Oduwa Osagiede, PMP®
Oduwa Osagiede is an excellent student here at Boston University Metropolitan College. Originally from West Africa, he currently lives in the Boston area. Already holding a bachelor’s and master’s degree in engineering, Oduwa, like many of our Metropolitan College students, is a practitioner, currently employed by Schneider Electric as a product manager.
In that role, he is able to navigate the intersection of engineering, marketing and sales. As one can tell from his certification, his current academic passion is in the arena of project management and its extension into program and portfolio management. In fact, Oduwa is one of the students in the pilot offering of AD782, Project Value Strategies. Oduwa enjoys traveling and spending time with his wife and kids.
I spoke with him about his accomplishment, and here’s what he had to say:
“Passing the PMP Exam was a personal achievement. I’m currently pursuing a master’s degree in Project Management, with focus on Program and Portfolio management. In my journey as a student, I have had the pleasure of being taught by some of the best instructors in the field of project management: The foundational AD642 Project Management course was taught by Professor Maltzman, AD644 Risk and Cost Management was taught by Professor Carl Belack, and AD646 Program Management was taught by Professor Kanabar. Teachings in these courses have been instrumental in shaping my knowledge and the understanding of effective project management, and it certainly helped in passing the PMP Exam.
Preparing for the PMP Exam wasn’t as stressful as I initially thought. First, I assessed myself to determine my strengths and weaknesses in the various knowledge areas, and then I created a plan that was tailored to my study habits and availability in order to be well rounded for the exam. Overall, I believe I spent about 100 hours to prepare for the exam — spanning a period of 2 months. It’s important to be well rounded for the exam as the exam questions are random and it could sometimes be weighted towards certain knowledge areas. I read some online resources, but my best-bang-for-the-buck was Rita Mulcahy’s PMP Exam Prep book that I purchased, and I would recommend this book to anyone that is preparing for the PMP exam. Professor Kanabar’s PMP Exam bootcamp was also very useful. The bootcamp met, virtually, once a week and we went over different knowledge areas and concepts, including how to decipher questions in the exam.
A week before the exam, I focused on taking lots and lots of practice exam questions. Overall, I answered over 2,000 exam questions in preparation for the exam. For the exam, it’s important to establish a good pace and train yourself enough to avoid mental fatigue.”
Congratulations and well-deserved, Oduwa!