How to clear PSM and PSPO Assessment Without Attending a Scrum.org Training

With many an organization now preferring Professional Scrum Master (PSM) and Professional Product Owner (PSPO) from scrum.org over other similar certifications, there has been a surge in enquiries around these certifications.

Unlike most of the other certification bodies, taking training from scrum.org is not mandatory to get yourself certified. If you already have enough experience and are looking to validate your scrum knowledge, then you just need to purchase an assessment code scrum.org and get yourself certified.

This being the case we get a lot of folks who ask how to clear PSM and PSPO certification without attending the training and hence this post.

There are multiple ways of clearing PSM-I and PSPO -I without attending trainings and here are a three of them –

1. I am neither endorsing nor guaranteeing but I know many people who swear by the website mlapshin.com that has helped them clear both PSM-I and PSPO -I assessments. Lately, I have been hearing of the website www.volkerdon.com which also seems to have a decent amount of questions that will help you clear the PSM-I and PSPO-I assessments. If you are curious to know, No, I am not getting paid for mentioning these websites nor am I promoting them.
2. There are a lot of folks both online and offline who are trying to create a brand for themselves doing free or almost free trainings and provide you with a bunch of questions they have collected which will help you clear the assessment. In return you need to endorse them on the online platforms – No, there are no free lunches.
3. Now if you are not looking for free lunches but more value then there are also training institutes that are selling Buy 1 Get 1 free offer. Here they give you a guarantee of clearing PSM-I or PSPO-I assessment if you buy one of their courses.

Now, why do I think none of the above actually makes any sense, especially an economic one?
Full disclosure before I answer that –

1. I am a Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) licensed by scrum.org to deliver PSM-I, PSM-II and PAL-E training.
2. I am a member of a company (agilemania.com) with offices in India and Malaysia and conducts scrum.org and many other certification training across India, Middle-East and South-East Asia.

Now to answer the question why not taking the training doesn’t make sense –
3 of the above-mentioned points seems to get you the PSM-I or the PSPO-I certification but

1.   With the number of PSM-I and PSPO-I certificate holders increasing by the day, your formal education (not discounting your experience, in any way) does help to distinguish yourself. Attending a training, gives the ability to display the class you attended in your scrum.org profile, which helps the organizations to validate your formal education. This entry in your scrum.org profile confirms that you have a sound understanding of scrum the way it was intended by the co-founder. It emphasizes the fact that you do understand the nuances of the scrum master / Product Owner role and are better equipped to take on the job of internal change agent or to maximize the ROI for the product line.
2.  When you attend a training, you automatically qualify for a free retake at the assessment in the unfortunate event that you don’t clear in the first attempt.
3. You also qualify for a 40% discount on your PSM-II assessment because you took the training from scrum.org PST.
4. So just by attending a PSM training, you get $150*2 (from 2 PSM-1 attempts) +$100 (40% PSM-II discount) totalling to $400 worth of value. That is with today’s conversion rate of INR75.6 to a dollar, you are getting INR 30240 worth of value by attending the training.
5. Ok, here is me marketing my company now – If you were to attend the training from Agilemania then you are eligible for a minimum of 10% discount on any future courses from Agilemania.

So by paying in the range of INR23,000 you are not only getting to understand scrum the way it was meant to be, but you are also getting a minimum of INR30240 worth of returns. Now that in my mind is maximizing the value of your investment. Oh! Scrum on, it doesn’t get better than this, now does it?

You can’t blame me for trying to sell you our training now, can you?

I hope I have given you enough insights to make an informed judgement on how you want to clear your PSM-I or the PSPO-I assessment.

Author's Bio

Preeth Pandalay

Preeth is a pragmatic coach, Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) & SAFe 5.0 Program Consultant (SPC 5.0) and is passionate about all things agile and leadership. With over 20+ years of experience and commitment, he trains and coach organizations to be agile and more importantly to stay agile. Preeth holds an enviable record of conducting over 10,000 hours of industry-specific training and coaching.