Free PDUs for Project Management Professionals (PMPs)

I’ve been a certified project management professional (PMP) with the Project Management Institute for several years now. As part of that comes the need for gaining 60 Professional Development Units (PDUs) in each three-year Continuing Certification Requirements (CCR) cycle.

This may sound like a daunting amount, but you can achieve a great portion of this for work you are already doing by practicing in the field and by performing volunteer PM duties for non-profits, etc. Besides these real world activities, completing training or studies related to the field of project management is the next natural way to pursue PDUs, but there are many others ( full details re: theCCRs are available at the PMI site).

The good news is that there are excellent resources out there for training and study which are totally free. This post is my personal list of some of those resources — please feel free to comment with additional ones and I will add them to the list.


PMCentersUSA Complimentary Webinars – Earn 0.5 PDUs/per.
Presented over lunch hour Eastern/US time – lunch and learn! They are not a PMI REP (IIRC), so these need to be filed under another category.
http://pmcentersusa.com/KnowledgeCenter/LiveWebinarsSchedule.aspx

They also have some on-demand free offerings:
http://pmcentersusa.com/KnowledgeCenter/WebinarsonDemand.aspx

IAG Consulting Complimentary Webinars – Earn 1.0 PDUs/per.
Presented over lunch hour Mountain/US time. Mostly on requirements capture and management, their specialty. They are a PMI REP, so these are all cat 3.
http://www.iag.biz/resources/webinar-events/

They also offer on-demand webcasts:
http://www.iag.biz/resources/webinars/on-demand-webinars.html

ESI International is another source, and is a PMI REP.
Free live sessions presented over lunch hour Mountain/US time.

Live events: http://www.esi-intl.com/en/Resources/Events.aspx
On-demand: http://www.esi-intl.com/en/Resources/Webinars-on-Demand.aspx

They also present IMPACT 2010, a day-long yearly virtual event, coming up September 29th. http://request.esi-intl.com/content/IMPACT_2010

Gantthead.com runs a yearly live “virtual conference” called PMXPO.
This is another day long live event which is also now available as recorded sessions. They are a PMI REP, so these are all cat 3.

You have to register on their site to access the resources, but there’s a free level of membership. They also offer lots of other free content of interest to PMs.

Update 3 Sep. 2010: Through a posting on a LinkedIn PMP group today, there was a link to this Examiner article which detailed the following additional resources (nice!):

1) Earn 30 PDUs in Category 2:

a. Category 2 –SDL: Self-Directed Learning:

* 15 PDUs – Visit http://pm411.org/ and start listening to their free podcasts. 60 minutes of listening qualifies for 1 PDU you can claim. Remember you can claim up to 15 PDUs from this type per each 3-year cycle. Keep a record of what you heard as PMI.org may audit your claims.

b. Category 2 H: Practitioner of project and/or program management services:

* 15 PDUs per 3-year cycle. Did you work as a Project Manager for more than 1,500 project hours during the past 3 calendar years? If so, you can claim these and it costs you nothing.

2) Earn 85 PDUs (yes, you can transfer up to 20 PDUs towards your next 3-year cycle) under Category 3 – PMI Registered Education Providers. And yes, these are all free:

a. 26 PDUs – Visit the International Institute of Learning’s web site. It has a number of podcasts and webinars for free:

* 2 PDUs – Hear Dr. Harold Kerzner’s 8 Modules Podcasts series on PM’s Best Practices, Executive and Line Managers in Project Management and the PMO. These qualify for 2 PDUs.
* 20 PDUs when you register to take over 20 Webinars offered by the institute, each worth 1 PDU

b. 24 PDUs – Visit Solution’s Cube Group site and register for two FREE live webinars offered each month, worth 1PDU each.

c. 18 PDUs – Visit IBM’s Rational Project and Portfolio Management certification training e-kit site. There are four free interactive training courses each worth 4 PDUs and one free course worth 2 PDUs.

d. 5 PDUs – Visit Provedia Learning Inc’s site and take the free course on Rescuing Troubled Projects worth 5 PDUs .

3) Earn 12 PDUs under Category 4 – Other Program Provider:

a. 12 PDUs – Visit Rita Mulcahy’s RMC Project Management, Inc site. It offers 12 free pre-recorded webinars per calendar year each worth 1 PDU.

Did you know that Categories 3 and 4 have no maximum on how many PDUs you can claim? So go ahead, listen and claim. And keep in mind, not only are you going to learn a lot by taking these PDUs, but you can return to many of these sites each cycle and earn your PDU requirements again for free. Good luck and share this knowledge with your fellow PMP-ers.

Update January 2014: I’ve noticed several recent comments posted which are straying from the Free PDU topic and show evidence of being posted by paid commenters. I am marking these comments as SPAM, which feeds back to a central registry of comment SPAMmers – so don’t bother commenting unless you’re just a plain old interested human being!

This entry was posted in Non-Profits, Project Management and tagged , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

27 Responses to Free PDUs for Project Management Professionals (PMPs)

  1. scott lopez says:

    Framework for project management, especially when it comes down to technology is not linier. Nevertheless, wonderful article! Would be interested to hear more insights from you on project management 3.0. We keep using outdated methods that don’t match requirements of current time. With so many different solutions coming on the market so fast the framework must be redesigned. Anyways, thanks a lot for great post.

  2. Brad A says:

    On-demand webinars provided by IAG and ESI – are they eligible for Category A (REP) PDUs or only live webinars are eligible?

    • Don says:

      I don’t believe the delivery format matters, so on-demand should be fine. The issue will be how you get the REP# and course code, etc. from the on-demand delivery. For live webinars they often put that information up only at the end of the call, or send a follow-up email with the details after the session. So be sure to give your contact details if/when asked. I’ve found these groups are also responsive to email contact, so you might consider asking them about it beforehand if you’re concerned.

  3. Christina says:

    Roeder Consulting is also a PMI REP and has free monthly webinars for 1 PDU. They are usually the 2nd Tuesday of the month and run from 11am ET to Noon. They also have archived webinars that you can take for 1 PDU, but those have a fee attached to them. To register for one of their upcoming webinars, go to http://www.roederconsulting.com/webinar.php

  4. Very useful information and of great assistance to many PMP’s. Thank you for taking the time and for sharing with us. Kind regards.

  5. Excellent web site. Lots of useful info here. I am sending it to some buddies ans also sharing in delicious. And certainly, thanks to your sweat!

  6. Loreta says:

    Awesome! Thank you for sharing! ^_^

  7. Its really useful to remind those who struggle with retaining their PDUs that this article is so helpful and makes it easy to catch up on your PDU collection.

  8. Martina says:

    Here are a couple of other resources for free PDUs.
    Up to 30 DUs for listening to Podcasts
    http://www.project-management-podcast.com/index.php/component/content/article/14-faqs/faq/50

    Free course download for 5 PDUs
    http://www.prodevia.com/s.nl/sc.2/.f

  9. Md Mahmudul Haque says:

    Hi Don, first of all thanks for your nice and comprehensive article.

    As mentioned in the artcile regarding IBM’s PDU, I have search the internet to get the link for
    “IBM’s Rational Project and Portfolio Management certification training e-kit site”

    But couldn’t get it. It would be very helpful if you kindly share the link.

  10. JoeKidd says:

    Try http://www.projectmanagementbookstore.com for over twenty recorded one hour webinars. Each gives you a PDU.

  11. ash says:

    The IBM website hasn’t been functional for more than a year now…i had taken two courses way back in 2010. The other sites mentioned on your blog has been very helpful.
    Thanks for sharing such useful information.

  12. ash says:

    This is another site where u will find lots of recorded webinars worth 1 PDU.

    http://www.globalknowledge.com/training/category.asp?pageid=9&catid=248&country=United+States

  13. New PMP says:

    Thanks for sharing all these information. I am having trouble with the free PDU webinar sites. They are NOT really FREE!!
    For an example any site they claim that it’s free on the advertisement, as soon as you click on the link it comes up with option where you need to buy and spend real $$. Even Rita Mulcahy’s website had the same issue. I got my PMP only couple months ago, already spent a lot of money for that, so I’m looking for FREE PDU options. Maybe I don’t know the correct steps, if any of you know the correct steps and could respond back here it would be really helpful. Thanks in advance!

    • Don says:

      Hi, I’ve taken many courses from the sources in my original post with success. I’ve not paid a penny for PDUs since I passed the PMP exam. Can you specify which links are not working for you?

  14. New PMP says:

    Thanks for your response. here is an example below –

    In your article it says ->
    3) Earn 12 PDUs under Category 4 – Other Program Provider:
    a. 12 PDUs – Visit Rita Mulcahy’s RMC Project Management, Inc site. It offers 12 free pre-recorded webinars per calendar year each worth 1 PDU.

    I couldn’t get to the actual page where I could find the above. When I click the link it takes me to Rita Mulcahy’s main web page. Sorry for me being ignorant here! I’m still new in this so maybe I’m not able to go to the right location.

    Also, in the article it says I think there is a limitation of 30 PDUs on the webinar/podcast type of PDUs? I was confused as I saw different information in different websites, so today I called PMI and they mentioned all 60 PDUs can be from Category B which is continuing education and they can be webinar/podcast.

    Once again thanks!

  15. Hans Garre says:

    One has to earn professional development units (PDUs) to maintain the designation. In today’s world a project manager has a number of options to earn PDUs for PMP certification renewal. But one has to chose carefully. Thank you for sharing such valuable information.

  16. Don (blog owner/author) says:

    I have to take some time to come back and update this post to remove items that are no longer available, etc. but in the mean time here is a new resource for free (and easy!) PDUs:

    The PMI Washington DC chapter has added a series of interesting podcasts (so far they seem to be ~15-17 minutes each) that will get you 0.25 CAT A PDUs per episode. Check it out at https://www.pmiwdc.org/pm-pov .

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