1.1 Exam Structure, the Five Syllabus Areas and the Certification Path

APMG Change Management Foundation Exam

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1 Chapter 1: The v3 Foundation Exam and the Organisational Context

1.1 Exam Structure, the Five Syllabus Areas and the Certification Path 1.2 Scene Setting: External and Internal Factors Shaping Change 1.3 Change Management, Benefits and Dis-benefits

2 Chapter 2: Understanding the Change Context

2.1 Kelman's Three Levels of Adoption 2.2 VUCA and the Cynefin Framework 2.3 Planned Change versus Emergent Change 2.4 Systems Thinking in Change 2.5 Organisational Culture and Its Three Levels

3 Chapter 3: Diagnosing and Structuring the Change Approach

3.1 Lewin's Force Field Analysis 3.2 Co-Design 3.3 The ADKAR Model 3.4 Evolving the n-Step Process and Kotter's Eight Accelerators

4 Chapter 4: Delivery Strategy, Agile Practices and the Change Strategy

4.1 Delivery Strategy: Big Bang, Phased, Voluntary and Iterative 4.2 Agile Practices and Agile Change Practices 4.3 The Continuous Change Management Cycle 4.4 The Change Strategy

5 Chapter 5: People and Change — Individual Difference and Response

5.1 Differences in People and Personality Preferences 5.2 Neuroscience and Change: SCARF, Mindset and Insight 5.3 The Change Curve 5.4 Bridges' Transition Model

6 Chapter 6: Motivation, Resilience and Learning

6.1 Rewards, Punishment and Pink's Three Motivators 6.2 Positive Psychology, Resilience and Appreciative Inquiry 6.3 The Beckhard-Harris Change Formula and Schein's Two Anxieties 6.4 Competence, Learning and the Learning Dip 6.5 Learning Preferences: Kolb, Honey and Mumford

7 Chapter 7: Key Roles in Change Leadership

7.1 Key Roles in the Change Process 7.2 The Role of the Change Sponsor 7.3 The Change Agent's Role and Personal Influence 7.4 The Role of Local Leadership in Change

8 Chapter 8: Psychological Safety, Leadership and Culture

8.1 Psychological Climate and Psychological Safety 8.2 Carolyn Taylor: How Leadership Shapes Culture 8.3 Leadership Styles and Organisational Climate

9 Chapter 9: Teams and Change

9.1 Team Structures and Change Agent Networks 9.2 Tuckman's Stages of Team Development 9.3 Lencioni: Assessing and Growing Team Effectiveness 9.4 Harvesting the Value of Team Diversity

10 Chapter 10: Stakeholder Identification, Analysis and Engagement

10.1 Stakeholder Definition and Identification 10.2 Stakeholder Analysis, Segmentation and Empathy Mapping 10.3 Stakeholder Mapping and Sources of Power 10.4 Barriers to Engagement 10.5 Planning Stakeholder Engagement

11 Chapter 11: Communication Theory, Messaging and Emotional Connection

11.1 Communication Theory and the Communication Process 11.2 Barriers to Communication and Cognitive Biases 11.3 Messaging: Setting Context and the Tell, Sell, Include Approach 11.4 Appealing to Hearts and Minds

12 Chapter 12: Communication Channels and Planning

12.1 Ways of Communicating and VARK Language Style Preferences 12.2 Communication Channels: One-Way, Two-Way, Lean and Rich 12.3 Communications Planning

13 Chapter 13: Assessing Change Impact and Severity

13.1 Change Management as Risk Management and the Two-Step Assessment 13.2 Step 1: Categorising Impacts and Identifying Impact Areas 13.3 Step 1 Continued: Gap Analysis, Impact Profiles and Monitoring 13.4 Step 2: Change Impact Severity

14 Chapter 14: Resistance to Change

14.1 Causes of Resistance and Oreg's Four Neural Factors 14.2 Common Reasons for Resistance and How to Deal With Them 14.3 Building a Strategy to Manage Resistance

15 Chapter 15: Change Analytics and Exam Readiness

15.1 Measurement Types and the Change Delivery Scorecard 15.2 Building a Change Analytics Strategy 15.3 Exam Technique and Final Revision

1.1 Exam Structure, the Five Syllabus Areas and the Certification Path

Key Takeaways Explain This Topic AI

Change Management Foundation is 50 multiple-choice questions in 40 minutes, closed book, with a pass mark of 25 marks (50%)

There is no negative marking, so every question should be answered even when you are guessing

The current syllabus is CM3 (third edition), launched by APMG in April 2024 and based on The APMG Change Management Study Guide

CM3 has five examinable syllabus areas: OA, PC, CT, SC and WM; a sixth area is examined only at Practitioner

Foundation is examined at Bloom levels 1 (knowledge) and 2 (comprehension), and the certificate does not expire

Last updated: September 2026

Before you learn a single model, get the shape of the paper straight. Candidates lose marks on this exam far more often through pacing and question-reading errors than through gaps in theory, because 50 questions in 40 minutes leaves you 48 seconds per question .

The Foundation exam at a glance

Feature Foundation Practitioner
Questions 50 multiple choice 80 marks in five 16-mark sections
Duration 40 minutes 2.5 hours
Pass mark 25 marks (50%) 40 marks (50%)
Materials Closed book Open book — the Study Guide only
Style Standalone knowledge questions Scenario-based, all questions reference a 2–3 page case
Prerequisite None A Foundation pass
Validity Does not expire 5 years; re-register between years 3 and 5

There is no negative marking . An unanswered question and a wrong answer score identically, so leave nothing blank. If a question stalls you, flag it, pick the best available option and move on — the clock is the real adversary.

Which syllabus you are being examined on

This matters more than candidates expect. APMG launched the third edition of the qualification, CM3, in April 2024 , based on The APMG Change Management Study Guide . Accredited training organisations were permitted to deliver the previous 2015 edition only until September 2024.

The older edition was built on The Effective Change Manager's Handbook and organised into four topic areas. A large amount of free revision material still circulating online — including question banks and summaries — teaches that retired structure. If your revision notes are built around Burke-Litwin, McKinsey 7-S as an organisational diagnostic, Morgan's metaphors, Galpin's wheel, Belbin, Ackerman's change typologies, Mendelow's matrix, Shannon-Weaver, Maslow, Herzberg or Kotter and Schlesinger's six strategies, you are revising the wrong syllabus . Those names have been removed. This guide teaches CM3.

The five examinable syllabus areas

CM3 organises everything into five areas, each carrying a two-letter code you will see referenced throughout accredited materials.

Code Syllabus area What it covers

OA Organisational context and approach Understanding the context (Kelman, Cynefin, culture, systems thinking, force field) and structuring the approach (co-design, ADKAR, n-step processes, delivery strategy, agile, change strategy)

PC People and change Personality preferences, neuroscience and SCARF, the change curve, Bridges' transitions, motivation, resilience, the change formula, learning

CT Change leadership and teams Key change roles, sponsor, change agent, local leadership, psychological safety, leadership and culture, team structures, Tuckman, Lencioni, diversity

SC Stakeholders and communication Stakeholder identification, analysis, power and mapping, engagement barriers and planning, communication theory, messaging, hearts and minds, channels, communication planning

WM Work of the change manager Change impact assessment and severity, resistance, change analytics

A sixth area — Developing professional change practice , covering sustaining change, momentum and tipping points, competence and learning for change, and coaching — exists in the Study Guide but is examined only at Practitioner level . You do not need it for Foundation. Knowing that saves you several hours of misdirected revision.

At Practitioner the paper is split into five equal groups of sixteen marks, one per syllabus area. Foundation does not publish a per-area question count, but every one of the five areas is assessed, so there is no area you can safely skip. Treat coverage as roughly even and revise accordingly.

What the questions actually look like

Foundation examines learning outcomes at level 1 (knowledge) and level 2 (comprehension) only. You are never asked to apply a model to a complex scenario — that is Practitioner's job. In practice the paper uses four recognisable shapes:

Definition recall. "Which statement best describes the role of a change agent?" You match a role, term or model component to its description.

Sentence completion. "Cynefin describes the complex zone as often safer to take an ______, ______ approach." These reward knowing the wording of the model, not just its gist.

Short worked example. "Which part of the change curve is someone likely to be on if they are heard saying 'It's not fair'?" A one-line vignette maps to one stage or category.

NOT questions. "Which of the following is NOT one of Pink's three key motivators?" Roughly one question in six is negatively worded. Underline the NOT mentally before you read the options — it is the single most common careless-error source on this paper.

A further style presents numbered statements (1, 2, 3) and asks which combination is correct. Evaluate each statement independently against the model, then pick the matching combination; do not try to judge the combinations as wholes.

Preparation logistics

APMG publishes two sample papers . Sit both under strict 40-minute conditions before your real attempt — pacing is the skill they build. Accredited classroom training is typically three days for Foundation and two more for Practitioner, but training is not a prerequisite: anyone can book the exam. Expect roughly 20–30 hours of study, and note that accredited providers issue about 12 hours of pre-course reading precisely because the syllabus is broad relative to the exam length.