PMI-PBA Mock Exam Lite - 17

Question 1

The system that includes the process for submitting proposed changes, reviewing and approving proposed changes, defining approval levels for authorizing changes, and providing a method to validate approved changes is the:

Answer 1

Configuration Management System

The configuration management system includes the process for submitting proposed changes, reviewing and approving proposed changes, defining approval levels for authorizing changes, and providing a method to validate approved changes. In most application areas, the Configuration Management System includes the change control system. [PMBOK® Guide 6th Edition, Page 115]

Question 2

The lead business analyst on the project has asked the junior analysts to compile all elicited information and develop relevant models to find patterns and to explore the problem space further. All of the following are the primary reasons to develop models for the elicited information EXCEPT:

Answer 2

Documenting the models in the lessons learned library.

Although you might want to store the models in the lessons learned library or as organizational process assets, this is not a prime objective of developing them. The rest of the choices are all primary reasons for developing models. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 184]

Question 3

You are working as the business analyst in a product team that is developing a new business intelligence-based reporting system. This system will have multiple interfaces with existing organizational systems and data sources. You have been asked to provide the system interface tables that capture all the detailed integration requirements for each system interface. Which of the following two models can help you identify the required system interfaces?

Answer 3

Context diagram and ecosystem map

System interface tables are usually created after the ecosystem map and context diagram have been created to identify the interfaces. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 205]

Question 4

You have recently completed a series of requirements elicitation workshops. You also have refined and formally documented the information obtained through these workshops. You are now planning to setup a few meetings with the senior stakeholders to review and validate this information. Which of the following business analysis processes will provide you with some guidance regarding this activity?

Answer 4

Confirm Elicitation Results

Since you have completed the elicitation workshops, this means that you have completed the Conduct Elicitation process. Now you are planning to confirm the obtained results form the stakeholders, this will be the Confirm Elicitation Results process. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 170]

Question 5

You are leading the business analysis activities on a software development project. You have recently completed all planned product requirements elicitation activities. You now want to classify the requirements into groups for further review and analysis. Which of the following tools could be used for this classification?

Answer 5

Affinity diagram

Affinity diagram is a technique that allows large numbers of ideas to be classified into groups for review and analysis. The rest of the choices are not grouping techniques. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 387]

Question 6

Agile projects typically do not schedule formal requirements approval workshops. On such projects, product requirements are often considered approved after:

Answer 6

The product owner’s prioritization of the backlog.

On adaptive projects, the product owner has the authority to approve requirements. Typically, on these projects, the product owner’s prioritization of the backlog is generally interpreted as approval. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 268]

Question 7

Agile approaches do not require developing a formal scope management plan or a WBS. In Agile projects, which of the following makes up the high-level project scope?

Answer 7

Product backlog

The backlog is the ordered list of all the work, presented in story form, for a team. At any given point in time, the current product backlog defines the current project scope. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, pages 133]

Question 8

You need to demonstrate the functionality of your product to a group of stakeholders. The demonstration must allow the stakeholder to interact with the model to clarify their requirements. Which of the following model should you select for the demonstration?

Answer 8

High fidelity prototype

High fidelity prototypes allow the users to interact with the prototype. None of the rest of the models have this ability. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 199]

Question 9

A project team is currently reviewing the scope of a recently awarded project. They prepare the following diagram. Which diagram is this?

Answer 9

WBS

This is an example of a Work Breakdown Structure. A work breakdown structure is a deliverable-oriented breakdown of a project scope into smaller components. [PMBOK® Guide, 6th edition, Page 158]

Question 10

You have recently made the first release of your product. The customer is not happy with the release as some of the lower priority features were included in the release while the more important ones were missed out. What could be the potential root cause of this issue?

Answer 10

Story mapping was not done correctly.

Story mapping is used to sequence user stories, based upon their value and the order their user typically performs them. Improper story mapping usually results in customer complaints similar to the one given in the scenario. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 134]

Question 11

You have been assigned to lead a procurement process re-engineering project for your organization. You have successfully mapped the current-state and the future-state processes. The future-state process has cut some roles, while at the same time, added some new roles. Which of the following techniques will you use to identify the new role requirements in the future-state process?

Answer 11

Job analysis

The output of job analysis may include details such as a high-level description of the work; a depiction of the work environment; a detailed list of the activities a person is expected to perform; a list of the preferred interpersonal skills; or a list of required training, degrees, and certifications. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 117]

Question 12

A business analyst is responsible for conducting Solution Evaluation activities for each product development or delivery project. Evaluation activities may occur at several points in time during the product lifecycle. Which of the following is not an appropriate time to conduct solution evaluation activities?

Answer 12

Early during the project initiation stage.

Solution Evaluation includes the processes to validate a full solution or a segment of a solution that is about to be or has already been implemented. Conducting evaluation activities early during project initiation doesn’t make sense. All other choices give valid points in time to conduct solution evaluation activities. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 279]

Question 13

The software developers in your team are asking for detailed textual narratives that describe the user-system interactions in a level of detail required for digitization of each business process being digitized. Which of the following needs to be done?

Answer 13

Develop use cases

A use case is a process model that uses textual narrative to describe the system-user interactions to achieve successful completion of a goal. This is what the developers had asked for and this is what needs to be developed. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 214]

Question 14

You are leading a complex ERP system development project using Agile software development methods. The project has recently made its first release and you are now reviewing the progress with the project team. Your project’s burndown chart shows a steadily declining trend. What does this mean?

Answer 14

The velocity is constant

A burndown chart shows a team’s progress by showing the number of story points remaining in the project. The vertical axis shows the number of story points remaining and the iterations are shown across the horizontal axis. A steadily declining burndown chart indicates that the velocity is constant; the same number of story points are being delivered in each project iteration. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 131, 148]

Question 15

You are currently conducting a workshop where stakeholders have proposed a number of ideas that can be implemented to improve the operations of a business unit. You want the group to help you categorize these ideas into more manageable clusters. Which of the following techniques should you apply?

Answer 15

Affinity diagram

Affinity diagrams are used to process a large set of information or ideas into a manageable set of data organized by categories. The rest of the choices aren’t fit for this purpose. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 77]

Question 16

You are leading a product team developing an online tool. A recent change in organizational strategic goals has impacted some key business objectives relevant to your project. How would you review this change and identify the impact on already developed product components?

Answer 16

Review the traceability matrix and perform an impact analysis.

In this case, some of the business objectives have been changed and you want to trace the impact to the developed product components. The requirements traceability matrix will help you identify the components that are linked to these business objectives. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 258]

Question 17

You are planning your project’s elicitation approach and activities. Which of the following elicitation techniques should you use prior to interviewing stakeholders to save their time and maximize the value of their time during elicitation sessions?

Answer 17

Document analysis

Documents may have enough information to use as a starting point, thereby saving significant stakeholder time during in-person elicitation activities. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 167]

Question 18

Sandra is managing an ERP system deployment project. Due to the complexity of the project and the number of project stakeholders involved, she decides to use a multi-criteria decision analysis for reviewing all change requests. What should be her first step in establishing this?

Answer 18

Develop a decision matrix

The Multi-criteria decision analysis uses a decision matrix to provide a systematic analytical approach to evaluate the requested change according to a set of predefined criteria. The other choices are either quality or risk management tools. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 119]

Question 19

You are leading a complex organizational transformation project. You have a wide range of stakeholders from active supporters to non-supportive and resistant stakeholders. You are now analyzing these stakeholders based on their influence and impact. What will be your strategy to manage the stakeholders classified as “low influence” but “high impact” stakeholders?

Answer 19

Pay attention to this group and address their concerns; stakeholders in this group may represent those expected to adapt to the implemented solution once it is built.

Stakeholders who are expected to adapt to the implemented solution once it is built are from the “low influence/high impact” group. Stakeholders that are just being monitored to ensure their behavior does not change over time are from the “low influence/low impact” group. Stakeholders who are decision-makers have “high influence”, and the stakeholders who are a critical source for requirements are “high impact”. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 119-120]

Question 20

You want your organization to invest in a great product idea that only requires an upfront investment and zero maintenance costs. The steering committee has appreciated the idea but has asked you to assess the financial viability of the product. Which of the following valuation techniques will give you a simple rate of return on the required initial investment disregarding the time value of money and the time needed to recover the initial investment?

Answer 20

ROI

The Internal Rate of Return (IRR) gives the projected annual yield of an investment (rate of return) considering the time value of money. On the other hand, the Return on Investment (ROI) is the percentage return on an initial investment disregarding the time value of money. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 90]

Question 21

You have recently taken over leadership of an Agile team that is halfway through a complicated project. You have recently examined project requirements and now want to get an idea of the team velocity. You have a look at the burndown chart to get some insight on the team’s velocity and observe a perfectly horizontal line for the last sprint. What does that mean?

Answer 21

The velocity for the sprint was zero.

A burndown chart shows a team’s progress by showing the number of story points remaining in the project. The vertical axis shows the number of story points remaining and the iterations are shown across the horizontal axis. A steadily declining burndown chart indicates that the velocity is constant; the same number of story points are being delivered in each project iteration. A horizontal line will indicate no story points were delivered during the sprint which means the velocity was zero. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 131, 148]

Question 22

You are leading the business analysis activities for a process flow automation project using a predictive life cycle. You have recently completed all requirements elicitation activities and updated the requirements management tool. For this project, what will constitute your requirements baseline?

Answer 22

Approved requirements

Requirements that are approved establish the requirements baseline. Requirements approval should be sought once the requirements have been verified and validated. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 264]

Question 23

Your organization has recently implemented a new technology product that has digitized some of the core business processes in the organization. You have been tasked to assess the outcome of this initiative. How would you measure the success of the product?

Answer 23

By assessing the solution’s ability to deliver its intended benefits to the organization.

You might assess the competitive advantage the product has provided to the organization if the intent of product development was to provide competitive advantage. Since this information is not provided, the best answer to this question needs to be more generic. The correct response is assessing the solution’s ability to deliver its intended benefits to the organization, which could be gaining competitive advantage, cost benefits or processing efficiency, etc. Also note that the question is asking for an approach to measure the product’s success and not the project’s success. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 17]

Question 24

You are the lead business analyst on an operating model transformation project. You have conducted a detailed gap analysis by comparing the to-be process flows to the as-is process flows. As an outcome of this gap analysis you have uncovered some transition requirements. If your project is following an adaptive lifecycle how would you document these requirements?

Answer 24

Document them as transition user stories and add them to the product backlog.

Since these are transition requirements these should be documented as transition user stories and not change requests. Furthermore, these should be added to the product backlog from where they will be prioritized and allocated to a sprint backlog. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 140]

Question 25

Most projects require use of repeated feedback and continuous analysis. As more information becomes available and as the project environment changes, project requirements are gathered, understood and analyzed. As a result, many project management processes are performed more than once and repeated throughout the project life cycle. In contrast to this, some of the processes, such as Develop Project Charter, are usually performed once or at predefined points on most projects. Which term best describes the Identify Risks process?

Answer 25

Iterative

The Identify Risks process is an ongoing, iterative process as risks are often identified throughout the project’s life cycle. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 409]

Question 26

Your venture capital firm has recently acquired two local construction firms and is merging these together. Both the firms have different construction specializations. You are assigned to design the enterprise architecture of the newly formed firm. Which of the following statements regarding enterprise architectures is INCORRECT?

Answer 26

Business architecture is the enterprise architecture minus the organizational structure and processes.

Business architecture is a subset of the enterprise architecture and CONTAINS components such as the business functions, organizational structures, locations, and processes of an organization, including documents and depictions of those elements. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 65]

Question 27

You have setup a center of business analysis excellence in your organization and are currently training a few resources. A trainee business analyst is confused regarding the difference between a facilitated workshop and a focus group. Which of the following statements is correct regarding focus groups?

Answer 27

A focus group brings together prequalified stakeholders and subject matter experts to learn about their expectations.

Focus groups and facilitated workshops are two different elicitation techniques. A focus group brings together prequalified stakeholders and subject matter experts to learn about their expectations. On the other hand, participants for a workshop do not need to be prequalified or SMEs. Workshops are used to generate ideas, while the focus groups are used to refine these ideas and lead the development efforts. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 167]

Question 28

You are currently developing your business analysis work plan. What should be your next logical step once you have identified the business analysis deliverables required to be produced for the product development team?

Answer 28

Determine the business analysis tasks and activities.

The process of developing a business analysis work plan is: Identify the deliverables -> Determine the business analysis tasks and activities -> Determine the timing and sequencing of tasks ->Determine the roles and responsibilities -> Identifying the resources -> Estimate the work [Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide, page 61-65; The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 111]

Question 29

You have recently been hired by a pharmaceuticals company. You are leading the first Agile project in the organization. Historically all projects have followed strict predictive lifecycles. In Agile projects, which of the following makes up the high-level project scope?

Answer 29

Product backlog

The product backlog is the list of all product backlog items, typically user stories, requirements, or features, that need to be delivered for a solution. On Agile projects, the product backlog makes up the overall project scope. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 133]

Question 30

Recently a few product security issues have been reported by the end users. You want to analyze these issues in a greater detail and want to uncover the most significant causes and effects involved in these security breaches. You develop an interrelationship diagram to help identify related causes and effects for this situation. What is the main advantage of using an interrelationship diagram?

Answer 30

They are helpful for visualizing complex problems that have seeming unwieldy relationships among multiple variables.

An interrelationship diagram is a special type of cause-and-effect diagram that depicts related causes and effects for a given situation. Interrelationship diagrams help to uncover the most significant causes and effects involved in a situation. They are helpful for visualizing complex problems that have seeming unwieldy relationships among multiple variables. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 71]

Question 31

You are leading the digitization efforts of a cross-functional manual workflow. So far you have only met some senior stakeholders from the involved departments and found out that many stakeholders have conflicting point of views. Which of the following elicitation techniques is considered a primary technique for quickly defining product information across multiple domains and reconciling stakeholder differences?

Answer 31

Facilitated workshops

Workshops are considered a primary technique for quickly defining product information across multiple domains and reconciling stakeholder differences. Because of their interactive group nature, well-facilitated sessions can build trust, foster relationships, and improve communication among the participants, which can lead to increased stakeholder consensus. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 167]

Question 32

The sponsor of your facilities upgrade project has left the company to join another organization. Several weeks later, you are reviewing the business case for the project, and you find that there are several inconsistencies between what is stated in the business case and what is described in the project scope. Further research shows that the business case as a whole is based on inaccurate information. What do you do?

Answer 32

Notify your project stakeholders immediately

Notify your project stakeholders immediately. They can determine the best path forward. An incorrect business case could have a serious impact on the usability of the final output of your project, or it could even impact the company’s strategic goals. Failure to point out this error to the appropriate management is a violation of the PMI Code of Ethics. [PMI Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct]

Question 33

Which of the following approaches encourages plan definition but also acknowledges that once work starts, the priorities may change and the plan needs to be updated to reflect this change?

Answer 33

Adaptive planning

Adaptive planning defines a plan but acknowledges that once work starts, the priorities may change and the plan might need to be updated. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 177]

Question 34

Which of the following statements regarding the Net Present Value (NPV) is incorrect?

Answer 34

NPV is the ideal financial benefit measurement method.

NPV alone is not the ideal financial benefit measurement method. NPV results are highly dependent on the magnitude of the project. Usually NPV measurements are presented along with the project IRR or the initial investment estimates to demonstrate the financial feasibility of a project. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 90]

Question 35

Your Agile project is halfway through the third iteration. One of the key stakeholders emails a change request that would make one of the backlog items unwanted by the business. How should you respond to this change request?

Answer 35

Work with the product owner to have this item removed from the backlog.

Since the product owner is ultimately responsible for the product, you need to work with them to have the item removed from the backlog. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 216]

Question 36

Which of the following is the process of communicating and working with stakeholders to meet their needs and expectations, address issues as they occur, and foster appropriate stakeholder involvement?

Answer 36

Manage Stakeholder Engagement

Manage Stakeholder Engagement is the process of communicating and working with stakeholders to meet their needs and expectations, address issues as they occur, and foster appropriate stakeholder involvement. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 523]

Question 37

You are leading a global project that has an impact on a big number of stakeholders that are globally distributed. Stakeholder identification and analysis on this project is not only a tedious but continuous process. Which of the following stakeholders cannot be classified as a supportive or non-supportive stakeholder?

Answer 37

A stakeholder whose business process is impacted by the project.

Stakeholders whose business processes are impacted by the project can be supportive or non-supportive. If they see the project delivering value to them or if they are direct beneficiaries of the outcome, they will be supportive of the project. On the other hand, if they are not the direct beneficiary of the project benefits and if their workload is expected to be increased as a result of the project’s outcome, they will be non-supportive. [Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide, page 41; The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 115-116]

Question 38

Complex projects usually demand preparation and distribution of periodic project performance reports. The contents of performance reports are usually determined early and documented in the project communications management plan. Which of the following is least likely to be a section on a work performance report?

Answer 38

Stakeholder engagement strategy

Stakeholder engagement strategy is a component of the stakeholder engagement plan and is usually considered confidential. Due to this reason, this section is least likely to be included in a work performance report. Other choices are more likely to be components of a work performance report. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 112]

Question 39

Understanding the customers, their needs, wants, and requirements is critical for the successful design of any business process and function. As a business analyst, who is the primary customer and consumer of your business analysis deliverables?

Answer 39

The product development team

The business analysis deliverables are produced for the project and the product team. The product team consumes the deliverables produced by the business analyst for product development; hence they are the primary customers. The key stakeholders and the product users are the customer of the product development team. [Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide, page 62; The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 111]

Question 40

The quality cost of a project rose significantly during the course of the project. A post-mortem analysis of the increased cost revealed that this was due to poorly defined acceptance criteria. During which phase should the acceptance criteria have been properly captured?

Answer 40

Define Scope process

Acceptance criteria are documented in the project scope statement, developed during the Define Scope process. Poorly defined acceptance criteria would then propagate to the Plan Quality Management process used for planning quality. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 154]

Question 41

You are performing the Determine Future State process for a technology implementation project. You have assessed the current state, identified the current issues and the associated root causes. You now want to identify the capabilities required to meet the business requirements and fill the gaps. Which of the following business analysis techniques will help you relate the identified problems within the current state to their associated root causes and the capability required to address the problem in the future state?

Answer 41

Capability table

Capability tables relate the identified problems within the current state to their associated root causes and the capability required to address the problem in the future state. The rest of the analysis techniques do not have this focus. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 78]

Question 42

Last year, your consulting firm was engaged by a major retailer to help mature some of its business development processes. As part of the engagement, your firm introduced some management tools and techniques to the organization. You are now on a follow-up visit to assess the effectiveness of your firm’s earlier engagement and find out that the organization didn’t properly understand the proper application of fishbone diagrams to conduct root cause analysis. Which of the following statement regarding fishbone diagrams is INCORRECT?

Answer 42

The root cause of a problem is listed at the head of the diagram.

The causes and the sub-causes are placed on the bones of the fish. The head of the fish lists the problem (effect) of the situation and not the root cause of the situation. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, pages 70]

Question 43

Which of the following is a market analysis quadrant diagram used by organizations to qualitatively analyze their products and product lines?

Answer 43

Growth-share matrix

A Product portfolio matrix, also known as a growth-share matrix, is a market analysis quadrant diagram used by organizations to qualitatively analyze their products and product lines. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 283]

Question 44

Which of the following documents will provide you a measurable description of the expected business value of the system?

Answer 44

Business goals and objectives

Business goals and objectives specify stated targets that the busines is seeking to achieve. They provide the context for evaluating solution performance because they are a measurable description of the expected business value. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 281]

Question 45

You have recently joined an Agile team. The team is new to Agile approaches and occasionally struggles with some of the Agile tools and techniques. You have noticed that during each daily standup meeting the team discusses WIP statuses with a focus on where different items are during the development cycle. You think this is a waste and the team should rather focus on the objectives of the standups. Which of the following tools can help the team in this situation?

Answer 45

Kanban board

A Kanban board provides a means to visualize the flow of work, make impediments easily visible, and allow flow to be managed by adjusting the work in process limits. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 233]

Question 46

Sam’s project has successfully been initiated, and all the major roadblocks have been removed. The senior stakeholders have now switched from a leading role to a supportive role. What is Sam’s next step once the first version of the project stakeholder register is developed?

Answer 46

Conduct stakeholder analysis

Conduct Stakeholder Analysis is the logical next step after the Identify Stakeholders process which first generates the project stakeholder register. The rest of the choices are the activities that must be started once the stakeholder analysis is complete. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 111]

Question 47

Your organization has recently been merged with another company. The newly formed organization has appointed an auditor to audit all capital projects and assess if these are still aligned with the new organizational strategy. The auditor wants to see how your product supports organizational strategy, business goals, and objectives over time. What would you present to the auditor?

Answer 47

Product roadmap

In business analysis, product roadmaps provide important information about a product, providing insights about the product vision and how the product will support organizational strategy, business goals and objectives over time. The other choices are part of the product scope, but they do not show the delivery of the features over time. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 93]

Question 48

You are leading a micro-component fabrication project. The project requires delivery of a number of components that need to be tightly quality controlled. Control charts are being used to determine the stability of the manufacturing process. Which of the following best describes the range of the control limits applied on a control chart?

Answer 48

The control limits are determined using statistical calculations.

The control limits are determined using statistical calculations. [PMBOK® Guide 6th edition, Page 304]

Question 49

You are analyzing requirements for a new software application. All product deliverables have been identified and now you need to determine the conditions that are required to be met before each deliverable could be accepted. These conditions are known as:

Answer 49

Acceptance criteria

Acceptance criteria are a set of conditions that are required to be met before deliverables are accepted. In business analysis, acceptance criteria are built to evaluate the product requirements and solution. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 387]

Question 50

You are leading the business analysis activities for a data intensive process automation project. In order to model the data, a number of data models are currently being considered by the team. Which of the following cannot be used as a data model in this context?

Answer 50

Process flow

A process flow is a process model and not a data model. The rest of the choices are all data models. [The PMI Guide to Business Analysis, page 185]