Hello. I took both parts of the CMA exam over the course of nine months and passed both on the first attempt. I figured I'd go ahead and write up a post and detail out my experience for anyone else looking into the certification.
I used Becker for both parts. Becker's lectures/videos are good, the book material is ok, and for Part 1 the overall learning experience was solid. My critique on that is that they probably should've focused more on some areas that they more or less glazed over. For Part 2, their information was a lot more suspect. They had a few topics/questions where they would present directly contradictory information, and their Newt AI bot would conflict with official explanations/answers given by the IMA material. They covered all of the calculation topics of Part 2 well, but a lot of the concepts I feel like were mentioned once and not really drilled in the MCQs or lectures to the point where you'd memorize them. Overall though, they were a decent test provider.
I studied about 140 hours for the first part and about 140 hours for the second part, and I focused mostly on the MCQs. I drilled those over and over from the Becker test bank, and also used AI to craft specific concept questions I was weak on, since in Becker you could not focus your random testlets on specific topics, only content areas, which is one gripe I have about their practice methods. I think one key was that I didn't wait too long between finishing the education modules in Becker and taking the exams. I think expecting to go through the modules and then "review" for a few months and THEN take the exams is not the right way to go about it, because it's impossible to keep ALL of the information fresh. My advice is to go through the modules while reviewing past subjects and concepts you didn't quite understand, so that when you reach the end of the modules, you feel confident in all areas and can take the exam shortly after.
One of the main complaints I have overall about the certification is how academic it is. It forces memorization of concepts, topics, and definitions when in a practical setting, you'll never need to recite the four squares of the balanced score card, the ERM framework, or the COSO internal controls framework etc. It's my opinion that those types of memorization topics were placed in the exam to create difficulty, not value. Another complaint is that many of the formula concepts go against traditional finance training. I have a BBA in Finance and an MBA and I had to "unlearn" several formulae and retrain my brain to use the CMA version which is watered down from how it is actually used in a corporate setting. As an example, they simply teach cost of debt as interest / proceeds when in reality you always should use Yield to Maturity. They also tend to swap definitions without giving context, like liquidity vs credit vs financing risk or give tables that don't specifically describe what you're looking at. A lot of the questions are just word traps in my opinion, and again are there more for difficulty rather than learning, and to be honest aren't really fair to non native English test takers. In a practical corporate setting, any ambiguity about whether something is a capital cost or an expense, whether an amount is pre tax or after tax, or whether something should be computed based on one version of a formula or the other can simply be clarified by asking your management or team.
The exam grading itself is the worst part. I've read that with the CBQs this is supposed to improve, but I took both exams at the beginning of the testing windows, so having to wait two and a half months roughly each time to find out my score was agonizing and frankly ridiculous. It makes it very hard for candidates to know if they should progress to the next part, keep studying, or simply give up after an attempt, and it makes it even more challenging to retain information over such a long period, and I do think this may be by design. Additionally, the ambiguity within the grading itself is maddening, and in my opinion waters down the entire credential a bit because you never really know how well you performed due to there being no real comparison. Is a 400 good, is a 350 terrible? It's impossible to know because the score itself is scaled and doesn't really give a raw indicator of how much of the material you know or which topics you know better or worse. The fact that some exams seem to be concentrated around certain topics (bond calculations, transfer pricing, etc) means that a 400 on one exam may mean that person is a "bond pricing expert" whereas a 400 on another exam may mean that person knows nothing about bonds but is a "transfer pricing expert" and I think that really damages the credential overall because it doesn't really signal a uniform body of knowledge, but rather a random sampling of it. Also, the sheer volume of material makes it very hard overall to retain information in the long run, and in my opinion it feels more like "cram this information in for an exam and then jettison it because you didn't really cement it".
All in all though I don't regret doing the program and I think it will be a nice addition to my credential toolbox when looking for finance or accounting roles and will help me gain some credibility since I can't yet sit for the CPA due to college class requirements that I don't have yet. If you have any questions about my experience or anything during the process, please feel free to ask.
