisfactory. “How to write a good enough job description for the PMI-ACP® Exam application” is always a top FAQ of PMI-ACP® Exam but PMI does not answer the question.

Tips on Writing PMI-ACP® Job Experience Description

With my experience in writing the job descriptions for both my PMP and PMI-ACP® Exam, I would guess the number one thing PMI looks for is your understanding about the project management methodologies according to PMI’s eyes. Below are some tactics I employed to write my PMI-ACP® and PMP Job Experience descriptions:

• Include the objectives, deliverables / outcomes and your personal role in the project
  • Your personal role is particular important as PMI does not need to know the detailed vision and mission of the project. However, your involvement in the Agile project will help PMI judge whether you have the necessary experience to qualify for the PMI-ACP® exam.
• Make use of PMI terminology
  • for PMI-ACP® application, try to use more “Agile terms” to show PMI that you understand Agile, e.g. daily standup meeting, timebox, iteration, MMF
  • This would also show PMI that you are well prepared for the PMI-ACP® Exam.
• Can be written in point form to slim down your description to meet the character limits
  • No need to be in paragraphs or complete sentences.
  • Though this is not a test of your English writing skills, you should double check to make sure the description is free from spelling or grammatical mistakes.
• Touch on every aspect / process / stage of the project
  • No need to include details of everything of every stage / process, but show that you are involved in the project and you know intimately what you are doing.

My PMI-ACP® application have been successfully accepted by PMI without hassles and the project descriptions for the Agile projects included in my application form are documented below with the hope that it may help some PMI-ACP® aspirants.

PMI-ACP® Application Form Project Experience Description Samples

Traditional Project Experience Description Sample

The 2000 hours project team experience is waived as I am a PMP. If you are including “traditional” / “waterfall” project experience, you are advised to take reference to my PMP Job Experience Description Sample. I made use of the terms found in the PMBOK® Guide and my PMP application was accepted by PMI without questions.

Agile Project Experience Description Sample

I included two Agile projects in my application. Below are my Agile Project Experience Description Samples:

Agile Project 1

Project Role:
Designer and Developer

Description: 
The project aimed at creating a information system to share and organize activity information. The design/interface of the website was developer iteratively over a series of UX testing and enhancements. The core features were incrementally added through each iteration. Shippable features (MMF) were released to production once testing was done and approval was sought from the customer.

Agile tools, techniques, knowledge skills and methods used on this project:

• Creation of project charter and product vision
• Agile planning and prioritization techniques Daily team stand-up meetings
• Frequent delivery and release (with a delivery schedule of 4 weeks)
• Frequent verification and validation with customer and end-users (e.g. A/B testing)
• Continuous Improvement of process and product

Agile Project 2

Project Role:
Designer and Developer

Description: 
The project is an ongoing revamp and redesign project for a website / web application. The website is
powered on LAMP stack and is used by visitors to search for information and solutions. A lot of tests
and enhancements are made to encourage user engagement through usability, design and feature
enhancements. The team is co-located. A number metrics are used to track the progress of the project.

Agile tools, techniques, knowledge skills and methods used on this project:

• Creation of project charter and product vision
• Agile planning and prioritization techniques
• Daily team stand-up meetings
• Frequent delivery and release (with a delivery schedule of 1-2 weeks)
• Frequent verification and validation with customer and end-users (e.g. A/B testing)
• Continuous Improvement of process and product

Summary: PMI-ACP® Application Project Description Sample

It is hoped that this article would give some assistance to PMI-ACP® aspirants to understand how to compose the Agile project experience description in their PMI-ACP® Certification application form in order to successful pass the completeness checking of PMI. Further tips, study resources and exam experience sharing on PMI-ACP® Exam can be found here.