Candidate handbook

1. About NBOP and what the credential attests

The National Board of Operations Professionals publishes a standard for business operations practice and certifies experienced practitioners against it. NBOP-CP is the core credential, standing for NBOP Certified Professional.

What it attests. That on the date of issue, the holder was assessed against a named version of a published standard, by a method that is published, and met a passing standard that was set before anyone sat it. The register records which version.

What it does not attest. It is not a licence and confers no legal right to practise. Business operations is not a licensed profession. It does not represent that certification produces any employment, promotion or earnings outcome. It is not an academic award. NBOP is not accredited by any third-party accreditation body, and if that changes this page will name the accreditor.

2. Scope of practice covered

The credential covers general, cross-functional business operations practice across the eight domains of the published standard: process architecture, measurement and reporting, operating cadence, capacity and resourcing, role design and accountability, financial operations, systems and tooling, and change and adoption.

It does not cover single-function specialisms. Someone whose remit is only supply chain, only quality, only project portfolio or only people operations is served better by an existing body in that field. The standard defines every domain in full and is free to read.

3. Eligibility, and how you document it

Three criteria. They are arithmetic, they are applied by the same code for everyone, and they are published before you answer anything.

• Experience. At least two years holding accountability for how work gets done, not for doing the work.
• Currency. That accountability is current, or ended within the last 24 months.
• Breadth. Personal accountability in at least four of the eight domains.

How you document it. The application asks for your role history with titles, organisation sizes, sectors and dates; a description in your own words of what you were accountable for; your current operating context; and two professional references who can confirm the accountability claimed. References are contacted for a sample of applicants rather than all, and applicants are told so in advance. You attest that the information is accurate.

No NBOP publication, course, or product is required to sit for or pass this assessment, and purchasing one confers no advantage. The assessment is built from the published standard, which is free to read in full. This is stated here, in the eligibility section, rather than in a footer, because that is what makes the separation real rather than decorative.

A free eligibility check gives you the answer in about a minute. It requires no account and stores nothing you enter.

4. Non-discrimination

NBOP does not discriminate on the basis of race, colour, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, national origin, ancestry, age, disability, genetic information, marital or family status, veteran or military status, citizenship status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

Eligibility is decided by the three published criteria in section 3 and by nothing else. No degree, no job title, no employer, no membership and no course from NBOP or from anyone else is required or considered. Where a decision requires judgment rather than arithmetic, the reasoning is recorded and is disclosed to the candidate on request.

5. Applying, and every fee

Application is free and there is no deadline. Applications are reviewed against the published criteria and a decision is issued within seven days: accepted, declined, or more information needed. A declined applicant is told why and what would change it. Payment is taken only after acceptance.

Refunds. Full refund up to 14 days before your sitting window opens. Fifty percent after that. None once the assessment has been opened, because the items have then been seen.

There is no annual fee, no membership requirement and no subscription. These are every fee NBOP charges. If a fee is not on this table, it does not exist.

6. Scheduling, delivery and identity

On acceptance you choose a sitting window. The assessment is delivered online, remotely proctored, with no test centre and no travel. Both parts may be taken in one sitting or in two, within a seven day window. Timing is enforced on the server rather than in the browser.

Identity. You will be asked to present government-issued photo identification at the start of the sitting, and the name on it must match the name on the application. The name that appears on the certificate and in the public register is the name you give at application.

Technical requirements will be published with the scheduling instructions before the first sitting window opens, and any candidate whose setup cannot meet them will be offered an alternative arrangement at no extra cost.

7. Accommodations

Federal law requires that examinations related to professional certification be offered in a place and manner accessible to people with disabilities. NBOP treats that as a design requirement rather than as an exception process.

• How to request. As part of the application, before payment. There is no separate form to hunt for.
• What to supply. A statement of the accommodation you are requesting, and documentation from a qualified professional describing the functional limitation it addresses. Documentation is read only for that purpose.
• Decision timeline. Ten business days from receipt of complete documentation. If NBOP needs more information, you are told what is missing within those ten days rather than at the end of them.
• Cost. None. An accommodation is never charged for.
• Effect. Requesting or receiving one has no bearing on the outcome, and is never recorded on the certificate, in the register, or in any report of your result.
• If refused. A refusal is given in writing with reasons and may be appealed under section 13. The appeal is free and is heard by someone who was not party to the original decision.

Neither of the two largest comparable bodies publishes a decision timeline for accommodations requests. NBOP publishes one because a candidate who cannot plan around an unknown wait is being disadvantaged twice.

8. The assessment

Two parts, and the second is where the credential is actually earned.

• Part A, selected response. Sixty items, seventy-five minutes, thirty percent of the result. Scenario based rather than recall based. There are no vocabulary questions, because knowing the definition of operating cadence is not the skill being certified. Items are presented one at a time in randomised order, drawn from a larger pool, with no backward navigation.
• Part B, constructed response. Four scenarios, one hundred and twenty minutes, seventy percent of the result. Each requires you to diagnose an operational situation, decide, and justify the decision against your own operating context as described in your application. Rubric scored by a trained assessor.

Passing Part A alone cannot pass the assessment. This is stated publicly because a candidate who knows the constructed response is the real assessment prepares differently from one who thinks the multiple choice matters.

Unscored items. Some sittings will include pretest items that do not count toward your result. Where they are used, the number is published in advance and the total time allowance accounts for them.

9. Test content outline

Not yet published, and blocked on purpose. The test content outline states how many items come from each domain. Those weights are set by the job task analysis, which is open now and not yet closed. Publishing an outline before the analysis closes would mean inventing the weights and then quietly changing them. The outline will be published, in full and traceable to the analysis, before the first assessment is sat.

10. Sample items

Not yet published. No assessment items exist yet, because items are written to the blueprint and the blueprint follows the job task analysis. When sample items are released they will be genuine retired or purpose-written items, published free to everyone, and never sold or bundled with anything.

11. Scoring and results

Part A is scored automatically. Part B is scored against a published rubric by a trained assessor. Twenty percent of Part B responses are independently double scored and the inter-rater agreement is published. Where two scorers disagree materially, a third scores.

The cut score is set by a formal standard setting study before the first sitting, and the method and the panel are published. It is not adjusted to control how many people pass. The pass mark and the pass rate are both published, the pass rate with raw numbers rather than as a percentage on its own.

Turnaround is twenty-one days from the close of your sitting window.

What you receive is a scored report rather than a verdict: your overall score and the cut score, your score in each domain, rubric feedback on each Part B scenario, and where you sat against the cohort distribution. That is true whether you passed or not, because a candidate who failed has paid for information about why.

12. Retakes

• Waiting period. Thirty days after a failed attempt.
• Limit. Three attempts in any twelve month period.
• Fee. $395 per attempt.
• Lifetime limit. None. There is no point at which NBOP decides you may never demonstrate competence.

Thirty days is deliberately shorter than a quarter. A wait long enough to cost someone a role they were otherwise qualified for punishes the candidate for the board's convenience.

13. Appeals

An appeal challenges a decision NBOP made about you. Appeals are free, permanently, and are heard by someone who was not party to the original decision.

Every appeal decision is given in writing with reasons. The count of appeals heard and upheld is published annually. An appeal that reveals a defect in an item or a rubric results in that item being reviewed for every candidate who saw it, not only for the appellant.

14. Complaints

A complaint is different from an appeal. An appeal asks NBOP to reconsider a decision about you. A complaint raises a concern about NBOP itself, about the conduct of the assessment, or about the conduct of someone who holds the credential. Complaints are free and may be made by anyone, including people who are not candidates.

• About NBOP or the assessment. Acknowledged within 5 business days, decided within 30 days, answered in writing with reasons.
• About a certificant. Reviewed against the code of conduct in section 15. The certificant is told what has been alleged and is given an opportunity to respond before any finding is made.
• Anonymity. A complaint may be made anonymously, but an anonymous complaint about a certificant cannot always be acted on, because the certificant has a right to answer it.
• Retaliation. Making a complaint has no effect on your candidacy, your result, or your credential, and NBOP will not treat it as a reason to act against you.

15. Code of conduct and discipline

The code of professional conduct and the testing code of conduct are published before the first assessment is sat, and holding the credential means agreeing to both.

The disciplinary process. A complaint or a report is reviewed; the certificant is notified and given at least 21 days to respond; a finding is made by people who were not the complainant and who have no interest in the outcome; the certificant is told the finding and the reason in writing; and the finding may be appealed under section 13. Sanctions range from a private written caution to revocation.

Where a credential is revoked, the public register says so. It does not quietly disappear, because a register that hides its revocations is telling employers something untrue.

16. Exam security and confidentiality

Before the assessment opens you agree that you will not reproduce, record, transmit, reconstruct from memory, or share any assessment content, and that you will not seek or accept assistance during the sitting.

Consequences of a breach are stated plainly: invalidation of the score without refund, ineligibility to re-sit for a stated period, revocation of any credential obtained by means of the breach, and a note on the public register where a credential is revoked. Findings of misconduct follow the same process as any other disciplinary matter in section 15, including the right to respond and the right to appeal.

NBOP publishes the item bank's security classification and the controls around it, but not the items. Item security is the reason the credential means anything to an employer.

17. Using the credential

• The designation is written NBOP-CP and is placed after your name. An endorsement is written alongside it, for example NBOP-CP, Endorsed in Customer Success Operations.
• What you may say. That you hold NBOP-CP, the version of the standard you were assessed against, and the dates of your term. Your verification address may be published anywhere you like.
• What you may not say. That NBOP-CP is a licence, that it is accredited while it is not, that it was awarded by any body other than NBOP, or that it covers a period it does not. The mark may not be used by an organisation to describe itself; individuals hold it, companies do not.
• Withdrawal of use rights. The right to use the designation ends the day the credential expires, is suspended, is revoked, or is relinquished. Continuing to use it after that is a misrepresentation and is handled under section 15.

18. Recertification

The credential runs for three years. Renewal is never a fee alone. There are two routes and the holder chooses.

• Continuing education, $150. Meet the published continuing education standard for the term. Education from any provider counts if it meets that standard. NBOP may offer one option among many and buying it confers no advantage. Requiring an NBOP product to stay certified would make the credential certify purchase rather than practice, so it will never be required.
• Re-sit, $395. Sit the assessment again against whatever version of the standard is current then. It is a full assessment and is priced as one. This route stays open permanently, so no holder is ever obliged to buy anything from anyone in order to remain certified.

Why three years. Operating practice moves, and a credential that certifies a decade-old context is not telling an employer anything true today. Three years is the interval used by the established bodies in adjacent fields and it is short enough that the assessed context is still recognisable.

Late renewal. Up to twelve months after expiry, renewal is still available at the applicable route fee plus $75. More than twelve months after expiry the credential is treated as lapsed and a full assessment at $395 is required. There is no separate reinstatement fee.

19. Suspension, revocation and relinquishment

• Expiry. The term ends and the register says expired. That is not a finding against the holder and the register says so in as many words.
• Suspension. Temporary, for the duration of a disciplinary matter or pending a decision. The register says suspended and gives no further detail while the matter is open.
• Revocation. Permanent removal following a finding under section 15, or on evidence that the credential was obtained by misrepresentation. The register says revoked and continues to say so. Revocation may be appealed under section 13 before it takes effect.
• Voluntary relinquishment. A holder may give up the credential at any time in writing, without giving a reason. The register records that it was relinquished, not revoked, because the difference matters and conflating them would be a false statement about the person. Relinquishing does not entitle the holder to a refund and does not stop a disciplinary matter already under way.

20. Your records

• Application material, including references and your operating context, is retained for the length of your term plus three years, then destroyed.
• Assessment responses and scores are retained for seven years, because a result may need to be defended long after it was issued.
• Accommodations documentation is held separately from your assessment record, is accessible only to the people deciding the request, and is destroyed twelve months after the sitting.
• Certification status, meaning the fact of the credential and its dates, is retained permanently, because the register has to keep answering after a credential ends.
• What is never published. Your score, your responses, your application, your references, your employer and any accommodation you received. The register publishes status, not performance.
• Your rights. You may request a copy of what NBOP holds about you, and ask for factual corrections. Requests are answered within 30 days.

21. Public verification

Every credential has a permanent public address that anyone can check, free, with no account, without asking the holder for permission. It keeps returning an accurate answer after a credential expires, is suspended or is revoked, and it says which of those it is.

Verification shows the holder's name, the credential and any endorsements, the version of the standard assessed, the issue and expiry dates, and the current status. It shows nothing else. Use the verification page for a single credential or the register to search.

22. Contacts

Every process on this page is reached at contact@nationalboardofoperations.org. There is one address rather than a wall of them, and it is routed internally. Say in the subject line which of these it is and it reaches the right person the same day.

• Eligibility and applications, including a request for the reasons behind a decision.
• Accommodations, including questions before you apply.
• Appeals, naming which of the four types in section 13.
• Complaints, about NBOP, the assessment, or a certificant.
• Records, to request a copy or a correction.
• Misuse of the credential, to report someone claiming a credential they do not hold. Check the register first; it will usually answer the question immediately.

Postal correspondence: 16220 N. Scottsdale Rd, Suite 300, Scottsdale, AZ 85254, United States.