It’s our feedback from day three of the ACCA March exams. How did sitters find PM and APM? Here is their feedback…
Performance Management (PM)
Students came out of the PM in shock: âI donât know what happened, the mocks and practice questions did not reflect the true nature of the exam.â
Sitters said this was a hard, challenging exam, with many admitting they ran out of time. As one said: âI completely ran out of time and then panicked!â
Where were the questions budgets, asked one sitter. It also seemed that some people had an all numbers exam and others pretty much none.
PQs can be their own worst enemy though. A trainee admitted: âI read every ACCA technical article on the website, except the balance s.c articleâŠwhich now I regret.â Why would you not read all of them?
Some PQs were also forced to sit the exam at 6pm because there was a power cut at their centre, and they had to be redirected to a new venue. Due to personal reasons we know of at least one PQ who couldnât stay.
Among the questions were: limiting factor, ABC, life cycle, value for money, and mix and yield. There was also learning curve, performance assessment, and rate variations.
Unsurprisingly, 43% of sitters in the Open Tuition poll said this was a âhardâ exam,. Some 17% said it was a âdisasterâ and just 38% said it was âOKâ.
Advanced Performance Management (APM)
March sitters found APM difficult overall. PQs seemed to particularly struggle with the question on the building block model. Students just felt the question was strangely worded and it took them an age to work out what the examiner wanted.
As one sitter said: âWasnât quite what I expectâ. Another said it was âa verty tough examâ.
Among the questions were: big data, political environment, balanced scorecard, transfer pricing, BCG matrix, and building block model.
The Open Tuition Instant poll revealed 21% of sitters felt this paper was a âdisasterâ for them. Another 33% found it âhardâ.
