yea thats what i got for the swap. Section A was a nightmare but i tried to answer it best as i could.

HI I didnt think this exam was too bad. I did q's 2 & 3. Thought the q on receivables (credit risk) ok as well as the corporate governence (combined code) one. Hadnt a clue what a sterring committee was. The project team part was ok. But was unsure on management controls All three exams have been tricky

Thought P3 was a nightmare today, what was section A all about? Thought they had completely ignored the whole point of this exam which was risk and control strategy! Not looking at IT systems and Steering Committees! Was really hoping for a good section A that could let you talk about the different risks and how you manage them but not to be! Agree with the comment about 20 marks for steering committees, wasn't that all in P4?!! Section B was ok, did Q2 and 3 which were not too bad, just hope I answered the question requirement and got enough depth in there Oh well all done, thank god for that!!! :-)

This is the first time I've done this but I was appalled at the exam I just sat.  In no way was it balanced or testing a wide range of my knowledge.  The split is said to be:

 

·         15% Management Control Systems

·         20% Risk and Internal Control

·         15% Review and Audit of Control Systems

·         30% MANAGEMENT OF FINANCIAL RISK

·         20% Risk and Control in Information Systems

 

Yet the exam concentrated almost exclusively on Information systems and spent 20% on subject matter involved in Paper 5 (integrated Management) and all but completely ignored Management of Financial Risk. 

 

There was nothing on:

·         Evaluating or Managing financial risks (I do not count a tiny little interest swap calculation that can be done in my head as counting)

 

And certainly nothing on:

·         The impact of differential inflation rates on forecast exchange rates

·         Explaining Exchange rate theory

·         Recommending currency risk Management Strategies

 

I have never failed an exam but this is the first exam where I honestly feel angry and cheated as it as if the examiner has gone to great lengths to test only a small fraction of the course and I do not feel in any way that this exam was able to fairly test my overall knowledge of this course.

Evening All

I thought all in all todays exam was ok. In fact I was relatively pleased with my performance!!! Answered it all which was assuring as yesterday I was unable to completey finish P9 despite its the paper I'm most comfortable with!!

So, what exactly did people put regarding the steering committee?

Also, can people please let me know what the answer was for q1 part A??? Evaluate the mangagement controlls??? Gave it a shot but not convinced I completely did myself justice!

I've spent 15 weeks of non stop studying so I'm hoping my hard work will filter through!!!!

For steering committe i just said that steering committe will be response for reccomending IT strategy to the board etc and will consist of a IT guy, Finance, HR, and operations. I really had to think back to what it was all about.

For management control evaluation i didnt know what to put down but just mentioned stuff about how management are weak and lack structure they were told by audit committee a year ago about the Risk to the system and they act now after a year stuff like that really. i dont know if thats even correct is that what you put down ???

I just think its amazing that for all the time, energy, effort, and industry that students put into learning the syllabus, ONE FIFTH of the the mark's on the day has no real relevance to what is in the P3 syllabus !!! There is no mention of the Project Steering Commitee in the official learning system for P3 at all.....and very little regarding the Project Team........... I basically put down Project Chairman, Project CEO, Internal Auditor, Senior Tester, Senior Designer, Senior Developer, Project Auditor, etc etc etc (Blah blah blah...), only to find out that Steering Commitee will probably be made up of the Managing Director, the Finance Director, and the Operations Director..................(Commitee = Directors, i.e. as in Nomination, Renumeration Audit etc...) I don't feel like i've failed this part, I feel like i've been let down..... I only hope that a few of the names above get me some for of marks............ part a i.e management controls was ok...the risk for management control was around the quality of the information.....obviously this is the kind of question which we should be being tested on...... I did question 4 which the HR part was exceptionally waffly. The rest of it was ok, as it related to the subject though.... The Swap question which I left till last, ironically feel the most confident about now...... And the reason why...? Well it had the most relevance to the syllabus..............why do they do it ???

Rebecca hi Seems like yours may be a sensible answer for question a) although i can't remember the exact question....others on this blog have mentioned names so can't be 100% sure ?...i'm sure you'll be getting something out of it though.......... I think that the project management question stumped a lot of people so there's gonna be lot of poor scores on that section for sure.....maybe not for you though... To be honest my only saving grace for this paper is the fact that as I have recently been entitled to extra time it meant that I could bash out as many points that came to mind on this one paper...hopefully that should get me through this time..... (Only drawback is that it does'nt matter how much time they give you if they are gonna give you a question based on something which outside the P3 syllabus.....) One last thing on it though...Overall I think that they've played the oldest trick in the book on this paper to be honest.....They must have known that there would be a lot of people taking resits trying to get this one out of the way before the new syllabus starts...people who would obviously have been massively focusing on the P3 syllabus and pretty much nothing else....(like yours truly....)...so what did they do ? dropped in a load of managerial stuff to toughen it up and make it a lot harder (e.g HR/Project Management/Account Receivable etc....) Oh well good luck to everyone and lets hope that hard work will have paid off in the end......

Hi - yep there will be some new books out no doubt....quids in for CIMA on that front....ironically I think the new syllabus should straighten things out though and put this random style of question to bed....it'll be less random application of ideas and more on what you know from what I gather...will be a plus from my perspective, but hopefully won't be needing another pop at it.....good luck and let's hope its TOPCIMA in 2010 !!

Hi everyone, I would say that the paper was fair enough with respect to the distribution of syllabus.... The focus was more on operational risks rather than strategic risks..... With the kind of information given in the first question, certain risks were apparent......the risks associated with inappropriate information systems.....ineffective internal controls and internal audit . The Management control question was decent enough....i wrote that the management control system left a lot to be desired.....had a lot of operational gaps, Inefficiencies were built up in the system.....management reporting information was unrealiable.....all this meant that the management control was ineffective since the information could not be used for feedback and feedforward systems....to set appropriate objectives, performance against objectives and implement corrective actions. Moreover the management had not kept pace with the changing internal and external environment.....as was apparent with its IT systems which were outdated. Though the organization had grown exponentially in the last 5 years.....no effort was made to upgrade the IT systems.....to support its growing information needs required for strategic and competitive decision making.

 On the steering committee and project team part...my thoughts were same as rebecca except that the steering committee had to focus on the key project deliverables such as cost, scope and timelines for the IT project....ensure that all relevant stakeholders were represented.....also that they were responsible for overall change management in the organization...identify, assess and mitigate relevant risks. The Project team were the actual executors of the project...and would have comprised of representative from all functional areas...marketing, finance, production etcc...risk officer, internal audit officer etc and a project manager responsible for resource allocation and monitoring and reporting for the project to the steering committee. Apart from design and development, the team would have taken care of system testing, implementation....preparing end user documentation and training of users.... The ERP part was also fair enough as we had to discuss the benefits as to how a supply chain organization can benefit from an ERP. Apart from the integration advantages, the system would have supported exception reporting for management control purposes.... Moreover the real time inventory information would have enabled the organization to switch into the JIT mode by extending the ERP to its suppliers and customers ....resulting in operational efficiencies and cost savings.... It would have reduced the use of spreadsheets which were error prone and provided real time strategic information on key financial and non financial KPI's. Overall the ERP system would have enabled the organiztion to have an effective internal control system... It would have also helped the organization in establising and sustaining competittive advantage....

I have to say, I think a lot of people on this board are complaining about the fact that only a small proportion of the syllabus was tested. In fact, we are supposed to know all of the syllabus, and any part of it can be tested! The weighting is the syllabus weighting, not the exam weighting. As for the swap question, I pulled out 9.7% for RGT, since I made out the best option for them. The counterparty ended up with L + 1.5%, which is the same as they could get outside. I did also suggest that they could amend the interest rate to make it attractive for the counterparty but I think they were aiming for the best position for RGT, otherwise I would have weighted the allocation of interest more favourably for the counterparty. I don't think I've done it wrong, as they say with Strategy papers, there is no "right" answer!

The shared benefit was 0.3% between each party, with the bank taking 0.2%...??

I actually thought that FS would be the harder paper, but R&CS was just absolute bollocks! I expected R&CS to be much more easier than this! The section A question was just plain horrible, might only get about 20-25 marks for that. The 2nd question was really easy, just rambled on about Enron as well as the recent bank collapses. The other section B questions were tough as well, did the 3rd one because it seemed comparitively easier than the others, though it was tough as well...just hope I get through it!

i think rajat dhingra is gonna win the world prize... :)

Thought i would fail p3 miserably,but was able to get 58