Passing the PL-300: Microsoft Data Analyst Associate certificate

I would not be modest, but honest with you. Clearing the PL-300 certification exam for power BI platform has been tough. I have studied for hours at stretch and prepared for months before I found the confidence to schedule the test for this data analyst certificate.

Why?

a)??The exam is not free, you have to pay a price (a decent amount, nothing extravagant) to schedule one. And I being a thrift data analyst (read miser) could not bear the thought of scheduling an exam after self-preparation and waste the money AND the amount of time invested in the preparation.

b)??I do not have strong background in tech/computer science, and I desperately wanted a credentialed proof of my analytical knowledge and skills to showcase on my resume.

Hence, I gave the exam preparation my best.

This might not be the case with you if you have a great professional experience with Power BI. You only need to pull up your socks and muster the courage to schedule the exam (go get it!).?

For all others, if you find it any good, feel free to grab a few pointers from the resources I used and my method of clearing the Microsoft exam.

Just remember, if a slow learner such as me can clear it, so can you.

Here it goes:

Resources:

A)?????Preparation ??

1)??The Holy grail: Microsoft self-paced learning path for Power BI Data Analyst Associate certification

2)??PL-300 study guide?

3)??Microsoft prep video series

4)? case studies Github link

Alternatives that I did not use, but I heard, are equally resourceful:

Microsoft's Power BI course on Coursera

Udemy- Phillip Burton’s course

Udemy-Maven analytics and Aaron parry’s course

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B)????? Practice and Mock exams

1)????? Examtopics free question dump

2)????? Skillcertpro paid question bank

3)????? Power Infotainment 45 videos on Pl-300 exam questions

4)????? Microsoft’s Practice assessment

5)????? Pragmatic Works course on PL-300

Alternatives:

Websites called passnexams and ITexams

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My Method of preparation:

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• I began with the official Microsoft documentation on PL-300 which is an exhaustive resource but gives you a solid foundation in power BI platform. It has lab courses to give you hands on experience alongside a few video explanations, but majority of it is pure documentation. I made sure I had ?power BI desktop AND power BI service opened at the side whenever I was studying, to practically try out whatever I could. You should too.
• You can also ty the Coursera learning path for power BI by Microsoft. The preparation timeline appears to be similar but they have an offer to avail 50% off on your Certification Exam (PL-300). In hindsight, I would have opted for this one (50%off!!) but I was already midway through the Microsoft documentation when I got to know about it.
• Make brief notes as you go- capture screenshots/images if you must. At the time of revision it would be impossible to go through the whole documentation again.
• Once you are done with the documentation and are enlightened with the new found Power BI knowledge, Iterate. Go back to those notes you made earlier.
• ? The next stage is here. Go though the study guide listed above. Make sure you have covered the essential stuff, if something is skipped, guess what? Make a note. Google/Bing/ChatGPT it and get done with it. Towards the end of the guide there’s a section called “change log” which tells you about the changes made in the exam “syllabus” between the latest date and the last change date. If you were preparing between the two dates, lookout for sections of change. Compare the topics covered through both dates and yes, Make a note. Make a note of what is deducted or added.

-????????? Finally , the prep video series: They will briefly go through each main module, listen attentively and make sure you know about each topic they touched.

• You are not asked to write DAX during the exam(phew!) but your DAX knowledge will be accessed. Think questions with a scenario statement and a formula with lots of blank spaces which you need to fill from the provided options. Stress on calculate function, time intelligence, filter functions, semi-additive measures, RLS functions and relationship functions.

Pro tips:

• Be consistent on this learning stage! (I would not venture to bore you with the science of ‘why’ behind it)
• Get some sample data and try out whatever you learn on it.
• Read the case studies (Litware, Contoso, Northwind, etc) before you take the exam in order to avoid losing time.

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Mock tests

• I began with the free questions available on examtopics website. The answers are not correct, and one must go through the discussions to find (or I should say guess) the correct one. But on my actual exam I saw many questions that came from their Qbank, so worth the time spend.
• During this phase of looking for correct answers, I stumbled upon the videos of Power Infotainment for PL-300. Some questions are outdated but I think they did a pretty decent job.
• Since I really wanted to practice out and test my knowledge before scheduling the exam, and as per my research, many people suggested that the Microsoft practice assessment does not mirror the actual exam difficulty level(which I second) , I opted to go for the paid question banks of skillcertpro.
• ? Their website offers 23 full mock exams + 1 not-so-great cheat sheet. The mock exams are great for practice. Their difficulty level is a bit higher than the actual exam, but they help you get the mindset required to answer the questions. I went sequentially through the first eight, until I realized the questions were now getting repetitive and probably outdated. I started going backwards from the 23rd mock exam and stopped at 18th. These last few mock exams are very different than the initial ones, difficultly level is on a higher end.
• Finally, I went through the Microsoft practice exams- took around five of those until the exam date. The question repetition rate was so high that I was practically answering without going through the complete question.

Pro tips:

• ? Time whatever mock tests you give. You will have 100 minutes for 50-60 questions.
• Take this as a request to go through all your answers after each mock exam, make notes if needed. If you are not analysing your mistakes, giving any practice test is a waste of time.
• Aim for atleast 70% if you decide to the skillcertpro mock exams or 80% if you are taking the Microsoft practice assessments.
• Do not try to memorise the answers.

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Important topics:

1. Connecting data: understand how power BI connects to other Microsoft platforms. Practice where possible.
2. Star schema AND snowflake schema (this is not a core part of power BI training but will definitely be covered in interviews)- helps you understand how data modeling actually works.
3. Bookmark and slicers
4. Row level security
5. Power BI workspace
6. data gateways
7. Case studies

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?? That’s all folks!

This may seem too much of a material and preparation based upon your level of acquaintance with the platform, but you are welcome to tailor it or pick up resources/tips you find useful.

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If my pathway to PL-300 helps you in some way with the exam, do come back and let me know! I would be delighted to know that this helped someone.

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