Practice Test Flashcards
What can be termed as the Agile triangle?
Agile projects deal with the basic triangle of Value, Quality and Constraints. Scope, Cost and Time represent the constraints.
Which phases can be observed in a project management framework applying the Agile mindset?
Envision, Speculate, Explore, Adapt, Close
The team is working on a project based on a Fixed price contract and is using Agile methodologies. Midway through the project, the customer requested for a change. What should you do?
If the customer requires a change, there is no point in telling them it is not possible, but rather try to work out a way in which it can be accommodated. Given the fact that it is a Fixed Price contract, you cannot simply accept the change at no cost to the customer– it would open a Pandora’s box. Deferring to management may be a tempting option, but before doing so, it seems that the team would have to do some homework. In an Agile team, the team can always substitute a feature with another as long as the team has not started working on it. But if a feature is already delivered or being worked on, then it cannot be changed unless there is a reciprocal action by the customer.
What are the 5 levels in the hierarchy of conflicts?
Level-1 means the team discovers a problem;
Level-2 means disagreement comes to the fore;
Level-3 means disagreement degenerates to contest (generalizations, formation of groups);
Level-4 means crusade (open warfare between groups);
Level-5 means World war (all hell breaks loose).
What is Time to market?
Time to market is the length of time it takes from a product being conceived until its being available for sale. The reason that time to market is so important is because being late erodes the addressable market that you have to sell your product into.
A product development company is concerned about improving the time-to-market for it’s products and is adopting Agile for faster turnaround. What should be the basis for prioritizing features in such a scenario?
Time-to-market is often a critical parameter for realizing value. In order to reach the market quicker, number of features may have to be compromised, so also the extent to which they are implemented.
A Product manager needs to find out who is working a specific task, in order to provide some valuable information. Where can she find this information?
During the Sprint planning session, the Sprint backlog will be created and embellished with information such as break-down of stories into tasks, assignment of tasks to team members,etc.
A team is estimating the amount of work required to complete work on a user story using the ideal time unit. In the context of Agile estimating, what is Ideal time?
Ideal time is the amount of “work time” that it would take to complete a story. This may be then correlated to the actual time to be estimated, based upon the level of expertise, the amount of distraction, etc. The concept of ideal time allows us to not worry about these other variables while sizing a story.
A Product owner is proposing a new product to be built that addresses an important need felt in the Telecom industry. Such software might best be referred to as what?
Horizontal market software is applicable across different industry segments. Vertical market software is applicable for a particular industry. Since the product in question is being developed for a specific industry, Vertical market software is the best choice.
What is the difference between Enterprise Software and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)?
Enterprise software is software your organization buys and installs on your organization’s servers. By contrast, SaaS software is software that you “rent” and is hosted “in the cloud” and accessed via the internet. In addition and significantly, SaaS offerings tend to be multi-tenant, meaning that multiple organizations are actually working in the same database.
A team is considering many options in terms of team formation, including co-located teams, virtual teams, offshoring, near-shoring, etc. The over-arching goal for this team is time-to-market. Other things being constant, what guidance can you provide regarding the comparison of time-to-market for co-located teams as opposed to dispersed teams?
Time-to-market improves 3-fold if the team is co-located. Ref: Agile software development - a cooperative game: Alastair Cockburn.
A product owner wants to introduce a new feature in a product as she believes it will bring in incremental revenue. What is incremental revenue?
Incremental revenue means finding ways to get more revenue out of the existing customer base (by up-selling, or upgrading or offering more value).
An Agile team needs to establish a fine balance between bringing in a new process and adapting a process to suit the particular requirements of the project. What is the difference between process tailoring and process instantiation?
Process tailoring is one of the foundational elements of Agile. You start out with a process and tailor it to how it best fits your team and its particular situation. Process instantiation on the other hand takes a (often heavy and prescriptive) process and implements it with little or no scope for adaptation.
A customer for a project team has signed off on the requirements and would like the team to follow Agile methods for development. The customer representatives are apparently in a very busy period and cannot make time for attending planning and demo meetings. What is the best way to proceed?
Make 5 minute recorded demos of completed features and submit to the customer for offline viewing and feedback.
Feedback (inspect and adapt) is an important tenet of Agile development and should not be compromised. If availability of time is an issue, workarounds may be adopted.
What are the 5 core risk areas for a project?
Intrinsic schedule flaw, Specification breakdown, Scope creep, Personnel loss and Productivity variation.
A development team, along with the customer representatives and other stakeholders are in a week long meeting to determine the content and outline of the forthcoming product release. What is the most appropriate name for this meeting?
The Joint Project Planning Session (JPPS) is a “look ahead’ planning session that is conducted to come up with a forecast for a release plan
An organization wants to establish the notion of “Self-organized” teams. What best describes the term “Self-Organized” in Agile?
A team that accepts accountability for delivering on its commitments.
A company is trying to transition to Agile and is looking for a suitable project to pilot the transition. Which one would be the MOST suitable for the pilot?
- 3 weeks
- 3 months
- 1 year
- 9 months
3 months. A medium duration project is best suited for the pilot. Too short may open criticism that the method will only work with smaller projects. Too long, and it will take a lot of time to see results.
A team worked on a story during an iteration and declared that a particular story meets the definition of ready. What can be said about a user story that meets the “Definition of ready”?
A “ready story” is one that is ready to be worked upon and taken up for planning. It means initial discussion has taken place between the product owner and the team
A team committed to implement 10 stories in an iteration. Development work is completed on the stories. Functional tests have been completed and basic regression tests pass. There are 12 defects pending on few of the stories that block few paths in the use cases defined. Defects have been fixed but they have not been re-tested. In such a scenario, can the Iteration be deemed successful?
No. The idea in an iteration is to complete all the engineering activities necessary to produce a product of “near releasable” quality. This has not happened, so the iteration cannot be termed as successful
You are working on a large project, that will be executed using Agile methodologies. How would you staff the team for such a project?
While it is true that Agile prefers smaller teams, the team size ought to be determined by the complexity and nature of the project. A larger project can be handled by multiple Agile teams working in parallel. Some methodologies like FDD can actually scale up to as high as 250 people.
The product owner is assigning priorities for stories in the product backlog. There are many parameters based on which the priorities get decided and the product owner is getting confused. Which is the best criterion (or set of criteria) that can be used for assigning priorities?
ROL (Risk of Loss) and risk. The best answer is RoI and Risk. Higher the RoI from a story, the higher would be its priority. Similarly higher risk items should have a higher priority. Stakeholder’s perceptions may play a role, but it is always better to have a dispassionate view based on these parameters. It should certainly not be a consensus exercise or a majority wins exercise (number of requesters).
Tim, Janet and Daisy disagree on the estimate for a story. Tim is the Product owner and knows about the business relevance of the story more than anybody else. Janet is a very experienced developer and the lead for the development team. She has worked on several similar stories in the past. Daisy is about 6 months old in the project and has been assigned to work on the story. Whose estimate should be used during Sprint planning?
A product owner should not ideally participate in the estimation. An expert’s opinion is valuable and must be considered, but in the event of a disagreement, the estimate of the person who is going to do the actual work should be respected.
A team is working on sprint planning. The stories were broken down into tasks and the tasks need to be assigned to the team members. Which is the best unit of estimate for the tasks that can help in this exercise?
Tasks are usually estimated in terms of hours taken to complete. There is no such thing as task points.
A SPIKE solution is undertaken in order to gain better understanding about a new technology or concept before starting work related to it. In which phase of an Agile project is it most appropriate to undertake SPIKE stories?
SPIKE is an activity that helps during design and development in gaining a quick understanding about a technology by doing some small, targeted experimentation.
A team is adopting a Kanban system and is designing the Kanban card and Kanban board. There is a lot of debate about what information should be included on the Kanban card and it is agreed to keep the information to a bare minimum to avoid cluttering the board. Which information would be MOST valuable on a Kanban card?
While all information is useful, the name of the person working on it would be the MOST valuable. The other information can be maintained somewhere else (e.g. on an electronic system) and cross-referenced
As a manager of an Agile team, you provide a reward to the testers in the team based on the number of test cases each of them produce. Is this a good practice?
Metrics have to be targeted to achieve the right behavior of the team. The goal of the entire team should be to achieve near releasable quality at the end of the iteration. Adding to test case volume by itself does not lead to better quality – in fact it might be perverse incentive to do meaningless tests in order to bolster the number of tests developed and executed.
A team member wants to bring up an improvement suggestion. Implementing it would require an organization-wide change. Which is the most appropriate meeting in which to bring up this suggestion?
Improvements that require cross-organizational involvement should be left for the release retrospective, because typically it requires more effort and lobbying that cannot be accomplished in a single iteration. The daily scrum is certainly not a forum for discussing such changes and there is no such forum as a monthly meeting.
A Product Manager in an organization is trying to understand what it would take to transition into a Product Owner role. What is the difference between a Product Manager and a Product Owner?
In general, the Product Manager focuses more on the external stakeholders and tries to reflect their view-point in the roadmap. A Product Owner has both an inward and outward focus. The Outward focus is like that of the Product Manager, and the inward focus calls upon the PO to work with the team in order to plan the iterations and the releases and therefore build a roadmap with team input.
What is SWOT analysis?
SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) gives an idea about the competitive position of a product.
In the Feature-Driven-Development methodology, there is no fixed length for an iteration. The duration of the iteration is driven primarily by what?
The time necessary to finish the feature. FDD teams work on a feature at a time. Once that feature is completed, they disband and start working on another feature
The Risk-burndown-chart plots the level of risk on a project over time to indicate if the project’s riskiness is increasing or decreasing over a period of time. What is plotted on the Y-axis of the chart?
Level of risk is commonly measured as the sum of the product of the likely impact and the probability. By summing the level of risk on all the identified risks on a project, a project manager can get a numeric indicator for the “riskiness” of a project.
Why is “Beeing 100% sure of meeting the goal” NOT a legitimate concern in determining the Goal of an iteration?
Levelled workload, priorities set by the PO and team buy-in are important. No team can be 100% sure of meeting the goal all the time
What is a product persona?
A persona description should indicate clearly the role a person is playing in the story, how they interact with the system and what their special needs might be. It allows the developers to get into the persona and understand real and perceived needs.
Ex.: “Mary is a front desk clerk handles 200 customer’s cash transactions a day and wants the system to be very quick and responsive”
A team has just finished estimating the stories in terms of ideal days and is trying to figure out how to translate this into the actual (elapsed) days. As an Agile coach, what would you suggest is the percentage of the total time worked by a developer is actually programming time?
Normally developers spend 55% of their time on actual programming tasks.
The manager of a Product team is working towards a critical product release. The team is split up into multiple Scrum teams working on different areas of the product. What is the BEST approach to form each of the participating Scrum teams?
A Scrum team needs to be as cross-functional as possible - and a feature team is most likely to meet this requirement
“Time traveling” is a practice used for de-bugging in Extreme programming. What does this entail?
Time-traveling is going back to previous versions to discover the genesis of a defect.
Although Agile teams embrace change, they also need to project a clear roadmap for the product. What is the normal time frame for which a “roadmap” is defined?
A roadmap is typically over multiple releases (up to 2 years).
An Agile coach in the context of Agile planning advocated the technique of triangulation for estimation. What is the best description of triangulation?
Instead of relying on just one benchmark, triangulating advocates using multiple benchmarks to ensure that the story is sized correctly relative to others.
Having well thought through and reliable estimates is an important foundation for planning. What type of estimation is most commonly used in Agile projects?
Top-down estimation is commonly used in Agile. Analogous estimation is considered top-down.
During a daily stand-up meeting, one of the team members brought up a blocking issue and another team member interrupts and starts describing how to resolve that issue. What should the Team Facilitator do?
One of the benefits of the Daily stand-up is that it enhances visibility to the blocking issues and it is a good thing that another team member is willing to step in and solve the issue - no need for a reprimand. However, the daily stand-up needs to move along at a brisk pace and hence the Team Facilitator should request that the resolution discussion be taken offline.
A team is working on release planning and is estimating the proposed release backlog. Whose opinion should be considered while finalizing estimates for a story?
It is important to have as broad a consensus as possible within the team about an estimate, hence Agile advocates arriving at estimates in a collaborative fashion. The person who has maximum expertise may tend to assign a low estimate, which may not be enough for a less experienced team member. The developer assigned to the story may not have expertise to properly assess. Hence everybody needs to have a say in the estimation.
What is a Niko-Niko calendar?
A Niko-niko Calendar is updated daily with each team member’s mood for that day. Over time the calendar reveals patterns of change in the moods.
“Delivering value early” is an important principle for an Agile team. However, each stakeholder’s perception of value might be different. The “Value” of a feature should be measured from whose perspective?
The user and the buyer are both important stakeholders. The buyer is the person paying the money for the system. The user is the one spending time using the system. Their notion of value is the one which matters the most. The Product Owner needs to look at each feature from their point of view.
At the end of two iterations, your team figures out that it has grossly under-estimated the time required for the project. What is the BEST way to address this situation?
The best way forward is to adapt to the new understanding of reality and re-evaluate the plans for the project. In Agile, the plan is fairly flexible and changeable from iteration to iteration.
What are the layers in an Agile enterprise framework?
- Portfolio governance
- Project Management
- Iteration management
- Technical practices
A particular team is observing that its backlog of escaped defects (defects escaped from the team and discovered by the customer) is increasing over a period of time. What is the BEST remedy for this situation?
Spending more time on hardening or adding testers or root cause analysis of defects are all reactive measures. The most likely cause of escaped defects is that the team is accepting too much in the iteration or release than it can deliver with reasonable quality. Therefore reducing the amount of work is the only pro-active measure and hence the best option.
An HR team wants to modify the key performance areas for different designations in an organization which has recently transitioned to Agile methods. Which of the following should be the primary performance goal of an Agile Project Manager?
The emphasis in Agile is to deliver maximum business value.
In a release planning session the team decided to fix the time and resources up-front, while trying to project how much work will get done in a given time period. The Project manager gave the following data. The average velocity over the past 8 iterations was 33. The average velocity of the worst 3 iterations was 28. The average velocity of the best 3 iterations was 37. What would be the best statement to make about how much functionality can be accommodated in 5 iterations?
In fixed date planning, you project a “will have” set of features based on worst velocity and a set of “might have” features based on the best velocity.
One of the issues that a project manager normally faces is that an estimate quickly gets converted into a firm commitment. What is the BEST way to prevent this from happening?
Estimates inherently have variability in them, whereas a commitment is firm and unshakable. While providing estimates, it is always advisable to provide a range so that the process of converting estimates into a commitment (and a plan) is more organized.
Two types of buffers commonly used for providing for uncertainties during planning are Feature buffers and Schedule buffers. What is the best use of Feature buffer?
The idea behind using feature buffers is to state clearly during planning that the team will certainly deliver a basic set of features (based on a pessimistic assumption of the velocity) whereas other features are designated as likely but not a firm commitment.
The testers on a team are obviously dissatisfied with their transition to Agile. They are not able to keep up with the developers because as they developers build new code, the testers need to not only test the new functionality, but also perform regression tests. Running these tests takes a long time, and they are simply unable to complete those during the iteration time frame. This results in pressure and unsatisfactory quality from iteration to iteration. Which measure will make the biggest difference in improving this situation?
Having a healthy set of automated regression tests is of immense value in an Agile team. Therefore, if automated tests do not exist, it is prudent to invest in developing automation.
A senior technical lead within the development team is worried that the design of the system is not finalized yet and hence the estimates for the work involved have a high degree of uncertainty. According to the theory of the cone of uncertainty what is the normal range of actual values from the initial estimate?
According to the cone of uncertainty, the actual would come in between 60% and 160% of the initial estimate.
An agile project manager is worried about the likelihood of personnel turnover which might affect the ability of the team to deliver on its commitments. What is the key factor that helps in mitigating the impact of attrition risk?
Fostering collective ownership is the only option that addresses mitigation of IMPACT, i.e. how do you reduce the impact of the event if it does happen. Other options address mitigation of probability.
A Project manager has determined the constraints on a project and is classifying them as Fixed, Flexible or Accept. What is this artifact that he is producing?
One way of looking at constraints to put them a Trade-Off Matrix, where the constraints would be either “Fixed”, i.e. unchangeable (e.g. a hard deadline), “Flexible” (e.g. release as soon as we can deliver a certain set of features) or “Accept” (e.g. no matter how much it costs). It gives a clearer picture about how the project manager handles the various trade-off decisions on the project.
A team facilitator is planning to conduct a planning poker session for estimating a bunch of stories and is estimating the amount of time that the session will take. How many rounds of voting should she plan for, for each story?
You would hope that you reach consensus in a “few” – as in 2 or 3 rounds at most, but you would continue the discussion as long as it takes to drive towards that consensus and so far as the discussion is adding value in terms of clarifying the story or the approach in completing the story.
In an Agile team, a set of developers are finding it hard to arrive at the right approach to design an interface for a use case. They set up a meeting with some customer representatives to clarify the approach. What do you think about this approach?
Direct contact of the team with the customer is a good thing. The product owner is the custodian of the backlog (requirements), but he should not try to be the single point of contact (or the bottleneck) for such discussions. Getting customer input during review may be too late (being reactive) and more documentation may not really help as much as an interactive discussion.
A trading software has very stringent performance requirements, which requires experimenting with different deployment architectures to come up with performance related recommendations. Where would you find the details of such requirements?
All kinds of requirements (including performance related requirements) need to be explicitly added to the product backlog. It is not advisable that they remain hidden in the performance test plan or the architecture or design document.
What are some objectives for an agile project management framework?
Objectives for an Agile project management framework could be: Continuous innovation, Product adaptability, Reduced delivery schedules, People and process adaptability, Reliable results. Agile emphasizes flexibility in planning and hence does not believe baselines are sacrosanct.
A Product Owner is on vacation for a few weeks. Who is responsible to guide the team during the Sprint Planning meetings at this time?
It is the responsibility of the Scrum Master to ensure that the Product Owner gives a subset of the backlog for consideration by the team while he is away.
A team is transitioning to Scrum and is debating which person would be in the best position to be the Scrum Master for a Scrum team?
- Most popular person on the team
- Manager with formal authority
- The team lead
- The PM, in a MATRIX organization
The Scrum Master is not necessarily the technical expert and ideally should not be a Manager with formal authority. Being Scrum Master is not a test of the popularity of a person. The Scrum Master serves the team by coordinating their activities, removing blocks, etc. and in this respect the Project Manager in a matrix organization seems to be the best fit.
To prevent cross-talk during the Daily stand-up meetings, the Scrum Master bought a baton, which would be passed around the team. At any point in time, only the person holding the baton can talk, others cannot interrupt. In light of the philosophy of communication in Agile teams, is this a good practice?
Yes. In the daily stand-up meeting, cross-talk and side conversations should be kept to a minimum.
Ideally each team member assigned to an Agile team should be full time. However, some shared team members may not have enough work to be full time. In case a team member is assigned to multiple teams, they need to make use of time slicing. What is Time-slicing?
Time-slicing involves working on multiple tasks in a given time period, but there has to be discipline that at any given point in time, you provide undivided attention to one of the tasks. Also, while doing task switching, you should bring the task at hand to a logical point before switching so that you don’t have to start from scratch each time.
A product owner undertaking prioritization of user stories is worried that all the priorities are being assigned through gut feel methods. She would like to get some kind of a numeric basis for the priorities so assigned. Which method should be helpful to get a numeric basis?
Karl Wiegers relative weighting method provides for a system of assigning numeric weights and a formula to capture priorities and ranks
In an Agile project, who is responsible for identification, monitoring and control of risks?
Many Agile methodologies provide for a project manager role. One of his responsibilities would be to manage the risks on a project.
A developer discovers a unique approach to resolve a technical issue that could help many of the other team members. What should he do?
A developer who discovers something of generic value should describe to everybody in the team as quickly as possible. It is not the purpose of the stand-up or the retrospective meeting to discuss specific techniques. The team lead should not be viewed as the bureaucratic authority who needs to be taken into confidence for every technical issue.
Exploratory testing is usually one of the last steps in the quality control of product. The term Exploratory testing refers to what?
XP integrates the testing of the feature into the development process (through test-driven-development). When a feature is marked as “Done” (referred to as done-done), then some exploratory tests may be performed to try out some basic use cases to make sure the core functionality is working.
Considering the disproportionate cost of defect fixing, more and more teams are moving towards Test-First-Development and Test-Driven-Development methods in order to prevent the introduction of defects. What is the primary difference between the Test-First-Development (TFD) and Test-Driven-Development (TDD)?
TDD = TFD + refactoring.
In order to capture all the risks on a project, the team facilitator decided to conduct a risk census. What is a risk census?
A risk census enlists all the risks associated with a given project.
During the implementation of a user story, the developer and tester came up with conflicting interpretations. The developer insists that the software is working as specified, whereas the tester believes this is not going to meet user expectations. How could this situation be avoided?
If the team had stories with clear acceptance criteria, the tester and the developer would have jointly interpreted them, which would have avoided the misunderstanding and disconnect between testing and development.
While implementing Continuous integration, it is observed that a set of automation tests take too long to execute and it slows down the build and integration process. What should be done in this case?
Running automated tests is a critical part of the Continuous integration process and is required to ensure that the changes being committed are not breaking the integrity of the system. Therefore, if the tests are taking too long, one should pause and address the root cause rather than try to work around the problem.
A Scrum team has failed to meet its Sprint commitments by a long way. The primary cause was a wrong design decision taken by two of the members assigned to a core story. As a Scrum Master, what should be your approach during the Sprint retrospective?
The retrospective is a forum for the team to reflect and come up with corrective actions. The Scrum Master should not dictate or lead the team to do things in a certain way. It is simply to make the issue visible and then trust the team to do the right things.
What is Relative weighting (Karl Wiegers model) ?
Relative weighting (Karl Wiegers model) -> Wiegers Prioritization Matrix -> five different components:
- item set: The items that are being evaluated for the prioritization effort
- criteria: The varying criteria that will be used to evaluate each item.
- value scales: Scale of possible values that can be used to specify the relationship of an item to the criteria being evaluated
- weighting: The relative weighting applied to each criteria
- formula: The formula selected to generate a priority
- value for each item based on the Criteria and Weightings
Which term best describes an Agile project’s approach to risk analysis? and why?
- Pareto
- Regression
- Monte Carlo
- Qualitative
Monte Carlo.
Monte Carlo simulations are used to model the probability of different outcomes in a process that cannot easily be predicted due to the intervention of random variables. It is a technique used to understand the impact of risk and uncertainty in prediction and forecasting models.
In XP, what is customer test?
Customer tests are done by having customers develop acceptance tests. These tests determine the overall performance and behavior of the system. Customers create them for every story they request. The team behind the system will run these tests to measure the progress in developing that system. The team leader tracking development maintains a graph outlining the performance of the system over time.
While writing these tests, an extreme programming team may have a programmer or tester work with the customer. However, the customer owns the tests. While doing the tests, the customer assists in specifying the requirements. Hence, for this practice to be a success, the system has to be testable, and this is one of the demands it should meet.
At a strategic level, what is the most appropriate way for an Agile team to estimate a project?
Using an abstract measurement to estimate Product Backlog Items.
In a vision meeting, the vision for the project is defined and presented by whom?
The customer.
What do project reports show during the Sprint review meeting?
ROI
When facilitated and managed well, what is the primary benefit of a PROJECT retrospective?
Allows the team to get ahead on release planning.
When are acceptance tests typically written for a user story?
At the start of Product Backlog prioritization planning.
A business analyst has identified a new risk in an Agile project. What is the best first step the business analyst should take regarding this risk?
Add the risk in a clearly visible location and ensure it is discussed after the next daily stand up.
What are the primary outputs of a release planning session?
Risks, action items, dependencies, and Release Backlog
Which of the seven principles of software development is best intended to solve the problem of inventories causing hidden errors in the process?
Eliminate Waste
In a Lean project environment, visual controls:
Can be used by management for communicating specific corrective direction.
The team space is key in Agile projects. What is the one thing that is recommended above all others for Agile teams?
- Colocation
- Information radiators
- Caves and common rooms
- Scrum boards
Colocation
Agile Earned Value Management (EVM) would be a valuable technique for managing a project because …
cost performance must be reported.
A common reason that a story may not be estimable is that the:
- team has no experience in estimating.
- business needs are prioritized over the system design.
- team lacks domain knowledge.
- developers do not understand the tasks related to the story.
team lacks domain knowledge.
When using Agile Earned Value Management (EVM), progress should be measured at which level?
Release
What would be the reasoning behind having an Iteration Zero?
To determine a process that works
User stories are temporary artifacts. They are considered relevant until when?
Until the team completes them
What is Risk exposure?
Risk Exposure = Risk Impact * Risk Probability
Risk Exposure ~ Expected Monetary Value (EMV)
Risk exposure is the measure of potential future loss resulting from a specific activity or event. An analysis of the risk exposure for a business often ranks risks according to their probability of occurring multiplied by the potential loss if they do. By ranking the probability of potential losses, a business can determine which losses are minor and which are significant enough to warrant investment.
Continuous integration ensures that a product is…
Technologically ready to deploy at any time.
What is systems thinking?
TLDR: Consists in “zooming out” of a “part” to better understand the “whole”, that is, the boundary system within which the part functions.
Systems thinking/synthesis/holism is a holistic approach to analysis that focuses on the way that a system’s constituent parts interrelate and how systems work over time and within the context of larger systems. The systems thinking approach contrasts with traditional analysis, which studies systems by breaking them down into their separate elements(reductionism). Systems thinking can be used to understand systems with high level of interconnectivity and interdependency through the synthesis approach, the process of reasoning that describes and entity through the context of its relations and functioning within the whole system that is a part of.
It can be used in any area of research and has been applied to the study of medical, environmental, political, economic, human resources, and educational systems, among many others.
According to systems thinking, system behavior results from the effects of reinforcing and balancing processes. A reinforcing process leads to the increase of some system component. If reinforcement is unchecked by a balancing process, it eventually leads to collapse. A balancing process is one that tends to maintain equilibrium in a particular system.
Attention to feedback is an essential component of system thinking. For example, in project management, prevailing wisdom may prescribe the addition of workers to a project that is lagging. However, in practice, that tactic might have actually slowed development in the past. Attention to that relevant feedback can allow management to look for other solutions rather than wasting resources on an approach that has been demonstrated to be counterproductive.
You have been tasked to evaluate the financial metrics of a potential project. You evaluated the percent of the benefit of the investment to the money invested. This is which of the financial assessment metrics?
ROI measure the amount of return on an investment relative to the investment’s cost. NPV is defined as the present value of cash flow over a series of time periods. The drawback to using the NPC approach is what the inflation rate and interest rate will be in the future is just a best guess, which may not always be correct. IRR is the discount rate at which project revenues and project costs equal zero. When a company is selecting which project to invest in, it will calculate the expected rate of return for each project and select the one that is project to yield the highest IRR.
What is the difference between validation and verification?
Validation: Are we building the right system?
Verification: Are we building the system right?
In other words, validation is concerned with checking that the system will meet the customer’s actual needs, while verification is concerned with whether the system is well-engineered, error-free, and so on. Verification will help to determine whether the software is of high quality, but it will not ensure that the system is useful.
A new stakeholder has joined your team. They are having a hard time focusing on really engaging with the team since their daily responsibilities are taking a lot of time. What could the team do to help alleviate the problem?
Very often, the people selected to be on an agile project team, are the busiest people in the organization because of their knowledge. But the team needs members who can most effectively help the team to understand the requirements and make the critical decisions. It might be beneficial for the project to pay to have someone take over the daily responsibilities to free up the stakeholder. The team cannot pitch in to help the stakeholder, which would compound the problem. Overloading the stakeholder would force him to decide where to place his time and of course, his boss is aware of the issues.
An essential discussion that should take place often is the definition of ‘done’. Why is this critical?
Defining ‘done’ is critical for satisfying all stakeholders’ expectations and to ensure everyone agrees as to what success is. The definitions of done is not meant to be used to negotiate new functionality or ideas, or to unveil new functionality at the last minute.
Among all these tools, which one is not used in knowledge sharing?
- Kanban board
- Bulletin boards
- White boards
- None of the above
None of the above
Your team has identified the highest value tasks of the project and want to deliver them as soon as possible. Why is this a good idea?
The longer high-value tasks take to deliver the longer the horizon becomes for risks that can reduce value. Maximize success by delivering as many high-value tasks before things change. Value-driven delivery means making decisions that prioritize the value-added activities and risk-reducing efforts of the project, then accomplishing the tasks based on the priorities.
As a member of the PMO, you are analyzing upcoming projects and feel that project teams will push back on one project. You understand this project is meant to implement safety standards for an off-shore manufacturing plant. Some project teams may not understand the value of this project, how do you avoid a long drawn out process of getting this project approved to move forward?
Assessing the value in financial terms is usually where a project begins. The organization would look at the financial ramifications on not undertaking a project, such as fines that might assessed, the business may be subjected to a lawsuit, the risk of the business shutting down. To avoid spending time trying to make teams understand its importance, spending money to outsource, or worse, defer the project to another time, the project should be marked as mandatory.
Your agile team leader recognizes that the team is disagreeing and seems to be overthinking a requirement. The team feels that a value stream mapping session would help identify the discrepancy. Once the scenario is defined, what is the next step?
Begin mapping the value stream by identifying the starting point and ending point. Next, identify the steps in the process, any supporting groups, and alternative flows. Once all time estimates are calculated, examine the value-added and non-value-added times to determine what can be eliminated.
As you look at your agile team’s high-level project plan, you notice there are three pre-mortems scheduled. You ask your leader to define a pre-mortem. Which of the following is the explanation given?
A pre-mortem is a session where all stakeholders will meet to generate a list of potential failure points and determine how to mitigate the possibility of the failure. The business owner’s participation is required since the team will offer resolutions to avoid a failure that the business owner will need to agree with. Business requirements are identified by the point of running a pre-mortem, since they are the source for the discussion. While conducting a pre-mortem, it would be improbable that the team envisions everything working as planned. All team members are identified by the time of a pre-mortem.
You are on a new agile team and the stakeholders are using the methodology without trying to tailor the processes at all. Why is this a good idea?
Making changes to the agile methodology prior to learning the benefits have been realized can be risky. Agile methods have been developed and refine based on many projects and experienced team leaders and members. Most agile tasks are related and dependent on other tasks, so dropping or adding tasks may throw the agile project out of balance. There is still a need for a project manager or team lead to keep the project headed in the right direction. There are predetermined processes, but it may be up to each team to document according to their needs.
Your agile team leader is discussing whether to tailor some agile’s methodologies because of what he refers to as systems thinking. Which of the following best describes systems thinking?
One part of systems thinking includes classifying projects in term of their complexity in two areas; project requirements and the technological approach. Complex projects have some uncertainty with requirements and technology, so are well suited for the out of the box agile methodology. Project that have a low or simple complexity can tailor some of the agile methods to suit the project.
Your agile team leader has been tracking the iteration velocity and compared that to the time left on the project and they determined that the least amount of iterations that can be done per month is seven and the most possible will be ten iterations. What is this measurement called?
This tool, or measurement, is called control limits. Setting a minimum and maximum of a certain entity, whether it be velocity, budget, time off, etc., lets the agile stakeholder know exactly what can be done, spent, or utilized in a given period of time. Trend analysis is a forward looking analysis estimating what might happen in the future. Variance analysis is the difference between estimates. Cycle time is the duration of time it will take to complete a task.
In an agile project, visibility is defined as what?
The concept that each team member’s work and progress should be transparent to all stakeholders.
Which guideline defines validation?
Making sure that the product manufactured is acceptable to the customers.
At which stage of adaptive leadership do you find the leader is asking many questions?
Early in a team’s formation, the leader directly helps with project activities and lays out a picture of what needs to be accomplished. The leader may also ask a lot of questions to ensure the team has an understanding of the team’s direction. While in the coaching phase, the leader mainly resolves conflicts so relationships are not damaged. During the supporting phase, the leader is still needed for conflict resolution in addition to challenging the team with high-level goals. The delegating stage is rarely achieved because teams are empowered.
You are an agile team leader and you’ve come to realize that there is very little interest coming from team members. What is a good method to motivate team members?
Offering a raise or bonus might engage team members for a short time, but probably not for the long-run. Aligning the project goal to the corporate goals still does not display ‘What’s in it for me?’ but aligning the project goals to the individual’s personal goals, for example, a promotion to a management position, will give them the motivation to be successful.
Your agile team is approaching their next iteration. There seems to be a disagreement of how the work items are prioritized since new functionality has been introduced. How can you assist the business team analyzing the priorities?
Agile planning is based on value-based analysis meaning the business value of deliverables are analyzed and delivered first. Agile teams can assist the business partners by factoring in likely development costs in order to make informed decisions. The time it takes to complete a task needs to have a cost associated with it before the priority is determined. The users typically don’t contribute to this process.
In conformity with agile terminologies, the personnel who measures the team’s progress (against the iteration plan, the release plan, test, etc.) and radiates the info to the team is the____________
Tracker
When your agile team is going through a pre-mortem, each member is asked to write down why they think some task or action might fail. The best method to reveal everyone’s list and consolidate it is to go around the room round-robin. Why do you think this might work well?
Presenting issues one at a time allows for discussion in the moment in addition to keeping the entire team engaged. When the list of failure points is complete and agreed upon, the team can prioritize the list and incorporate the fixes in the upcoming iterations.
What is the plus/delta review?
Plus= “What is working well”
Delta=”What needs change” -> Action items
When analyzing variances and it is determined that the difference is a common cause variance, what is the next step the agile leader should take?
When the agile team has determined the difference is a common cause variance, the team lead should accept that there will be small differences and move onto the next task. Trying to rectify a common cause variance is a form of micromanaging the project instead of focusing on true roadblocks.
What is the successful response option at Conflict Level 1 : Problem to Solve ?
Successful response options at Level 1 are, Collaboration- Seeking a win-win situation. Consensus- Learning where every team member’s head is with regard to the issue and, in time, arriving at a decision everyone can back.
What is Force field analysis?
Force field analysis is a technique for analyzing the forces that are encouraging and resisting potential or real change and the strength of these forces.
The Scrum framework is flexible enough to embrace many learning loops. Which of them is the shortest?
Scrum leverages several predefined learning loops. The Daily Scrum is a daily loop and the sprint review is an iteration-level loop. Pair programming is the shortest learning loop (feedback in seconds). Test-driven development has feedback in minutes.
Team 1 has been asked to complete work on Item 10 story and deliver it to Team 2 so that they can initiate work on Item 12 story, which is dependent on completion of Item 10 story. The leader of Team 1 decides to insert a buffer that protects the start date on Item 12 story against delays in the completion of Item 10 story. This buffer is known as,
The Feeding buffer protects the start date on Item 12 story against delays in the completion of Item 10 story.
When a team member approaches the Coach with a complaint about another team member, what conflict resolution technique should the Coach use?
Three-step intervention path:
- “Have you shared your concerns and feelings about this with _________?”
- “_________ should know of your concerns. Would it help if I go with you?”
- “May I tell _________ that you have these concerns?”
Can velocity be used as a performance metric?
Velocity is used as a planning tool and as a team diagnostic metric. It should not be used as a performance metric in an attempt to judge team productivity. When misused in this way, velocity can motivate wasteful and dangerous behavior.
In story splitting, what is vertical and horizontal slicing?
Horizontal slicing: breaking down the features into the work that has to be done at architectural layers, i.e., design, back, front …
Vertical slicing: stories are broken down in such a way that smaller items still result in working, demonstrable, software, or a specific working feature useful for the user
What is the least appropriate usage of the the documentation in Agile project?
When a customer and a developer interact to jointly develop specifications and produce some form of permanent record (documents, notes, sketches, story cards, drawings), the documentation is a by-product of the interaction. When the customer sits down with a business analyst and they write a requirements document that gets sent to a development group, then the document has become a substitute for interaction. In the first scenario, the documentation may be valuable to the development team. In the second, it has become a barricade to progress. Little knowledge is either gained or transferred. Furthermore, as interaction decreases, the volume of documentation increases in a fruitless attempt to compensate.
What are the steps in a Retrospective meeting?
Set the stage, Gather data, Generate Insights, Decide on what to do, Close the Retrospective
The Scrum team has just performed a stakeholder analysis. Where most likely would it save the information gathered?
One of the activities that helps is a process known as stakeholder analysis. When performing stakeholder analysis, the stakeholders are identified, and their interest in the project is understood. All of this information is captured in a stakeholder register, which is a simple artifact.
What is Integrated change control?
Integrated change control (ICC) is the process of reviewing all change requests, approving changes, and managing changes to deliverables with documentation. It also involves communicating decisions that have been made.
In agile projects, integrated change control is referred to as continuous backlog management.
Why are budget and schedule listed as conditions of satisfaction to be considered during release planning but not during iteration planning?
Iterations are timeboxed, so schedule and budget are always fixed too. During iteration planning we talk about the tasks that will be needed to transform a feature request into working and tested software.
Who are referred to as “Pigs” in Scrum?
Someone occupying one of the three Scrum roles (Team, Product Owner, Scrum Master) who has made a commitment and has the authority to fulfill it.
Forecasting the Financial value of a theme is the responsibility of ______.
Forecasting the financial value of a theme is the responsibility of the product owner but it is a responsibility shared with all other team members—programmers, testers, analysts, project managers, and so on.
What is a component test?
Component tests verify that units and combinations of units work together to perform the desired operations.
What are key attributes of Agile? Iterative Feature-based delivery Timeboxed Incremental All of the above
All of the above
Iterative development means that we build a partial version of a product and then expand that version through successive short time periods of development followed by reviews and adaptations.
Feature-based delivery means that the engineering team buildsfeatures of the finalproduct or, particularly withindustrialproducts,atleast aclose representation of the final product (such as a simulation model).
Iterations are constrained to produce a result within a certain period of time—a timebox (as short as 1–4 weeks for software). Timeboxes force closure; they force us to make something concrete, often before we are quite ready.
Incremental development means that we build these products such that they could be deployed at the end of one or more of the iterations.
What are the scrum values?
- Commitment (People personally commit to achieving the goals of the Scrum team)
- Focus (Everyone focuses on the work of the Sprint and the goals of the Scrum team)
- Openness (The Scrum team and its stakeholders agree to be open about all the work and the challenges with performing the work)
- Respect (Scrum team members respect each other to be capable, independent people)
- Courage (The Scrum team members have courage to do the right thing and work on tough problems)
What is the length of the XP iteration?
An iteration is the full cycle of design-code-verify-release practiced by XP teams. It’s a timebox that is usually one to three weeks long.
Who is eligible to initiate a cancellation of the Sprint?
A Sprint can be cancelled before the Sprint time-box is over. Only the Product Owner has the authority to cancel the Sprint, although he or she may do so under influence from the stakeholders, the Development Team, or the Scrum Master.
A Ratio of Earned Value and Planned Value that can be used to calculate when a project will be completed, or how a project is progressing is called:
A Ration of Earned Value and Planned Value that can be used to calculate when a project will be completed, or how a project is progressing is called Schedule Performance Index (SPI)
What is a complex story?
Epics typically fall into two categories - Compound Stories and Complex Stories. the complex story is a user story that is inherently large and cannot easily be disaggregated into a set of constituent stories.
At the second level of conflict, i.e. Disagreement, Team members distance themselves from one another to ensure they come out OK in the end or to establish a position for compromise they assume will come. They may talk offline with other team members to test strategies or seek advice and support. What becomes as important as solving the problem?
At level 2, self-protection becomes as important as solving the problem. Team members distance themselves from one another to ensure they come out OK in the end or to establish a position for compromise they assume will come. They may talk offline withother team membersto test strategiesor seek adviceand support.
What is the The 100-Point Method ?
The 100-Point Method was originally developed by Dean Leffingwell and Don Widrig for use cases and is used for prioritization as well. It is a voting scheme where each stakeholder is given 100 points that he or she can use for voting in favour of the most important requirements. How they distribute the 100 points is up to them: 20 here, 10 there or even all 100 on a single re quirement if that is their sole priority.
According to DeMarco, Fragmented knowledge workers may look busy but a lot of their business is just thrashing. The minimum cost penalty is :
The minimum cost penalty is 15%.
Who “owns” iteration demo in Scrum?
The Product Owner conducts the Iteration Demo meeting together with the rest of the team
The difference between actual time and ideal time is _________________.
Interruptions.
Actual time is the amount of time an assignment would take to complete. Ideal time is the amount of time an assignment would take if there were no interruptions or distractions.
Who provides ongoing funding of the project in Scrum?
The Product Owner achieves initial and ongoing funding for the project by creating the project’s initial overall requirements, return on investment (ROI) objectives, and release plans.
Who is responsible for communicating progress, and managing the stakeholders in Scrum?
The product owner is responsible for managing the release scope and date, managing the budget, communicating progress, and managing the stakeholders.
Product Burndown Chart illustrates:
Product Burndown Chart illustrates a meta-view perspective of product development progress.
What is the sashimi technique in agile?
Differently from the architecture-centric method, the sashimi method involves in picking just a slice of functionality, determined by an acceptance test, building it, refactoring it and delivering it to the client for review. The architechture is only reviewed when Architecturally-Significant Functional Stories demand so.
The minimum plan necessary to start a Scrum project consists of:
The minimum plan necessary to start a Scrum project consists of a Vision and a Product Backlog. The vision describes why the project is being undertaken and what the desired end state is.
What are the branches in decision theory?
Decision theory can be broken into two branches: normative decision theory, which analyzes the outcomes of decisions or determines the optimal decisions given constraints and assumptions, and descriptive decision theory, which analyzes how agents actually make the decisions they do.
Heuristics in decision-making is the ability of making decisions based on unjustified or routine thinking. While quicker than step-by-step processing, heuristic thinking is also more likely to involve fallacies or inaccuracies.
In a Fixed Price contract, the risk is beared by ______
Obvious risk is on the side of the supplier. If the estimates are wrong, the project will lose money. Less obvious risks are the change request game, through which the supplier negotiates additional revenue through scope changes. If the supplier had badly underestimated the effort or risk,or quoted anunrealisticallylowprice, the losses can even threaten the existence of the supplier, which also presents a problem to the customer.
Product risk is primarily the responsibility of _________________.
The Product Owner has responsibility for the product risk.
The product backlog should adhere to DEEP, what does DEEP stand for?
Detailed appropriately, Estimable, Emergent, Prioritized (DEEP)
How can cycle time be calculated?
Cycle time = WIP/throughput
What are the basic stages of a project pre-mortem?
- Imagine the failure
- Generate the reasons for the failure
- Consolidate the list
- Revisit the plan
What is most important for your agile team to continuously focus on? Getting the right answers Understanding their tasks Defining their tasks Measuring their performance
Answer: Understanding their tasks
Explanation: This question tests your high-levelunderstanding of knowledge work versus industrial
work. Getting the right answers, defining tasks, and measuring performance are emphasized more
in industrial work than knowledge work. Knowledge workers focus instead on understanding their
tasks. Although all of these activities are performed on an agile project, notice that the question asks
what the team should “continuously focus on.” This is a clue that the question is looking at the team’s
high-level process, not specific parts of their work.
What wouldn’t be a key focus of your agile approach? Increasing return on investment Expecting change and uncertainty Measuring progress Working incrementally
Answer: Measuring progress
Explanation: The best way to approach this question is by a process of elimination. You should be
able to recognize that three of the options are essential elements of the agile mindset: increasing
return on investment, expecting change and uncertainty, and working incrementally. Once you have
eliminated those three options, then the remaining option (measuring performance) must be the
correct answer. Although agile teams certainly measure their progress, this isn’t one of thebasic tenets
of agile.
You’ve been asked to recommend how a team should transition to using agile. How would you reply?
Try out some agile practices first to see if they are helpful in your situation.
Hire the best ScrumMaster you can afford and make that person accountable for the transition.
Identify a successful agile team and copy what they are doing.
Learn agile values and principles and use them to guide which practices to adopt in your situation.
Answer: Learn agile values and principles
Explanation: This question tests your understanding of “being” agile versus “doing” agile. We
need to first understand and integrate the mindset behind agile practices before we can use them
effectively. Therefore the best way to transition to using agile is to learn agile values and principles and
use them to guide which agile practices to adopt in your situation.
The agile triangle of constraints is said to be inverted from the traditional triangle because it allows:
Scope and time to vary instead of cost
Cost and time to vary instead of scope
Scope and cost to be fixed instead of time
Scope to vary while time and cost are fixed
Unlike the traditional constraint triangle, in which scope is fixed and time and cost
may need to bend to achieve that planned scope, agile teams typically allow scope to vary within fixed
parameters of cost and time. In other words, they aim to deliver the most value they can by X date
within X budget.
You have been asked to outline thebasics of agile contracting for your steering committee. Which of
the following statements best describes the recommended approach to contracting on agile projects?
The contract is worded to allow for early completion of scope, and acceptance is based on items
matching the original specification.
The contract is worded to allow for reprioritization of scope, and acceptance is based on items
matching the original specification.
The contract is worded to allow for early completion of scope, and acceptance is based on items
being fit for business purpose.
The contract is worded to allow for reprioritization of scope, and acceptance is based on items
being fit for business purpose.
Two components common to agile contracts are an ability to reprioritize work and
the goal of satisfying the business, rather than conforming to a spec. The closest match to these
characteristic is the option “The contract is worded to allow for reprioritization of scope, and
acceptance is based on items being fit for business purpose.”
What is the primary benefit of involving business representatives in the prioritization of work?
To proactively engage the business representative between acceptance testing cycles
To answer business-related questions about the requirements
To promote communication about when features will be delivered
To better understand the business needs for the project
While involving business representatives in prioritizing the work does help us promote
communication and answer questions, the primary reason for that practice is to help the team better
understand the business needs for the project. “Proactively engaging” the customer between testing
cycles really just means keeping them busy, which is not a concern of the team.
The definition of done is _ .
Provided by the product owner
Determined by the team and the ScrumMaster
Defined by the customer and the ScrumMaster
Agreed upon by the team and the product owner
Although this question uses Scrum terms, it is equally applicable to generic agile teams.
As a rule, the definition of done is the result of a conversation between the team and the product owner. If you think about it, this is logical; the team and the product owner each have information that the other party doesn’t have. The product owner knows what is needed by the business, and the team knows what can realistically be built within the available constraints.
Both of these perspectives need to be weighed to come up with a shared definition of done.
Agile’s emphasis on two-way communication means that:
Distributed teams have to make an effort to communicate effectively.
Agile teams need to share knowledge as widely as possible.
The customer should solicit the delivery team’s ideas, risks, and concerns and take them seriously.
The stakeholders need to be kept in the loop about the team’s progress.
Agile projects need to have bidirectional communication in which information
flows both from the business to the team and from the team to the business. While all the options
listed could be interpreted as correct statements, option C is the only one that refers to this kind
of communication. If you thought option D was correct, notice that it simply refers to keeping the
stakeholders informed, not to decision making based on that information.
Your project team is in turmoil, and you’re trying to diagnose the level of their conflict with another
department. You notice that statements such as “Marketing has no clue again!” are becoming
commonplace. What level of conflict would you say the team is experiencing?
Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
Level 4
Marketing has no clue again” falls into the category of overgeneralizations,
presumptions, and magnified positions, which indicates a level 3 type conflict. At level 2, they
wouldn’t be using overgeneralizations such as “no clue again,” and at level 4, their language would
likely be more ideological and hostile.
Which of the following isn’t a form of agile workshop?
The stakeholders gather to identify and define the user stories.
The team gathers to reflect on their last iteration and identify issues and process changes.
The delivery team gathers to estimate the user stories for the next iteration.
The team gathers to share their progress yesterday, discuss what they will do today, and identify
any impediments to progress.
The last option here isn’t a workshop, because it describes the daily stand-up, which is
a brief meeting, not a workshop. The other three options, in order, describe story-writing workshops,
retrospectives, and estimating sessions, all of which are forms of agile workshops.
Which of the following benefits isn’t part of the agile value proposition?
Reduced risk at the end of the project
Increased visibility throughout the project
Increased adaptability during planning
Earlier delivery of business value
Although the agile value proposition does include reduced risk, that effect is most
pronounced at the start of the project, since agile teams aim to lower risk as quickly as possible. At the
end of a project, no project risk remains since the project is over and we already know the outcome.
The other three options are accurate descriptions of the other elements of the agile value proposition.
As an agile team leader, you want to avoid:
Prioritizing team goals over individual goals
Providing rewards for expected behavior
Finding out what motivates the team members individually
Rewarding individual goals at the expense of project goals
As an agile team leader, it might be helpful to focus on any of the activities listed
here except for rewarding individual goals at the expense of project goals. An effective team leader
understands the team members’ individual goals and leverages them for the good of the project,
rather than the other way around.
What question would the sponsor of an agile project focus on?
Will the project deliver the expected value on time and on budget?
Does the team understand the project vision?
Is the ScrumMaster prioritizing the features accurately?
Does the product owner understand the end user’s requirements?
The sponsor is focused on the big picture of value delivery; this person is responsible
for ensuring that the project will deliver the expected value on time and on budget. Typically, it
is the product owner who communicates the product vision to the team. The product owner is
also responsible for ensuring that the end user’s requirements are met, so if they don’t know those
requirements, they aren’t doing their job; this isn’t something the sponsor should be worrying about.
Finally, the team’s coach or ScrumMaster doesn’t prioritize features; that is done by the product
owner, customer, or value management team.
Another agile team leader in your organization comes to you for advice. She’s having trouble getting
her team to take ownership of the project and get comfortable selecting the work to be done. She
keeps finding herself making the decisions and directing their work. What do you advise her to do?
At the stand-up meetings, assign a different person each day as the decision maker to get them all
comfortable in the role.
Implement an incentive plan and officially report any lack of participation to team members’
functional managers.
Meet them halfway and work with their functional managers to align each team member’s goals
with the project goals.
Explain to them that agile teams self-select their work and tell them to get on with it.
In this situation, the team leader should assume a coaching role to help the team
members get to the point where they are comfortable selecting their own work. This will include
meeting team members a half-step ahead, guaranteeing safety, partnering with their managers, and
building positive regard. Assigning someone as a decision maker at stand-up meetings is incorrect
since agile teams are consensus-driven and decisions aren’t made in stand-up meetings. Incentive
plans can be useful, but what this team really needs is guidance, not rewards and punishments.
Simply explaining that agile teams self-select their work isn’t enough to get team members
comfortable assuming more ownership of the project.
What are the 4 guidelines for one-on-one coaching?
Meet them a half-step ahead
Guarantee safety
Partner with managers
Create positive regard
Your team has decided they need an Iteration 0 before starting the development work. Why?
To set up the build server for the project
To practice working together and get through the Storming stage before the real work starts
To hold planning poker sessions to estimate the user stories
To minimize as many of the project risks as possible before development begins
teration 0 is an optional iteration that the team can use to set the stage for their
development efforts. It isn’t used for estimating or for working together, since those activities are
done in the development iterations. Although agile teams do try to minimize risk early in the project,
they usually do this by prioritizing risk mitigation stories or by scheduling a risk-based spike. So
although risk mitigation could theoretically be part of Iteration 0, the answer that BEST fits the
definition of Iteration 0 is to set up the build server for the project.
The team believes that it will take 15 hours of effort to write the user guide for the new product they
are building. What should their estimate be for that task?
15 hours
18 hours, to add a buffer for distractions and availability issues
12 hours, since teams tend to overestimate how long a task will take
12 to 18 hours
Agile teams estimate tasks in ideal time —how long it will take if there are no
interruptions or distractions. In this case, they have decided that the effort will take 15 hours, so
their estimate should also be 15 hours. If they think the work will take 15 hours, then they wouldn’t
estimate less than that (and in general, teams tend to underestimate how long a job will take, not
overestimate it). Although agile teams do rely on estimate ranges to convey the uncertainty of larger
estimates to stakeholders, tasks are typically given single-point estimates. That’sbecause those
estimates are only for the team, and also at this point (shortly before the work is done) they should
have enough information to agree upon a single-point estimate rather than using a wide range such as
12 to 18 hours.
In the daily stand-ups, the team coach should:
Schedule and facilitate the meeting.
Let the team members resolve their own conflicts.
Listen and note any problems for immediate follow-up.
Ask questions to determine the root cause of any problems that are raised.
In a daily stand-up, the role of the ScrumMaster or team coach is to listen and note any
impediments to the team’s progress for quick follow-up. This meeting is generally held at the same
time and place every day, so scheduling usually isn’t required —andbecause the discussion is run
by the team members, no facilitation is necessary either. Since daily stand-ups are strictly limited to
answering three questions, team conflicts shouldn’t be an issue in these meetings. Root cause analysis
of the problems wouldbe done in a separate meeting, rather than during the stand-up itself.
We can say that an iteration demo is successful if ____ .
The product got shipped and the team would work the same way again.
The customer accepts the minimalviable product that has been built.
A gulf of evaluation is cleared up.
The product owner says the product increment is done.
This question requires you to think through the options carefully, since each of them
is applicable to some aspect of an agile project. “The product got shipped and the team would work
the same way again” describes methodology success criteria — these are signs that our methodology is
working well. However, these criteria don’t apply to iteration demos since only one increment is built
in an iteration, not the entire product. We can also rule out “The customer accepts the minimal viable
product that has been built” because the minimal viable product isn’t built in one iteration. Although
we do want to identify and clear up any gulfs of evaluation that may exist during the iteration demo,
that isn’t what determines if the meeting was successful. The success of the demo is based on whether
the product owner accepts the product increment built in the iteration as “done.”
What would be most helpful for improving a teams problem-solving proficiency?
Focus on keeping arguments and disagreements to a minimum.
Encourage them to share their mistakes and problems with each other.
Ask more experienced team members to mentor their peers.
Score their suggestions and post a leaderboard in the team space to encourage competition.
The best answer here is to create an environment in which people are encouraged to
openly share their mistakes and problems with each other. This will not only allow problems to be
solved more quickly, it will also lead to better solutions by drawing upon a wider range of viewpoints.
Minimizing arguments and disagreements stifles the healthy debate that is necessary for finding the
best solution to a problem. Asking senior team members to mentor their peers would probably be
misinterpreted andlead to problems— also, on an agile team, mentoring is done by the team coach
or ScrumMaster, not the team members (who have their own work to do). Posting scores on a
leaderboard to encourage competition wouldn’t be consistent with the agile principles of respect and
team empowerment.
Which tool or metric would allow a team to find problems most quickly? Variance analysis Technical debt Risk burnup chart Defect cycle time
The phrasing of is question is a bit misleading since only one of these options (variance
analysis) is a method for detecting problems. Because Option A is the only viable answer, the speed
of finding problems isn’t relevant for selecting the answer. Although our level of technical debt and
defect cycle time may be useful metrics for diagnosing or analyzing problems, they don’t help us
identify the problems in the first place. Risk burnup chart is a made-up term.
Ideally, who will catch and fix a coding error?
The customer will spot it in the demo.
The developers will find it during unit testing.
The reviewer will catch it during pair programming.
The testers will find it in testing.
Although this question uses the word who, it is actually asking for the IDEAL way
to catch and fix an error. Because of the cost of change curve, the sooner an error can be found, the
better. So we are looking for the fastest way to identify an error, not who will do it — and the quickest
way to find a coding error is to catch it in pair programming.
Two team members are having a difference of opinion about how to build the next user story. What
shouldbe done?
The team coach should assess the level of conflict and intervene appropriately.
The ScrumMaster should decide the issue, since it is becoming an impediment to progress.
The product owner should be consulted.
The team should gather to discuss the issue and come up with a collective solution.
On an empowered agile team, it is up to the team members to resolve their technical
disputes collectively. The coach, ScrumMaster, or product owner is unlikely to have the knowledge
required to make such decisions.
We put risk mitigation stories in the backlog to:
Avoid having to keep a separate list of threats and issues.
Keep the team focused on risks.
Ensure that risk reduction efforts are done in the early iterations.
Make sure the team doesn’t forget to do something about the risks.
Here we have a few reasonable choices to consider, but only one option is the main
reason. Putting risks in the backlog does prevent us from having to maintain a separate list, but that is
not the reason we do it.It also helps keep the team focused on the risk, but again, that is not the main
reason we do it Keeping the team from forgetting about the risk is a lot like the previous idea, and is also
not the real reason we put risks into the backlog. Instead, the main reason we do that is to ensure that the
risk mitigation work is done early in the project, to rapidly address any risks that can reduce value.
Stories and features are prioritized in the risk-adjusted backlog based on their:
Risk impact or risk probability
Risk mitigation impact or user impact
Expected monetary value or business value
Cost-benefit ratio or customer value
We prioritize risk stories based on their expected monetary value and feature stories
based on their business value. Option A, “risk impact or risk probability” is partly correct, because
that’s how we calculate expected monetary value; however, that doesn’t account for feature stories,
and the question doesn’t specify only risk stories. The other two options are made-up.
Which of the following is not one of the questions that we are continually asking in a product
feedback loop?
Does it meet the customer needs and expectations?
Does it work in all conditions?
Did we break anything while building this ?
Did the project get shipped?
The first three options are the questions that are asked in a product feedback loop, at
increasingly more granular levels as the project proceeds. The last question is associated with the
methodology success criteria for process analysis, not feedback loops.
The company invests in a project that costs $200,000. The benefits of doing the project save the company $230,000 in the first year alone. What would be ROI of the project in this case?
The ROI would be calculated as (benefit - cost) / cost, or $30,000 / $200,000 = 15%
Which acronym best describes the product backlog?
DEEP
(D)etailed appropriately, (E)stimable, (E)mergent, (P)rioritized.
Which acronym best describes the product owner?
CRACK
An effective product owner is Committed, Responsible, Authorized, Collaborative, and Knowledgeable
What is the different between PV and NPV?
Net present value considers project costs in the equation.
What are the stages in Acceptance Test-Driven Development (ATDD)?
ATDD stages are, discuss, distill, develop and demo. Discuss during the discuss stage, clarify the details related to the requirements with the product owner. Distill find out the necessary tests related to that. Develop – Develop the code and test the code with the tests developed. Demo – Once the code is passed, then give the demo to the customer.
What does negative Schedule Variance mean?
SV = EV - PV (schedule variance = Earned value - Planned value). Negative Schedule variance means the project is behind schedule.
What are the best leadership models for every team formation stage?
Forming (Directing)
Storming (Coaching)
Norming (Supporting)
Performing (Delegating)
What is the Time and materials (T&M) contract type?
Time and materials (T&M) is a standard phrase in a contract for construction, product development or any other piece of work in which the employer agrees to pay the contractor based upon the time spent by the contractor’s employees and subcontractors employees to perform the work, and for materials used in the construction (plus the contractor’s mark up on the materials used), no matter how much work is required to complete construction. Time and Materials is generally used in projects in which it is not possible to accurately estimate the size of the project, or when it is expected that the project requirements would most likely change.
This is opposed to a fixed-price contract in which the owner agrees to pay the contractor a lump sum for fulfillment of the contract no matter what the contractors pay their employees, sub-contractors and suppliers.
Many time and materials contracts also carry a guaranteed maximum price, which puts an upper limit on what the contractor may charge, but also allow the owner to pay a lesser amount if the job is completed more quickly.
During development, which features should be considered first in terms of value and risk?
High value and high risk should come first.
What are the three principles of the Kanban method?
The Kanban method has three principles:
- Start with what you know;
- Incremental change;
- Respect current roles, responsibilities, and job titles
What is the primary purpose of brainstorming?
The primary purpose of brainstorming is to generate ideas. However, it is also used to engage participation, address a problem, and identify a solution.
What is the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs?
1 - Physiological needs 2 - Safety needs 3 - Love and belonging 4 - Esteem 5 - Self-actualisation
What is the Thomas-Kilmann’s conflict model?
- Competing: “Win-lose aproach”
- Avoiding: “When no chance of winning is visible”/”Changed environment”
- Collaboration: “Win-win aproach”
- Accomodating: “Yielding”/”Preserving relations”
- Compromising: “Lose-lose aproach”
What is Little’s law?
“the duration of a queue is proportional to its size” -> by limiting the WIP, teams can complete work faster
Little’s law states that at a given WIP level, the ratio of WIP to Cycle Time equals throughput (T). T = WIP/CT
When working with a globally distributed team, the most useful approach would be to:
A) Bring the entire team together for a diversity and sensitivity training day before starting the first iteration.
B) Bring the entire group together for a big celebration at the end of the project
C) Bring the entire group together for a get-to-know-you session before starting the first
iteration.
D) Gather the entire team for a kickoff event and keep them working together for at least the first iteration.
Answer: D
Explanation: Having the team work together for an iteration would be a great way to help integrate a globally distributed team. Diversity training and get-to-know-you sessions are nice, but having the team members actually work together would be the best opportunity for them to learn each other’s work habits and interaction modes.
Involving the team in Planning and Estimating and providing early feedback on Delivery Velocity is BEST used to mitigate what kind of risk?
Schedule flaws
When forming an Agile project team it is BEST to use:
- Generalized Specialists
- Top management officials
- Highly specialized developers
- All of the above
Keeping the team to a reasonable size means selecting “generalized specialists” who are willing to do additional work outside what has been traditionally expected of them given their job title.
The process of testing Delivered or "done done" stories is known as: Unit Testing Integration Testing Exploratory Testing Release Testing
The process of testing Delivered or “done done” stories is known as exploratory testing. Under this phase, an expert tester uses his intuition and experience to test already delivered stories.
Although your team has completed their last iteration, it hasn’t been “approved.” What does this mean?
The team still needs to do refactoring and user testing.
In trying out the product increment, the customer thought of another feature to add to the backlog.
In the demo, the customer decided that the team hadn’t completed one of the items selected from the backlog for that iteration.
The product increment hasn’t passed QA testing.
An iteration is “approved” when the product owner is satisfied that the product increment meets the iteration goal–the items selected from the backlog for that iteration. Although the customer might also think of another feature to add to the backlog, they would still approve the iteration if the work that was done meets the goal that was set. The other two options (missing refactoring, user testing, and QA testing) describe activities that should have been done during the iteration. If the team hasn’t done them, that might be a reason for not approving the iteration. But they aren’t the best answer to this scenario, since we don’t have enough information to pick one of them.
After several months, the agile team you are leading has finally reached the Performing stage. What do the team members need from you as their leader now?
They need a lot of direction to keep them fully focused on their goals.
They need your direction and support now, to make sure their performance stays high.
They don’t need much direction or support now; they are mostly self-supporting and self-directing.
Even though they won’t admit it, they still need a lot of support. You can let them direct their own work, though.
When a team reaches the Performing stage, the team members don’t need much direction or support from their leader; they work together so smoothly that they are mostly self-supporting and self-directing.
When implementing agile using Scrum who is reponsible for forecasting the financial value of a theme?
Senior management
The product owner, but it is a responsibility shared with all other team members.
Senior management and the customer
The product owner
Forecasting the financial value of a theme is the responsibility of the product owner, but it is a responsibility shared with all other team members.
Your Extreme Programming (XP) team is nearing the end of an iteration and it is now obvious that one of the stories will not be completed when the iteration ends. What is your best course of action?
Define the code as complete at the iteration finish as the iteration end date defines completeness rather than the state of the code
Discard the partially completed code and start the story from scratch in a future iteration if the story is still wanted
Include the partially completed code as part of the iteration deliverables and explain to the customer that the code will be completed when time permits
Extend the iteration finish date to allow the code to be completed.
An XP best practice is to delete all the code for uncompleted stories at the end of an iteration and deliver only what’s completely done. The software is either accepted or thrown away at the timebox deadline, which ensures that quality level is be acceptable at all times.
Which of the following represents the total number of sprint points completed so far on the project divided by the total number of story points planned to complete on the project? Planned Percent Complete (PPC) Actual Percent Complete (APC) Schedule Baseline Performance Measurement Baseline (PMB)
Actual Percent Complete (APC) = The total number of sprint points completed divided by the total number of story points planned.
Extreme Programming (XP) teams will sometimes describe a story as being ‘done-done.’ What does this mean?
The code is complete, tested and bug free and can be released to the customer.
The code is completed but not tested.
The code is complete but failed testing.
The code is complete and tested but contains minor known bugs.
In XP, the term “done done” refers to code that is complete, tested and bug free, and can be released to the customer.
The practice of confirming that the build and tests succeed before moving on to your next task is referred to as what? Exploratory testing Asynchronous integration Synchronous integration Continuous integration
When you use the integration script discussed earlier, you’re using synchronous integration you’re confirming that the build and tests succeed before moving on to your next task. If the build is too slow, synchronous integration becomes untenable. In this case, you can use asynchronous integration instead. Rather than waiting for the build to complete, start your next task immediately after starting the build, without waiting for the build and tests to succeed.
In a Scrum environment, John is writing a project data sheet. What sections should be included in the project data sheet?
Elevator Statement, Scope Statement, Customer Attributes, Tradeoff Matrix
Elevator Statement, Stakeholder Analysis, Performance Attributes, Tradeoff Matrix
Elevator Statement, Customer Attributes, Performance Attributes, Tradeoff Matrix
Elevator Statement, Risk Register, Performance Attributes, Tradeoff Matrix
Typical sections of the project data sheet include: Identification (of the Scrum Master and Product Owner), Elevator Statement, Customer Attributes, Customer Benefits, Feature/Ability to, Performance Attributes, Major Milestones, and Tradeoff Matrix
In Scrum which of the following roles has the responsibility for prioritizing stories?
Belongs completely to the customer
Is shared among the whole team but the effort is led by the product owner
Is shared between the sponsor and end user
Is exclusively that of the product owner
The responsibility for prioritizing is shared among the whole team, but the effort is led by the product owner.
What effect will improving the performance or amount of a linear feature have on your agile project?
Decrease team velocity
Have a great positive impact on customer satisfaction
Produce a significant savings in developer time
Have little impact on customer satisfaction
A linear feature is one for which the more, the better holds true. These are called linear features because customer satisfaction is correlated linearly with the quantity of the feature. The better one of these features performs (or the more of it there is), the more satisfied the customers will be.
For the agile project team, when obstacles are addressed as part of the daily stand-up meeting, this is considered this type of risk management, as opposed to when risks are charted on a white board or flip chart, which is consider this type of risk management. Overt, Organic Obvious, Overt Original, Overt Organic, Overt
The framework of the agile software development process fosters organic, or naturally emerging risk management by making it an intrinsic part of the project lifecycle. The agile framework both increases positive events and decreases negative events by constantly reviewing the product functionality, the project plans, and the process itself. If the team is conducting risk management overtly, then new problems, risks, and risk triggers are identified during the stand-up meeting and placed in a highly visible location, usually the Risk Board.
Which of the following are valid ways for the agile project manager to ensure that project status is reported to the customer in accordance with the contract?
All of the above
An open-door invitation to observe the daily stand-up meetings
Informal documentation (e.g., burndown charts, iteration summaries, task board webcam)
Formal documentation (e.g., reports)
The agile project manager must determine how status will be reported in accordance with the contract. Will there be a status report once a week? Once a month? Daily as part of the daily stand-up meeting? The contract could be written such that the buyer gets the status through a combination of informal documentation (burndown charts, iteration summaries, task board webcam) and an open-door invitation to observe the daily stand-ups.
When using Extreme Programming (XP) practices, a list of your project's unique risks is referred to as a \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_. Risk plan Risk strategy Risk census Risk mitigation
The generic risk multipliers include the normal risks of a flawed release plan, ordinary requirements growth, and employee turnover. In addition to these risks, you probably face some that are specific to your project. To manage these, create a risk census.
What are the variable components of agile triangle? Time and Cost Time and Scope Scope and Cost None of the above
Agile teams allow the scope to vary within the fixed parameters to ensure most valued features are delivered within a certain time and budget.
Which of these statements is not correct selecting a pilot project to move to agile?
Select a mission-critical project so that high value can be demonstrated by using agile methods.
Pilot project should be of short duration
Should be small enough to be done by a single team
All of these
Correct answer is option A.
Option A is not a valid statement hence it is correct answer according to the question. It is not advisable to take too much risk on pilot project by selecting a misson-critical project.
Option B and C are correct statements (but incorrect options) as pilot project should be of small size and small duration, so that results can be demonstrated quickly without taking too much risk.
If requirement is too vague or 100% well defined that is also not a suitable candidate for agile transformation.
What is not a responsibility of PMO in agile transformation? Manage inflow of projects Coaching teams Assist teams with compliance Build continuous integration pipelines
Answer D
Building CI pipeline is applying best engineering practices activity and it should be carried out by technical person .
Which of the following are three key aspects of user story?
Card, confirmation, closing
Written Description, Conversation, Success Criteria
Collation, conversation, confirmation
None of these
Three 3C’s are card, conversation and confirmation. In other words, card denotes short written description, confirmation is same as success criteria, conversation is discussion with business to flesh out details of the story. Hence, the correct answer is option B.
Option A is incorrect because of incorrect aspect given ‘closing’.
Option C is incorrect because of incorrect key aspect ‘collation’ .
Option D is incorrect as we do have one correct option .
Product backlog has 400 story pints worth work.Team velocity is 25 story points.Total budget is 200000.
After 2 nd iteration actual cost is 22500 and story points completed =60
What is CPI?
1.20
1.15
2.2
1.33
Answer D
CPI=Earned Value/Actual Cost
Estimated Cost per Story Point=500
EV = 500*60=30000
AC=22500
CPI=30000/22500=4/3=1.33
* Other way of doing it: CPI=EV/AC=(PV*SPI)/AC SPI=60/50=1.2 PV=50*500=25K AC=22500 CPI=1.33
What is decision framing?
Decision framing focuses on who gets involved in the decision process. Managers who make decisions without input from subordinates and peers make poor decisions. Engineers who make decisions without input from managers and peers make poor decisions. Who makes the decision is less important than getting the right people involved in the decision process.
What are the theories X and Y?
In Theory X, employees are assumed to be lazy and shiftless and will avoid work and responsibility if they can. Theory Y proposes that people want to do well and are self-motivated to succeed if given the opportunity.
What is a risk map?
One of the best ways to visually display risks in a succinct manner is to use a Risk Map. On the vertical axis you have the probably of a given risk occurring, that is, the likelihood that the risk will materialize and become an Issue. On the horizontal axis we have the impact that the risk will have on the project or program should it materialize.
What are FBS and WBS?
Agile development favors a feature breakdown structure (FBS) approach instead of the work breakdown structure (WBS) used in waterfall development approaches
Advantage
· They allow communication between the customer and the development team in terms both
can understand.
· They allow the customer to prioritize the team’s work based on business value.
· They allow tracking of work against the actual business value produced.
Each iteration must be fully regression tested. May the cost (usually in terms of time) be considered an important reason for having four-week iterations instead of shorter ones?
- No, this may not be considered an important reason for having such a long iteration cycle
- Iteration does not need to be fully regression tested, therefore it is not an important reason
- Yes, it’s an important reason
- Not enough information provided
There are costs associated with each iteration. For example, each iteration must be fully regression tested. If this is costly (usually in terms of time), the team may prefer longer, four-week iterations. Remember, that each increment should be potentially shipped. This includes fully regression testing.
Feature teams are organized around:
- Product Backlog Items
- Software Architecture
- Motivated individuals
- Product Increment
Feature teams are organized around product backlog items, component teams around the software architecture.
Which statement best describes the Sprint Review?
- It is a review of the team’s activities during the Sprint.
- It is when the Scrum Team and stakeholders inspect the outcome of the Sprint and figure out what to do in the upcoming Sprint.
- It is a demo at the end of the Sprint for everyone in the organization to provide feedback on the work done.
- It is used to congratulate the Development Team if it did what it committed to doing, or to punish the Development Team if it failed to meet its commitments.
A Sprint Review is held at the end of the Sprint to inspect the Increment and adapt the Product Backlog if needed. During the Sprint Review, the Scrum Team and stakeholders collaborate about what was done in the Sprint. Based on that and any changes to the Product Backlog during the Sprint, attendees collaborate on the next things that could be done. This is an informal meeting, and the presentation of the Increment is intended to elicit feedback and foster collaboration.
What is the best length of an iteration in Scrum?
- 1 week
- There is no ideal iteration length. It depends on the project and can vary
- 2 weeks
- 1 month
There’s no one magic iteration duration that is right for all teams under all circumstances. The right length for a team on one project may not be the right length for that same team on a different project.
What of the following is not true of the Self-organization in Scrum?
- Self-organization is not an option in Scrum
- Self-organized teams are highly disciplined
- High trust and high commitment is an outcome of self-organizing teams
- Self-organization implies a laissez-faire approach
Self-organization is not an option in Scrum; it is a core principle. Without this, high performing teams will not happen. Self-organization does not at all imply a laissez-faire approach; on the contrary, self-organized teams are highly disciplined. They are encouraged to take reasonable risks and to learn through failure and self-reflection. High trust and high commitment is an automatic outcome of truly self-organizing teams.
What metaphor does not expresses the role of the Scrum Master in Scrum?
- Bulldozer
- Ship dog
- Chicken
- Trainer
Metaphor: The Scrum Master is a facilitator, coach, mentor and bulldozer! A Scrum Master is often compared to a sheepdog, responsible for keeping the flock together and the wolves away. Chicken refers to those outside the three Scrum roles.
What happens to the Grooming Horizon on large Scrum Projects?
Product backlog items are still decomposed and refined just in time on large Scrum projects. But the grooming horizon changes. Rather than focusing on the subsequent sprint, large projects look ahead to the next two to three sprints when preparing the product backlog
Which are the three coach styles?
The three coach styles are Teaching, Coaching, and Advising.
During which project management phase are the product stories delivered?
Options: A. Envision B. Speculate C. Explore D. Adapt
During the Speculate phase, the product stories are delivered. This phase involves planning and delivering tested stories in a short iteration, constantly seeking to reduce the risk and uncertainty of the project.
A company is starting to introduce Agile practices, and the project manager has been asked to identify how to introduce the new process. The project manager’s initial plan should be to:
A. Institute daily standup meetings immediately.
B. Communicate the Agile Manifesto to the team.
C. Balance teaching principles with Agile practices.
D. Rate the team’s progress in learning new methods.
Balance teaching principles with Agile practices.
Which layer of the product planning structure defines details at the capability or feature level?
A. Iteration
B. Roadmap
C. Release
D. WaveC. Release
Collaboration can be defined as working together to jointly produce a deliverable or make a decision, whereas coordination is:
A. Agreeing on a due date.
B. Sharing information.
C. Agreeing on the design.
D. Pair programming.B. Sharing information.
When an Agile project team receives an “emergency request” during an iteration, which is the best first step that the Agile project manager should take?
A. Stop work on unfinished user stories and work on the urgent request.
B. Call a team meeting and change the iteration scope to include the request.
C. Provide the customer with options provided by the project team.
D. Explain that the team cannot do the added work until the next iteration.
C. Provide the customer with options provided by the project team.
According to the fundamental principles of Lean Management, errors result from:
A. Inadequate user requirements and documentation.
B. Misjudgment made by project teams and operations staff.
C. Flaws in development and production systems.
D. Insufficient management oversight of projects and operations.
Flaws in development and production systems.
What is a high-level representation of the features or themes that are to be delivered in each release?
A. Release plan
B. Product roadmap
C. Iteration plan
D. Product BacklogCorrect Answer: B
Release plan focus on single release. it has goal and PBIs. only product roadmap focuses on multiple releasees
What is the common communication bridge between the team and the Product Owner?
A. Burndown chart
B. Product Backlog
C. Scrum team meeting
D. Sprint release planB. Product Backlog
What are the primary outputs of a release planning session?
A. Release vision, assumptions, action items, and iteration goals
B. Prioritized Product Backlog, risks, action items, and release goals
C. Estimated iteration velocities, risks, action items, and Release Backlog
D. Risks, action items, dependencies, and Release Backlog
A is not -iteration goals is part of sprint planning
B is not - Prioritized Product Backlog is input to the release planning
C is not - velocity is input to the releae planning
D is because all are output
The prerequisites of release planning are as follows −
A ranked product backlog, managed by the Product Owner. Generally five to ten features are taken which the product owner feels that can be included in a release
Team’s input about capabilities, known velocity or about any technical challenge
High-level vision
Market and Business objective
Acknowledgement whether new product backlog items are needed
Output
The output of a release planning can be the following −
Release plan
Commitment
Issues, concerns, dependencies, and assumptions which are to be monitored
Suggestions to improve future release plannings
A “Scrum of Scrums” meeting is:
A. Another name for the daily standup project meeting in a Scrum team. B. A mechanism that coordinates multiple teams working on a single project. C. A project meeting that happens twice every day across the Scrum teams. D. An occasional leadership meeting that provides direction to multiple Scrum teams.
B. A mechanism that coordinates multiple teams working on a single project.
Agile Earned Value Management (EVM) would be a valuable technique for managing a project because the:
A. project is in a CM MI-certified organization.
B. customer wants to maximize delivered value,
C. cost performance must be reported.
D. team is newly formed or new to Agile.
C. cost performance must be reported.
How is the participatory design process characterized?
A. A well-planned and well-documented process is documented for each of the iterations in the project.
B. Users including project team members participate in the planning process for the project plan.
C. End users participate and assist in the design process from the beginning of the project.
D. A high level brainstorming process is conducted for the project team and the project sponsor.
C. End users participate and assist in the design process from the beginning of the project.
Which of the following is part of the 12 practices defined in eXtreme Programming (XP)?
A. Risk management
B. Small releases
C. Project management
D. Project charterB. Small releases
- Pair Programming
- Planning Game
- Test Driven Development
- Whole Team
- Continuous Integration
- Design Improvement
- Small Releases
- Coding Standards
- Collective Code Ownership
- Simple Design
- System Metaphor
- Sustainable Pace
The advantage of face-to-face collaboration emphasized in eXtreme Programming (XP) is that it:
A. allows team members to use common language in their design and code.
B. delays feedback much more than scheduled inspections.
C. eliminates communication delays and misunderstandings.
D. allows team members to correct some mistakes on the fly.
C. eliminates communication delays and misunderstandings.
The process of reviewing, testing, and accepting implemented features is called:
A. Retrospective.
B. Stakeholder review.
C. Scope verification.
D. Iteration planning.C. Scope verification.
Scope verification is the process of formalizing acceptance of the project scope by the stakeholders. It requires reviewing work products and results to ensure that all were completed correctly and satisfactorily. Scope verification occurs at the end of each project phase, and as part of the project closeout process. Scope verification is concerned with stakeholder Acceptance of the work. Work is sometime denied and must be Re-Worked.
Which three criteria should be looked at when setting iteration length?
A. Time needed to complete a user story, time needed to build and test the stories, and product team acceptance of the stories
B. Timeframe in which the stories must be released, the cost to deliver the features to market, and product team acceptance of the stories
C. Delivering chunks of user-valued functionality, time needed to build and test the stories, and product team acceptance of the stories
D. Features that categorize the product, the time needed to complete the features, and the cost to deliver the features to market
Correct Answer: B
The Kaizen philosophy is change:
A. For the better.
B. Driven by process improvement.
C. Driven by teams.
D. For small groups.A. For the better.
Kaizen is a Japanese term meaning “change for the better” or “continuous improvement.”
Which of the following is NOT a principle of the Agile Manifesto?
A. Working software is delivered frequently B. Close, daily co-operation between business people and developers C. Daily team meetings to review progress and address impediments D. Projects built around motivated individuals, who should be trusted
C. Daily team meetings to review progress and address impediments
Agile works on the following 12 principles
Customer satisfaction by rapid delivery of useful software. Welcome changing requirements, even late in the development. working software is delivered more frequently as compared to other models. working software is the principal means of progress. sustainable development able to maintain constant pace. close, daily co-operation between business people and developers. face-to-face conversation is the best form of communication. projects are built around motivated and trustworthy individuals. continuous attention is being given to the technical excellence and good design. simplicity self-organizing teams regular adaption to the changing circumstances.
Who developed extreme programming (XP)?
A. Mike Cohn
B. Ken Schwaber
C. Kent Beck
D. Alistair CockburnC. Kent Beck
Which 2 are goals of Lean Software Development? (Choose two.)
A. Ensure value
B. Simple Design
C. Continuous integration
D. Minimize wasteA. Ensure value
D. Minimize waste
Which Agile framework adopts and tailors methods such as Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Agile Modeling (AM), Unified Process (UP), Kanban and Agile Data (AD) in order to support scaling?
A. DSDM B. Crystal C. Disciplined Agile Delivery (DAD) D. Agile Delivery Framework (ADF)
C. Disciplined Agile Delivery (DAD)
Product Backlog Items (PBI) described as emergent, are expected to:
A. Become new technology requirements
B. Grow and change over time as users’ stories are completed
C. Become the highest priority items
D. Be the most recent stories added to the backlog
Correct Answer: B
James is managing a project in which he is replenishing his storage of materials and using his own trademark approach. What type of process is his project utilizing?
An empirical process
An experimental process
A defined process
A hybrid of both an empirical and defined process
A defined process.
A defined process is one in which the materials are known and understood and the approach to the solution is known. A good example is a construction project. An empirical process is one in which learning takes place along the way and the path is uncertain. Exemplified is a synonym of empirical, which this approach is not. There is no such thing as a hybrid empirical and defined process, as those are two opposing process types.
To best exhibit the agile approach to documentation, William chose to discuss work assignments with the team instead of taking the time to put documentation in writing. No one directly asked for written requirements. What is the best way to characterize William’s approach?
William should begin completing some documentation in writing, as taking an agile approach to documentation does not imply that documentation should not be completed at all William is correctly demonstrating the agile approach to documentation, as it is not required William is correctly demonstrating the agile approach to documentation, as no one asked for requirements in writing William should write some requirements, but only for the more complicated work assignments
The agile approach to documentation is focused on minimal documentation, not no documentation. William is not demonstrating a correct approach. He also would not be correct if he only completed some requirements and not others. All items should have requirements, although the documentation should be minimal.
At Consumer Recreation services, a highly successful agile organization, their primary measure of progress is:
How much of the solution is designed, which they track on a burndown chart
How much of the solution has been approved by the Product Owner, which they track on a Gantt chart
The development of working software, rather than fully comprehensive documentation
The percentage of time spent on bugs vs. the original development work, which they track on a team analysis report each cycle
Working software should be the primary measure of progress on an agile team. The amount of the solution designed, approved, and the relevant quality metrics are not the primary measure of the team’s progress.
How does Margaret ensure that only a minimum viable product is produced within her team?
Hear team always delays the correction of bugs until the next sprint
She has an architect focused exclusively on simplification who approves the design of every item
She involves the Product Owner to regularly narrow focus to the core items only, not the extra 60% of features that never get used
She focuses only on the primary features that are used, which is typically 60% of what is built in every app
She involves the Product Owner to regularly narrow focus to the core items only, not the extra 60% of features that never get used.
The team must focus on the agile principle of simplicity, maximizing the amount of work not done. There is no correlation between bug completion and architect review. A typical project includes 60% unused features, not 40.
Christopher’s team has just undergone an assessment from the country’s premiere agile consulting firm. They were rated exceptionally well. Given this performance, the methodology that the team used is most likely:
The Scrum methodology, including timeboxed sprints, Product Owners, and all artifacts and events described by the methodology
Any agile methodology that has not been customized in any way. The best use of agile involves strict implementation without exceptions, especially as teams mature over time
A customized hybrid approach that combines the adaptability of Kanban and the standard rules implemented in Scrum
None of the above
None of the above.
There is no best method of implementing agile. It is recommended that new teams generally want to follow a methodology more strictly, but we do not know the maturity of Christopher’s team. There is no single right way to implement agile. Most teams end up customizing their approach as they mature in their understanding and practice of agile. However, that does not make their practice better than a team that strictly follows the methodology.
Galaxy Communications practices the XP methodology. Anthony can best exhibit the XP core value of respect through:
Carefully reviewing the standards and practices chosen by their team regarding the approach to take in Lisa’s code, and reminding her of the approach
Refusing to gossip with others regarding Lisa’s novel approach in her code, which he discovered during their code review, since everyone should be working in the same way within a module of code
Ensuring that he completes code review for Lisa on any items she has completed within the same day
Congratulating Lisa for a job well done during his review of her code, despite her taking a different approach than he would
Congratulating Lisa for a job well done during his review of her code, despite her taking a different approach than he would.
Respect is exhibited in the peer review process by understanding that others work differently, and embracing those differences. Strict adherence to standards, refusal to gossip, and frequency of code reviews do not directly exhibit respect.
Andrew is the ScrumMaster for his team of ten. All team members sit near each other in the same space. Donna, the Product Owner, has mentioned exciting new features several times this week in the Scrums. Andrew makes sure she’s reminded that:
She must limit her comments on new enhancements to two minutes or less in the Scrum
She can discuss these outside of the Scrum in their team area as soon as the standup is done
She is encouraged to think of innovative new features, but should not mention them in the Scrum
She should hold off on change requests until the end of the current release cycle
She is encouraged to think of innovative new features, but should not mention them in the Scrum.
Scrum encourages changes, but they should be discussed in the sprint planning session, not in the daily Scrum. New enhancements that are not assigned to an iteration should not be mentioned in the Scrum sessions. They should also not be mentioned in the team’s area the same day. Lastly, she should not hold off on mentioning these changes until the end of a release.
Project SpideySense is a 3-year project that will ensure that GothCorp adheres to a new financial regulation. Project BulletProof is a 1-year project that will protect the company against the risk of a lawsuit. What is the best way to determine which project will provide the company the most value?
No analysis is needed, as both projects must be done Whichever project receives the most support from the company's board Calculate the net present value of both and choose the one with the higher NPV Calculate the forecast revenues for both and choose the one with the highest forecast revenues
Calculate the net present value of both and choose the one with the higher NPV.
Net present value allows you to calculate the value of a project in today’s terms, regardless of the project length, and is the best choice for comparing the value of projects. Avoiding analysis will not determine the greatest value, nor will having the board vote. Calculating future revenues does not tell us a project’s value at a single point in time, which would include deduction of costs and the time value of money which is part of NPV.
Brian’s team oversees the software used for the Lightman Group’s new venture into launching spacecraft. There are two potential approaches his team can take. He has calculated the NPV of Project Houston at $200,000, which will take 2 years. He has calculated the NPV of Project Canaveral at $500,000, which will take 3 years. Solely considering NPV, which project should be undertaken?
Project Houston, which can be completed in 2 years Project Canaveral, which has the higher NPV of $500,000 Project Houston, which has an IRR of 15% There is insufficient information to determine the higher value
Project Canaveral, which has the higher NPV of $500,000.
The highest NPV indicates the highest project value. Project Houston has a lower value and should not be chosen. Internal Rate of Return (IRR) is irrelevant. Sufficient information is provided through NPV.
Ronald is assessing his agile project at Haly’s Circus through the use of a double-S curve earned value tool. The line representing scope built is much lower than the lines representing actual spending and projected progress. What does this tell him?
The team is behind in scope compared to projections
The actual spending is much higher than projected spending
The team is behind in scope and the costs are higher than expected
The team is fine, as projected progress and actual spending are aligned
A line showing scope built at a very low level compared to projected progress indicates that the story points completed are not where they were forecast to be. The chart does not indicate anything related to spending, as we do not know what the projected spending amount. It does indicate that there is an issue with scope, so the team is not fine.
Ryan’s agile project at Jabot Cosmetics is subject to regulatory compliance from the FDA. They will require extensive documentation as part of the approval process for his work. What are his options for handling this need?
This cannot be an agile project, as projects requiring regulatory compliance should be done with the traditional methods
His team must complete this documentation as each feature is developed
His team may complete this documentation either in each iteration or at the end, but not both
His team may complete this documentation as they go, after product development, or in a hybrid model of the two
Compliance work can be completed with each iteration, after product development, or both ways, with some of the work completed along the way and some done at the end. Compliance work does not have to be done using traditional methods, it does not have to be done only with each iteration, and it can be performed in a hybrid model.
Gary is sitting down with his team at National Motors Corporation to prioritize the remaining work items in the backlog. The best approach for the team to use is:
None, as prioritization of the backlog should be done privately by the Product Owner
Any method, as there is no single best method for prioritization of work in agile projects
The MoSCoW method
The multi-voting approach
There is no single best method for prioritizing agile work. Prioritization should be done by the Product Owner and development team and could use any method the team chooses.
Jacob's team is using the MoSCoW method to prioritize the backlog at PaperCo. The team has several items that would be useful to their software and would add value. It is most likely that they prioritize the items as:
Could have
Would like to have
Should have
Must haveCould have.
Items with this definition are classified as ‘could have’ features, which are useful additions that add value. The other categories listed are all defined differently in the MoSCoW method. ‘Must have’ items are core features, ‘should have’ items are required for the system to work correctly or without a difficult workaround, and ‘would like to have, but not at this time’ items are nice additions, but likely not going to be done at the time.
Jonathan’s team delivers value incrementally for each cycle. This most likely means that:
They deliver working software to the business
They deliver working software to the end user in a production environment
They deliver at least one item that has all features completed in every cycle
They deliver work that has been unit tested by their developers
Delivering incrementally means delivering working software to the business. Incremental delivery does not imply that the work is released to a production environment, that it has all planned features, or that it is only unit tested.
Frank notices on his CFD that the area related to his user testing work is consistently very shallow while other areas are getting wider. This indicates to him that:
There is a bottleneck related to the activities other than user testing
There is a bottleneck related to user testing
The value of the project is not increasing
The value of user testing is not increasing
There is a bottleneck related to user testing.
A shallow area on a CFD indicates that the area is likely a bottleneck. The other statements are not accurate. If there is a widening difference in areas on a CFD, this indicates that the shallower line is a bottleneck and the other activities are not. CFD’s related to the features completed over time, not the value of the work.
Acceptance Test-Driven Development is different than standard Test-Driven Development. As Debra writes her code, she can expect that she will most likely not have to:
Focus on the testing of business requirements
Implement upfront testing of requirements
Focus exclusively on the testing of code
Discuss the user story acceptance criteria when it is pulled from the backlog
Focus exclusively on the testing of code.
Debra will not focus exclusively on the test of code in ATDD, which is focused on requirements instead. In ATDD, developers do focus on testing business requirements, they write the test upfront, and they discuss the acceptance criteria often when an item is pulled from the backlog.
Alexander is focused on writing user stories and testing as part of his team at Tyrell’s Toys. They have just begun development using ATDD. Since the team is new to this process, Alexander can expect his testing work to most likely be:
Focused on manual testing
Focused on regression testing
Development of tests at the point that the user story is pulled from the backlog
Focused on exploratory testing using automated scripts
Focused on exploratory testing using automated scripts.
ATDD has testers focused on exploratory testing primarily using automated scripts. The other answers are not requirements of ATDD. There is no extra focus on manual testing, on regression testing, or on testing at the time a user story is pulled from the backlog. Testing is only done further done the cycle when the item is done.
Rachel ensures that her project is aligned with her stakeholder’s priorities by:
Having the full stakeholder team agree on the prioritization of the backlog
Having the Product Owner and delivery team prioritize the backlog
Using the planning poker method to prioritize the backlog
Comparing the priorities listed in the charter with the planned release schedule and prioritizing the backlog accordingly
Having the Product Owner and delivery team prioritize the backlog.
The Product Owner and delivery team should prioritize the backlog to ensure alignment with stakeholder priorities. The Product Owner should be well versed in business priorities and the needs of the customer. The full stakeholder team does not prioritize nor is it done using Planning Poker. Prioritization is also not charter-based but done just in time for each iteration.
Emma’s team is focused on making sure stakeholders are well engaged and that the full team agrees on the expectations for each iteration. The best way for her to do this is to:
Ensure that the team regularly discusses what the definition of done is for their project
Invite all stakeholders to the daily standup meeting
Have the full stakeholder team participate in the prioritization of the backlog
Require that all stakeholders are present for the reading of the charter
Ensure that the team regularly discusses what the definition of done is for their project.
The best method is to ensure that the team regularly discusses the definition of done, so everyone is aligned with the expectations of what done means. It is not effective to invite everyone to meetings or to have everyone prioritize the backlog. A review of the agile charter would have no effect on the expectation for each iteration.
Adam wants to let the other stakeholders know about an issue he’s having on their project. The most appropriate way to do this in an agile project is to:
Share this information with the ScrumMaster, who would then ask him to share this in the daily standup
Discuss this in the next daily standup with the team
Share this information in their next Sprint Review
Document this issue in an email so it can be added to the risk log
The best answer is to discuss in the next daily standup, where roadblocks are communicated as part of the three questions for each resource. The other methods are not the best way to share this information in an agile project. There is no need to go to the ScrumMaster first, to wait until Sprint Review, or to document in an email.
Zachary wants to make sure that his team shares as much product and project knowledge as possible in their agile projects. To do that, they are most likely to use:
Automated reporting and weekly training sessions
Kanban boards and wireframes
Detailed requirements
Acceptance Test-Driven Development
The best answer is Kanban boards and wireframes, which would convey knowledge of the project and product. The others are not the best choice for sharing product and project knowledge. People often don’t read automated reports. There is no weekly training stipulation, and agile methods typically avoid detailed requirements. ATDD is irrelevant.
The way that Joan manages knowledge sharing in her agile project is most likely to be:
Emailing out the Gantt chart to all stakeholders daily
Making copies of the daily status report and distributing to all stakeholders in person
Hosting a weekly project review session in which all stakeholders are invited
Using cards on a wall to plan and schedule the project
Using cards on a wall to plan and schedule the project.
The best answer is using cards on a wall, which all stakeholders can see at any time, which is an information radiator. Gantt charts are not typically the best knowledge sharing tools, nor is a weekly review session. Making copies of a daily report would cause excess time and cost, and likely be ignored in favor of face-to-face communication.
Carl is sitting in his team's agile workshop, and writing his ideas down for five minutes. He will then be asked to present his ideas to the group, just like the rest of the team. Carl is participating in:
Round Robin
Free Hand
Quiet Writing
Fishbone DiagrammingThis accurately describes Quiet Writing. The other answers are inaccurate based on this description. Round Robin is focused on everyone speaking in the group, Fishbone Diagramming is focused on the root cause of an issue. Free Hand is a fictional term.
Angela works for a Family Credit Union, which would like customers to open new accounts online. The best example of a Minimum Viable Product for this functionality on their website is:
A webpage where the customer provides the minimum information, released only after the code for creating new accounts has been completed
A webpage that allows customers to quickly set up checking, savings, and money market accounts in an automatic way
A webpage where the customer provides the minimum information, while Angela’s team manually creates the account behind the scenes during business hours
A webpage that provides basic information about opening new accounts when you click on Open a New Account.
A webpage that allows customers to still open a new account, even if back end processes have not been fully automated is the best example of an MVP with the required functionality. A webpage that fully automates the back-end processes is not the best choice for an MVP. The webpage where the customer submits the information to a manual processor would be more of a minimal approach. A webpage that provides basic information only does not have the required functionality of allowing customers to open new accounts online.
A Kanban board is a great visual aid to assist in the review of:
The priority and stage for work items in the current iteration
All items waiting in the backlog that need to be prioritized
The planning of work over the course of a release
The reasons for any bottlenecks in the current iteration
A Kanban board helps to review the priority and stage of items in the current iteration. A Kanban board does not help the team visualize the backlog or a release, and it does not give the reason for a bottleneck.
Justin’s team at Shadrack Inc. limits WIP to no more than ten items. When they see on the board that there are only two tasks in progress, the team is most likely to:
Decrease the WIP limit to two to three tasks
Look for a bottleneck
Stay late until there are five tasks in progress
Hire more developers
If only a small portion of the expected WIP is being complete, the team is likely to have a bottleneck that they should investigate. A small number of items in WIP does not necessarily indicate that the WIP limit should be lowered, that the whole team should work more, or that more developers need to be hired.
Lori’s team expects that each user story will be estimated during their backlog planning sessions with several story points. The new item that the Product Owner has made the highest priority is something the team has never done before, and the team is uncertain about what to do. What advice does Lori give?
She tells them that they should only plan for the best-case scenario She asks that they do blind voting to get to a number She suggests to the team that they provide a range for their estimate, to allow them to have the wiggle room they need None of the above
The best course is to give a range for their estimate, which gives them flexibility in an unknown area. There is no agile requirement to ignore risk and plan for best case, nor is their requirement for voting.
Bobby has worked hard to incorporate the concept of agile discovery into his project team, and is working with the executive stakeholders to explain the concept. The example he uses is most likely to be:
That his team uses a large range for estimates if what they are building is not something they have done before, and even more if it is using an unfamiliar technology
That the Product Owner has the team gather more ideas for each iteration regarding the requirements of each user story planned
That the goal of the project should be discovered along the way as the team learns more about it
That the look and feel of the system is reviewed after each iteration and adjusted until the stakeholders discover what they want
The best choice relates to using a broad range for estimates, so account for the discovery process for unfamiliar items. Agile discovery focuses on having greater understanding as you get closer to working on an item. The other descriptions are not accurate for the term. Agile discovery is not a requirement to gather more ideas around requirements. Agile discovery is also not about post-iteration reviews or discovering the goal of the project, which is set at the beginning.
James is working on a project cost estimate for the stakeholders on his team during the first month of his project. His approach to producing this estimate should be:
Determine the number of sprints until their preferred end date, and multiple by the expected cost of the first sprint
Look at a similar project that has been done and adjust based on the differences in the two projects
Using a range for the estimate with a buffer that the team agrees on that accounts for the uncertainty in the rest of the project
Plan out all known user stories for the project, estimate their points, and determine the cost accordingly
The best choice is to use a range for agile cost estimates, as it is difficult to be exact so early in the project. It is best to not provide an exact figure this early in an agile project, as changes are expected. Another project is irrelevant to the estimate. It is not agile to plan all the way to the end of the project during the first month, as projects should be planned closer to the start of the work.
Mary is asked to estimate a user story for their upcoming sprint during their sprint planning session. She takes the expected number of points, 10, and then adds 20% to account for her typical meetings during this time and breaks, giving her a total 12 points. Her ScrumMaster should let her know that:
This is the ideal way to plan for user stories, as each should have a buffer depending on each person’s standard schedule
That user stories should be estimated based on ideal time
That he will also add an additional project buffer of 20%, bringing the user story up to roughly 14 points
That she should also factor in her time out of the office into the expected points
That user stories should be estimated based on ideal time.
User stories are estimated based on ideal time, which is undistracted time. The buffer will be accounted for automatically in the team’s velocity. There is no need to add a buffer in the estimation process, nor a need to consider any extra time. Estimates should focus on ideal time.
Elizabeth has reevaluated the stories in her backlog. She has determined that some items they originally planned to release just aren’t of much value for the intended users. Elizabeth is most likely to:
Prioritize those stories very low
Only allocate to the upcoming sprints if there are a few leftover points in the cycle
Place a note on the user stories indicating that the customer research does not indicate strong value
Remove the stories from the backlog
Elizabeth should remove the stories from the backlog if low value. The other choices are not appropriate for a story that does not provide much value. Elizabeth should maximize value, so she should just prioritize the story low or place a note on the stories. Elizabeth also would not be responsible for assigning a story to a sprint.
Susan has created a board of VIP customers that helps her make decisions on their software products. They are about a month into the delivery of their project and she organizes a meeting to give the board an early preview. During this session, the overwhelming feedback is that the look and feel of the project was not intuitive and it was a confusing product overall. What is Susan’s best choice for moving forward?
She should add some user stories to the backlog that make the product look better
She should cancel the project and gather user feedback that can guide their future project priorities
She should revamp the workflow of the product
She should reprioritize what’s already in her backlog
The best choice is to cancel the project, producing a fast failure if the customers don’t understand the value of the product. The other options don’t make sense when customer feedback indicates that this software doesn’t provide value. Agile preaches failing fast if a project is going to fail. It is much better to cancel a project that will be a failure than can complete it if there is not sufficient value in the project. Simply adding user stories, changing the workflow, and reprioritizing do not address the lack of value.
Jessica has given the project team a target date for the first release of her product in a high-level planning session. The ScrumMaster most likely tells her:
Target dates are only chosen after all iterations have been planned
Only the team selects the target date
Nothing, as it is ok for the customer to choose a target date
That it is far too early to select a target date in agile projects
It is ok for a customer to have a target release date, given that the scope can vary. The other choices are not accurate responses. A customer can choose a target release date, and it can be done before all iterations have been planned.
Agile methods focus on decision making in which the major stakeholders are involved. Which two major features do all the agile decision models involve?
Colocation and communication
Emotional intelligence and asynchronous communication
Convergence and shared collaboration
None of the above
The best answer is convergence and shared collaboration, where the team comes together on an answer through sharing ideas. Colocation is not required of all major stakeholders, nor is asynchronous communication, as there is a preference for face-to-face interaction.
Sean’s team has discovered a missing requirement in their user story. The developer speaks with the person who best can describe what should happen in the scenario discovered. However, that person failed to update their software tracking tool with the updated requirement. Sean knows that he should:
Ensure that the tool is changed immediately for the best means of communication
Make sure that this change is discussed in the next standup meeting and not worry as much about the process for their tracking tool
Ask that no discussions take place without the involvement of the party most likely to be testing
Disallow a change such as this, as new items should always go to the backlog
If this has a minor impact, it is fine to discuss and not worry about the process of changing the tool. People over processes is a core focus of agile. There is no agile requirement that documentation needs to be updated immediately, as the team decides the level of documentation needed and processes around it. There is also no rule about requirements related to the party testing and a potentially minor change going to the backlog.
Hannah has inherited an agile team that was not doing so well. She has 2 Business Analysts, 5 Developers, 2 Database Administrators, and 2 Testers. What is her one of her initial areas of focus?
Break up the team into two groups, as it is too large
To evaluate each of the team members
To work with the team on a solution to focus on the creation of cross-functional skills
To combine the Business Analyst and Testing functions into cross-functional roles
Hannah’s best focus is to work with the team to begin creating generalizing specialists, as no one is performing a general role on her team. The team is not too large for an agile project. It is not an initial responsibility to evaluate the team and she should not decide what to do about functions without discussing with the team.
Olivia’s team is new to agile and everyone has a separate role. She knows that the team wants to move to the model of generalizing specialists. She can expect that as they complete their work toward this model, her team will:
Have knowledge of each functional area of delivery including analysis, development, and testing
Be able to accept tasks in any area
Will be regularly training across every delivery area
Will master several areas within the team’s delivery work, but are not expected to master all
The best answer is that the team is expected to master several areas but not all, which is expected of generalizing specialists. The other answers are not accurate depictions of a generalizing specialist. There is no requirement of knowing or training in every area.
Austin is his team’s leader and the team is starting a new agile project. Austin has six delivery team members. Each of them specializes in only two skills within their agile team’s responsibilities. Austin needs to:
Work with the team to find a solution to broadening their skillsets
Focus on scheduling training for each team member on the missing skills
Do nothing, as the team resources do have multiple skill sets, unless the team decides their skills need to broaden
None of the above
The best answer is to do nothing, as generalizing specialists are not expected to have all skills. They should have skills in at least a couple of functions to limit bottlenecks. There is no need to have more than two roles unless the team chooses that, so no training would be required.
As Gloria works on improving her team’s performance on their agile projects, she wants to ensure that the team makes decisions faster and that they trust each other. What should she do to make that happen?
She should limit the team size to 12 resources or less
She should make sure that they are not assigned more story points than their capacity
She should ensure that established processes for communication points are followed well
Gloria should create a shared vision for the team and ensure the team knows this vision well
The most critical focus is creating a shared vision to allow the team to produce faster decisions and trust each other. The other choices are not the initial focus to ensure improvement in the two areas listed. There is no mention of having excess team members or her team getting excessive assignments. There is also nothing about not having established processes. Even if those were concerns, the primary way to bolster fast decision-making and trust is to create a shared vision.
As a strong leader of his project, Jesse oversees pointing out the direction on his agile projects. He expects his team to:
Let him know that it is inappropriate for a leader to give direction and that the team should be doing this themselves self-organize, with 8 people or less Create a path in the direction that he's pointed out Change the direction throughout the project as new information is discovered
The best choice in an agile team is that the team creates a path in the direction shared by leaders. It is fine for a leader to give direction and teams are not limited to 8 or less. They also should not be changing the direction of the project on their own.
Marie is stepping into an existing agile team that has lost their leader. She has noticed that the team members are angry about what has happened in the past. Her focus regarding this should be to:
Facilitate training on the causes of the anger Facilitate the team toward a better team identity Do nothing, as this is a self-organizing team Facilitate the team in the direction necessary to shift the anger to trust
The best choice for an agile team is to ensure that the team moves toward trust rather than anger. The other choices are not as strong for the situation. Knowing the cause of anger doesn’t resolve it, and team identity has little to do with this issue. Marie should address any team issues as a good leader, but facilitate, not make decisions.
Theresa participates in several activities that help her team’s knowledge to grow. On her agile project, the most common activity she is likely to perform is:
Training Mentoring Coaching Evaluating
The most likely activity is coaching for the team which is the core role of an agile leader. The other activities may take place, but are not as common as coaching. A coach does not necessarily perform training and evaluating. Mentoring is more of an occasional need.
Eugene is a successful agile team leader, but none of the team members report directly to him. It is part of his role to partner with the managers of his team members. He does this by:
Filling out the performance evaluations for his team members Teaching the manager of his team about agile Writing up goals for each team member and sending them to the managers Ensuring that the managers for his team are well versed in the agile approach and that they work together to make sure his team's goals are aligned with that approach
The best choice is focused on working with managers to increase their knowledge of agile and making sure that goals are focused on the agile approach. The other choices are not the ideal fit for this situation. There is no agile requirement that team leaders fill out performance evaluations or write up goals for the manager. It is also the better choice to both keep the manager well versed and ensure the goals are an alignment vs educating the manager alone.
Wayne’s company has asked him about the resources for his upcoming agile project. They suggest several team members, including those located in his building, those located in his building and in another building in a nearby state, and a team which includes both offshore team members and locals. What is Wayne’s ideal resource team if the skills are roughly equivalent in all locations?
Wayne would choose a team in his building and do daily standups together in the same room Wayne would choose a team in his building and move them to the same space Wayne would choose the team in his building and those located nearby since they have the same schedule, but would be required to set up video conferencing All these scenarios are ideal means of doing agile projects, if they can collaborate physically or virtually
The best choice is always to have a physical team in the same space, although we do not always get that option. The other options are not ideal if given the choice. It is better to have teams in the same room than in the same building. You would not want to have team members located nearby ideally.
Sarah’s team is working to arrange the user stories so that they can fit the proper number of story points into the first iteration of their project. They guess that the team can accomplish 40 points in the first sprint. The Product Owner mentions that their last project started off with 50 points and that should be the basis for this project. The Product Owner:
Is right, that points are arbitrary, and it is fine to choose 50 instead of 40 for the first sprint Knows that he should not be speaking up, as the ScrumMaster is responsible for managing capacity discussions Should not try to influence the planning of how the team accomplishes the project None of the above
The Product Owner should not try to influence how the team plans to accomplish their work, as the delivery team is responsible for figuring out how to accomplish it. The delivery team is responsible for choosing points, and they are not arbitrary, they are based on what the team feels the value of a point is. A ScrumMaster is not responsible for managing any discussions.
Christopher is a part of the delivery team that is working on the first iteration of their project. One of his assigned user stories is missing acceptance criteria. Christopher should most likely:
Ask the ScrumMaster to add the acceptance criteria so he can continue work Stop work on the item, as the team made a mistake in estimating a user story that does not have defined acceptance criteria Ask the Product Owner to add the acceptance criteria so he can continue work Reestimate the item before he continues his work
The best choice is to stop working on the item, as it should not have been estimated without clear criteria. A ScrumMaster is not responsible for acceptance criteria. The Product Owner could add acceptance criteria, but the item should not have been estimated without it. The item should be reestimated, but work should not necessarily continue, especially if the estimate is different.
One of the primary reason that agile methods focus on incremental development is that:
It is faster than standard development Humans are expected to make mistakes in their work It makes the project work much easier Humans like repetition
The best answer is that humans are expected to make mistakes. There is nothing that says that incremental development is faster than standard for the same scope. It is not necessarily much easier to do incremental development, nor any relevance to humans liking or disliking repetition.
Ashley is her team’s Coach and is focused on the average amount of work her team can do in each iteration. She can also refer to this metric as:
Productivity Throughput Cycle Time WIP
Throughput is the correct definition for this description. The other choices are not accurate. Productivity is focused on how efficiently the work is done, the cycle time is focused on the iterations it takes to complete WIP, and WIP is the number of items in progress.
Amanda lost a large portion of a team to a divestiture in her company. Her team previously worked together to pick a solution for the project. When new members were added to her team to replace the old, Amanda’s primary focus should be:
Holding a training session with the new team members to review the solutions they'll be implementing Having the Product Owner do a demonstration of the current software Reviewing the solutions chosen by the prior team with the new team, to ensure they agree with the approach Having the existing team members rearrange their pair programming teams to ensure that two new team members are not paired together
It is important to review the chosen solution with the new team members to ensure they agree, as the new team could make the choose to deliver differently. The other choices should not be Amanda’s primary focus. This new team has the choice to change the delivery of this solution, so they would not need a training session on the choice of another team. A demonstration is highly relevant to picking a solution. Pairing up old and new programmers might be a good idea, but it is not an agile standard. The team choosing how to deliver a solution is though, making it the best answer.
Melissa’s team has been working on agile projects for more than six months now. Her management team has asked that they change the way timeboxing works to allow for flexibility in the length of their iterations. Melissa’s response to the executive team should likely be:
That agile allows for process flexibility and this is fine if the team agrees to it That the team will do what is needed to support the company's objectives That the team is new to agile and there is a lot of risk in changing the process this early None of the above
The best response is that Melissa’s team is new to agile and it is risky for them to customize the process, especially not based on the team’s desire. The other choices are not the best for this situation. Only seasoned and matured teams should consider changes, and her team is new. They should not just change this early and not based on management request.
In the systems thinking approach, the most successful agile projects can be classified as:
Having highly uncertain technology and highly uncertain requirements Having low technical complexity and low requirement complexity Having high requirement complexity and high technical complexity Having complex technology and complex requirements
Agile projects have complex technology and complex requirements, but not technology or requirements that are approaching chaos. The other choices are not accurate for the most successful agile projects. The most successful are in the middle of the complexity standards, neither high nor low.
Timothy has been brought into World Company as a mentor for their agile team leaders. He has noticed that the company is fully supportive of agile and that 100% of their projects are implemented using an agile methodology. Timothy’s most likely response to this is:
Delight, as agile should be used in all projects To investigate further, as it would be rare for a single methodology to be the right choice for every project Skepticism that the numbers are accurate To provide a survey to the teams to see how agile they really are
The most likely response is that Timothy will want to investigate further, since a single project methodology is not often best in all circumstances. He is likely not delighted, but more skeptical since it is very rare for agile to be appropriate in 100% of projects. Whether the teams think they are agile or not is irrelevant.
Stephanie’s project team has the requirement that a thorough and detailed user story manual should be produced as part of every agile project. This requirement is most likely an:
Corporate requirement Based on the needs of the agile teams Embellishment None of the above
This is likely an example of an embellishment, something that teams have added on but does not produce much value. There is nothing to indicate that this is a corporate requirement Agile teams do not need detailed user story manuals, as it is not an agile requirement.
During sprint demonstrations on Gary’s team, feedback requested on the product always begins with the most senior managers in the room and then proceeds to the newest delivery resources on the project team. Gary’s agile mentor weighs in on this process, and is most likely to say:
Nothing, as the process is standard at their company Nothing if the agile team has agreed on this approach That this process can take far too long and should be amended to focus on managers This process does not follow the agile guideline of respecting individuals
When responses are ordered like this, it makes it appear that the value for the response from certain people is more than the value of other responses. Gary should not do nothing since the agile value of respecting individuals is not being followed, even if the company or team desire it. The length of the process is irrelevant.
Extreme Programming (XP) defines four basic activities that are performed during the software development process. These include designing, coding, testing and “¦?
A. Collaborating B. Leveling C. Communicating D. Listening
Listening
Agile project management and product development use several types of documents specific to each iteration; they are known as “artifacts”. All of the following documents are Agile iteration artifacts except:
A. Iteration Vision Statement B. Iteration Backlog C. Iteration Plan D. Iteration Burndown Chart
Iteration Vision Statement
What are the 5 values of Agile Modeling?
A. Communication, Simplicity, Feedback, Courage, Humility B. Communication, Efficiency, Transparency, Courage, Humility C. Communication, Simplicity, Feedback, Adaption, Continuous Improvement
A. Communication, Simplicity, Feedback, Courage, Humility
What are the three components of an Agile Project Charter? (Choose three.)
A. Success Criteria
B. Vision
C. Objectives
D. Scope
E. Mission
F. RisksSuccess Criteria
Vision
Mission
What are the 12 practices of XP?
The Planning Game Small Releases Metaphor Simple Design Testing Refactoring Pair Programming Collective Ownership Continuous Integration 40-hour week On-site Customer Coding Standard
What is SDLC?
SDLC is a process followed for a software project, within a software organization. It consists of a detailed plan describing how to develop, maintain, replace and alter or enhance specific software. The life cycle defines a methodology for improving the quality of software and the overall development process.
Following are the most important and popular SDLC models followed in the industry −
Waterfall Model
Iterative Model
Spiral Model
V-Model
Big Bang Model
