muhammad_hisyam

Hi all,

I'm sitting for my P3 this coming June. Having gone through some of the past years, I found this paper is quite difficult to tackle. Many times when I thought of an answer and penned it out only to find out that was not what the examiner had in mind. Also, the recommended answer don't seem helpful because I always find difficulties in identifying what are actually the important points.

One more thing, what would be the better way of presenting the answer, essay form or point form? Other exam papers would highly recommend the students to present a clear framework of answer where the marker could easily look for the points. However, I think it is going to be a different approach for P3, based on feedback from my lecturer as well as past years Q&A. My lecturer always stresses that the allocated marks serve as a guide as how long should your answer be. This is important as we are striving for marks and should work along that line, therefore a clear guide for answering questions would be very important to me.

Apart from the above, I also have problems remembering the facts and models required to answer the questions. How can I improve on this? I'm hoping that experienced students, passed finalist, educators or anybody in this forum could give some tips and advices on my dilemma. Sorry for the lenghty post.

TQ.

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Mustan

Well, I have really not studied for this paper but I feel pretty confident since it is a "writing" paper. I also did P1 with very little studying and I passed. I think in any exam a great deal of your success comes down to what you do in the three hours. That said, P3 does have some important models - such as BCG, Porters 5, Value Chain, Ansoff, McFarlans IT grid, Product Life Cycle, Mandelow's matrix, SWOT, PESTEL and so on.

You have to know the models. The paper is relatively easy since a lot of the times the scenario will dictate which model(s) should apply. Also, I think that matching the examiners answer with yours is not a good idea; sure, I mean, to get an idea of a model, yes, but for the actual content, each student probably writes something different so I would not be too concerned.

Also, the length of your answer - yes, the marks are a guide but rambling on and on about something incorrect is going to help either.

The style - I firmly believe that at the professional stage, essay style is the way to go. However, for questions that are worth a few marks, bullet points should be fine. Also, in the essay style, you can still use bullets to structure your answer.

Personally, examples to enrich your answer and writing something a little different should work in the candidates favour; don't try to simply regurgitate stuff you learnt from the text or in classes - I think the marker looks for understanding and your answer, even if different from the examiner's answer, could be equally valid.

Good luck =)

Cheers,
Mustan

Jatin83

The paper is relatively easy, the models can be remembered easily by drawing a mind map of all the models and how are these models interrelated. The models need to be divided into three core areas of the paper; Strategic analysis, Strategic choice and Strategic Implementation.

The hard bit of this paper is not the identification of the model, but the application of the model to the question asked. You would score really high if you can identify the elements of the model in the question and give appropriate answers in a structured format. I guess this has been the reals challenge for all the candidates that have been sitting for this paper in the past.

Try not only to memorize the models, but try and get the models come from the question. when i had gone over the past papers i have noticed that in most of the questions the answers exist within the scenarios, therefore learn to read the scenarios real carefully, focus on the question and not the model.

I hope the above is helpful.

regards

JATIN

samseiko

I have the same problem with hisyam too, really not easy to memorize it eventhough I have the mind map, how about you share your mind map with us?

Masa2

It would be very helpful if someone shared their mind map with us for P3

yasslimz

I dont know if some of you have taken the BPP tuition courses but with the study notes on each chapter there is a mind map. Also there is a tool kit that splits up the module into three

Strategic Position
Strategic Choices
Strategic Action

These are the core areas and within these area the toolkit has the tools/models to be used in easch area.

ACCAING

Who has the map?

isabelle

useful !!!
thank you!

KAT

What is the mind map??

Am struggling with tyring to get head around this subject

maryog

Originally Posted by Jatin83

The paper is relatively easy, the models can be remembered easily by drawing a mind map of all the models and how are these models interrelated. The models need to be divided into three core areas of the paper; Strategic analysis, Strategic choice and Strategic Implementation. The hard bit of this paper is not the identification of the model, but the application of the model to the question asked. You would score really high if you can identify the elements of the model in the question and give appropriate answers in a structured format. I guess this has been the reals challenge for all the candidates that have been sitting for this paper in the past. Try not only to memorize the models, but try and get the models come from the question. when i had gone over the past papers i have noticed that in most of the questions the answers exist within the scenarios, therefore learn to read the scenarios real carefully, focus on the question and not the model. I hope the above is helpful. regards JATIN

thanks a lot.God bless you1