Articles
Top 10 Most Common Reasons People Fail in CBAP
by Ananya P. Co-founder“Hey, I am looking for some guidance on CBAP certification. I gave it a
couple of attempts, once in earlier 2017 and the recent one was two days back.
I failed twice and it is so disheartening and demotivating. I really want to be
CBAP certified as I have 10 + years of Business analysis experience”
I just have one more chance to go for the test
before my application and chance to sit for CBAP expires this year. Can you
suggest what should be my strategy to prepare for CBAP?”
This is the email we received a few days back from
one aspiring CBAP.
Till now, I have been blogging about how to be
successful in CBAP certification exam but the above mail and few other such
emails prompted me to write a blog on the common reasons for failure in the
CBAP certification exam.
Of course, there was success post training and a
good preparation strategy in place, on the third attempt.
Many professionals approach us after being
unsuccessful in CBAP so we thought of doing some analysis to come up with the
most common reasons of failure in CBAP.
There are many articles and blogs giving tips on how
to pass the CBAP exam but on a first search, I didn’t find any article
explaining why people fail in CBAP.
This will definitely help the CBAP aspirants to make
sure that they don’t repeat the mistakes.
1. Inadequate Experience for CBAP
Many times professionals get tempted to go straight
for CBAP, even if they are not ready yet for the same in terms of skill and
knowledge.
Though as per eligibility conditions of IIBA, CBAP
requires about 5 years of business analysis experience; sometimes we have seen
professionals stretching themselves to go for CBAP with barely 4 years of
business analysis experience.
It’s always advisable to go for CBAP with at least
5.5 years of business analysis experience. The CBAP v3 examination requires a
good amount of business analysis experience as well as knowledge of BABoK v3
since the questions are case-based. This requires the ability to correlate the
knowledge of BABoK to the given case and answer accordingly.
Hence business analysis experience as an active BA
is essential for clearing this exam.
2. Expecting direct questions from BABoK
This is another reason why many people fail, though
they have the required experience they don’t prepare with the right resources
or to be specific with the right kind of questions.
Many times they expect direct questions from BABoK.
This was the case in CBAP v2 based exam but that’s
not true anymore for CBAP v3.
The CBAP v3 questions are case study-based (i.e.
longer cases (1-1.5 pages) of information) with multiple questions about the
case. It is competency-based and aligned with BABOK Guide Version 3.
It doesn’t have any direct questions from the BABoK.
Many cases people are misguided by the exam and
questions pattern, they prepare from questions which are direct from BABoK on
input, output, techniques etc and scenario based questions.
Unfortunately, CBAP v3 doesn’t have such questions
and hence they are taken aback during the exam with the questions being much
longer and complex.
3. Overemphasizing on remembering BABoK
One participant was lost with her result of failure
and shared her preparation recently with us,” I literally remember each word of
BABoK, but still failed to clear CBAP. I failed 3 times already and I am not
sure what could be the right preparation strategy for my retake”
This was sad for us to hear her story.
The first thought was how someone can remember 500+
pages of content.
This sounded dreadful to us.
One needs to understand that it’s important to
understand and assimilate BABoK rather than remembering.
One need to understand the tasks, techniques well
and the interrelationship with each other.
4. Lack of proper understanding of BABoK
terminologies and expectation
It’s important to know the terms used in
BABoK and relating it to the terms used in your organization
This is so much true in case of BABoK v3 since there
is a significant enhancement in the standard.
There is a significant enhancement that has happened
from BABoK v2 to BABoK v3, which is great.
The highlights of the enhancements are:
- Introduction
of 18 new techniques
- Rephrasing
of the old techniques
- A lot more
explanation
- Many more
perspectives
At the same time, it also has added significant
complexity in terms of the language used in the standard.
For example one of the key terms that you encounter
in BABoK v3 is business analysis information.
This was called requirements plus other information
related to BABoK in BABoKv2.
Now we are going to call this BA information which
you may not hear so much about your work. That’s the challenge that many of us
face because the terminology used in BABoK v3 isn’t very close to what we use
in our workplace.
That requires some extra effort in trying to
memorize and make one familiar with these new terms.
See a video on the BABoK v3 terms here
https://youtu.be/a2qU8DnxOzM
Hence one needs to make himself/herself familiar
with the terms used in BABoK v3 to pass the CBAP examination.
5. Poor Time Management
Time management is one of the key skills for
clearing CBAP.
Some quick facts on the CBAP exam:
- Duration –
3.5 hours
- Number of
questions – 120 with a mix of around 50+ case-based questions and around
70 scenario based questions
- Scenarios –
short cases
- Case-based
questions – about 1 to 1.5 pages long cases
- Multiple
questions on the case
- Some
mathematical calculation based questions like ROI calculation etc.
- Case-based
questions require significantly more time compared to rest of the
questions
- Cases
require reading a lot of content and information given; hence it’s
important to keep track of time spent on these questions.
- It’s
suggested to glance through the case first before moving over to the
questions and then come back to the case to go through the details and
answer accordingly.
- Many a time
the cases may contain information which may seem relevant but that
information is not needed to answer the questions.
Hence most of the times people struggle to manage
time in this examination unless one is aware of the time management tips.
6.
Getting stressed based on the initial
difficulty level of questions
Most
of the exams have this kind of an approach; the initial few questions are
intentionally kept of a higher order of difficulty to test the candidate’s
confidence and ability to handle the harder questions.
This also tries to test the candidate’s ability to
maintain the right mental aptitude to answer the rest of the exam questions.
Many exam takers get tense and lose their mental
balance seeing the initial level of difficulty of the questions.
And the initial stress negatively affects the
performance and ultimately leads to failure.
7. Underestimating the exam complexity
“I have around 12+ years of business analysis
experience; I know this profession and its intricacies thoroughly.
Hence this is going to be a cakewalk for me” – This
is what some exam takers feel about the exam.
Underestimating the exam, its rigor and hence being
under prepared is also one of the reasons for failure in CBAP.
Working
experience as a BA definitely helps in clearing
this exam but that’s not the only thing needed to achieve the CBAP goal.
One also needs to dedicate time to prepare from
BABoK and CBAP v3 mock questions to be able to clear the exam.
8. Inadequate preparation
There are various reasons why one may not be
adequately prepared for the exam, some of which are given below:
- Going for
the exam too soon
- Not finding
adequate time to prepare
- Not being
guided by a right mentor or coach
- Not preparing from the right resources
9. Inadequate Questions Preparation
It’s important to know the concepts well for CBAP
and at the same time, it’s important to solve enough of sample CBAP questions
to make one prepared for the exam.
Doing either of them and missing the other is going
to lead to failure.
It’s also important to pick up sample questions
which are of similar complexity to the real exam and can give one the real
feeling of the exam.
Many times certification seekers practice from
questions which are easier/simpler than the real exam and that makes them get
cold feet during the exam.
Hence please look for reviews and success rate
before choosing the sample questions set.
10. Over-reliance on one’s own BA
experiences being the single most factor to help them pass the exam
“I have been heading the business analysis team in
my organization
I lead a team of 10 business analysts”
“I have set up the business analysis practice in my
organization and also for many of my clients”
These are some of the statements we have heard from
some certification seekers.
They underestimate the exam and the preparation
needed and hence do not achieve their certification goal.
They rely primarily on knowing the business analysis
practices to clear the CBAP exam.
One also needs to dedicate time to prepare from
BABoK and CBAP v3 mock questions to be able to clear the exam.
Summary
This is only a suggested set of reasons why people
usually fail in CBAP; this is not necessarily the entire set of reasons why
people fail in CBAP.
This
set is provided as a guideline to help people to not to repeat these mistakes
and in turn help them to pass the certification exam.
About Adaptive US
Adaptive
US provides CBAP, CCBA, ECBA, and other business analysis certification
training online and consulting needs for Individual or
Corporate either online or offline. Adaptive US is an endorsed education
provider of IIBA®
Learn
more about this training here: http://www.adaptiveus.co
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About Ananya P. 
Co-founder
4 connections, 0 recommendations, 19 honor points.Joined APSense since, June 1st, 2018, From Edmond, United States.
Created on Sep 20th 2018 01:32. Viewed 549 times.
