Questions 1

Question 1

A directive PMO (Project Management Office) differs from a supportive PMO in that a directive PMO is responsible for providing which critical role/resource to a project, while the supportive PMO acts in consultative roles?

1. Risk Manager
2. Project Manager
3. Software System Analyst
4. Business Process Owner

Answer 1

Answer Project Manager

Explanation
Directive PMOs take control of the projects by directly managing the projects. Project managers are assigned by and report to the PMO. The degree of control provided by the PMO is high.

Question 2

Your project has undergone two change orders and you need to gain an understand of how those together have impacted the original baselined project budget solidified during Planning. Which of the following variance analysis formulas would you use?

1. SV = EV – PV
2. VAC = BAC – EAC
3. CPI =EV/AC
4. CV = EV -AC

Answer: CV = EV -AC

Answer 2

Answer: CV = EV -AC

Explanation
SV = EV - PV Schedule Variance = Earned Value - Planned Value VAC = BAC - EAC Variance at Completion = Budget at Completion - Estimate at Completion CPI = EV/AC Cost Performance Index = Earned Value - Actual Cost CV = EV - AC Cost Variance = Earned Value - Actual Cost

Question 3

When you are planning Quality Management for your project, there are different techniques for data representation. Which of the four following techniques includes model known as a SIPOC, an acronym which stands for: suppliers, inputs, process, outputs, and customers?

1. Flowcharts
2. Logical Data Model
3. Mind Mapping
4. Matrix Diagrams

Answer 3

Answer: Flowcharts

Explanation

Flowcharts are also referred to as process maps because they display the sequence of steps and the branching possibilities that exist for a process that transforms one or more inputs into one or more outputs. Flowcharts show the activities, decision points, branching loops, parallel paths, and the overall order of processing by mapping the operational details of procedures that exist within a horizontal value chain. One version of a value chain is the SIPOC. You can see a sample of this model in Figure 8-6 on page 285 of the PMBOK.

Question 4

The Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct includes both aspirational standards and mandatory standards for project managers. The Code was created to instill confidence in the project management profession and to help an individual in making wise decisions, particularly when faced with difficult situations where the individual may be asked to compromise his or her ___________ or values.

1. Integrity
2. Beliefs
3. PMP Designation
4. Knowledge

Answer 4

Answer: Integrity

Explanation
PMI publishes the Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct [5] to instill confidence in the project management profession and to help an individual in making wise decisions, particularly when faced with difficult situations where the individual may be asked to compromise his or her integrity or values. The values that the global project management community defined as most important were responsibility, respect, fairness, and honesty. The Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct affirms these four values as its foundation.

Question 5

One of the two major influences on projects is known as EEFs. What does “EEF” stand for?

1. Empirical Evaluation Failures
2. Enterprise Estimation Field
3. Enterprise Environmental Factors
4. Evaluation Elemental Factors

Answer 5

Answer: Enterprise Environmental Factors

Explanation
The correct answer is Enterprise Environmental Factors. EEFs originate from the environment outside of the project and often outside of the enterprise, and may have an impact at the organizational, portfolio, program, or project level.

Question 6

In which of the project management processes will you find stakeholders engaging with the project for the first time?

1. Identify Risks
2. Develop Project Charter
3. Plan Scope Management
4. Develop Project Management Plan

Answer 6

Answer: Develop Project Charter

Explanation
While stakeholders are engaged throughout every phase of the project, and can be involved in all of the project management processes, inputs and outputs, the first time a stakeholder engages with the project is during the Initiation process of Develop Project Charter.

Question 7

Methodology is a system of practices, techniques, procedures, and rules used by those who work in a discipline which project manager apply in their management. (PMBOK is NOT a methodology, but a recommended reference for what practice?
1. Tailoring
2. Program management
3. Project management
4. Product management

Answer 7

Answer: Tailoring

Explanation
Methodology is a system of practices, techniques, procedures, and rules used by those who work in a discipline which project manager apply in their management. (PMBOK is NOT a methodology, but a recommended reference for tailoring). Tailoring is necessary because each project is unique.

Question 8

Who does the Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK) say is responsible for what the project team produces?

1. Project Sponsor
2. Project Business Owner
3. Project Manager
4. Executive Sponsor

Answer 8

Answer: Project manager

Explanation
Project Management Institute explains the role of a project manager as being similar to that of an orchestra’s conductor, stating, “The project manager and conductor are both responsible for what their teams produce—the project outcome or the orchestra concert, respectively. The two leaders need to take a holistic view of their team’s products in order to plan, coordinate, and complete them.”

Question 9

Integration is a critical skill for project managers. Which of the following is NOT one of the levels that performing integration takes place at?

1. Integration at the Cognitive Level
2. Integration at the System Level
3. Integration at the Context Level
4. Integration at the Process level

Answer 9

Answer: Integration at the System Level

Explanation
The correct answer is “Integration at the System Level” because “System Level’ is made up. Project management may be seen as a set of processes and activities that are undertaken to achieve the project objectives. Although there is no stated definition on how to integrate the project processes, it is clear that a project has a small chance of meeting its objective when the project manager fails to integrate the project processes where they interact. The project manager should strive to become proficient in all of the Project Management Knowledge Areas. In concert with proficiency in these Knowledge Areas, the project manager applies experience, insight, leadership, and technical and business management skills to the project. Finally, it is through the project manager’s ability to integrate the processes in these Knowledge Areas that makes it possible to achieve the desired project results. Project managers need to be cognizant of the project context and these new aspects when managing the integration. Then project managers can decide how to best use these new elements of the environment in their projects to achieve success.

Question 10

The definition of project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet the what?

1. Step by step outline of project management process found in the PMBOK
2. Sponsors and stakeholders expectations
3. Project requirements
4. Deadlines set forth by the Board of Directors

Answer 10

Answer: Project requirements

Explanation
Though expectations and deadlines are important to a project manager, first and foremost their duty is to meet project requirements, in whatever form those requirements take.

Question 11

Directing and Managing Project Work and Managing Project Knowledge are the two components of which part of which of the following:

1. Facilitation Mangement
2. Project Integration Management
3. Core Objectives Management
4. Executing Process

Answer 11

Answer: Project Integration Management

Explanation
Directing and managing project work is he process of leading and performing the work defined in the project management plan and implementing approved changes to achieve the projects objectives. Managing project knowledge is the process of using existing knowledge and creating new knowledge to achieve the project’s objectives and contribute to organizational learning. These two components define Project Integration Management.

Question 12

Amber and Aurora are both performing software development tasks on a project to develop a new medical software to help doctors tune hearing aids more accurately for an individual patient. As Amber continues her work, Aurora sees her code degrading right in front of her eyes and realizes that one of the risks she had voiced earlier on in the project is coming true: the more Aurora tells the software to fine-tune the higher decibel ranges, the less capable it becomes of accurately identifying the lower decibels. She brings it to Aurora’s attention and after a short discussion they decide they need to report it to the Project Manager, Nishan, who pulls out the Risk Management Plan and sees that the team had developed a risk response should this occur. What should Nishan do now that the risk has now come to pass?

1. Tell Amber and Aurora not to worry about it
2. Update the Risk Management Plan to say the risk happened
3. Execute the previously defined risk response.
4. Check with the project sponsor

Answer 12

Answer: Execute the previously defined risk response.

Explanation
Proper attention to the Implement Risk Responses process will ensure that agreed-upon risk responses are actually executed. A common problem with Project Risk Management is that project teams spend effort in identifying and analyzing risks and developing risk responses, then risk responses are agreed upon and documented in the risk register and risk report, but no action is taken to manage the risk. Only if risk owners give the required level of effort to implementing the agreed-upon responses will the overall risk exposure of the project and individual threats and opportunities be managed proactively.

Question 13

When she was assigned to a project to add one more flight between Honolulu and Tokyo to her airline’s daily scheduled flights, Xia was told by the portfolio steering committee exactly how many passengers they expected to be traveling this route by 3 months, 6 months, 9 months and 12 months after implementation. Into which project document did Xia record this information?

1. Project Charter
2. Benefits Management Plan
3. Marketing Plan
4. Business Case

Answer 13

Answer: Benefits Management Plan

Explanation
The benefits management plan is used to measure whether the benefits of the project were achieved as planned. And while Xia is a project manager, she was actually assigned the project prior to its official initiation, by helming the effort to do the research that led up to the formation of a business case and benefits management plan, which is how she and her team were able to get the steering committee to agree to initiate the project.

Question 14

The Plan Quality Management process exists within the Planning phase of a project. In the Monitoring & Controlling phase of a project, you Control Quality. What is the missing related process you undertake during the Executing phase of a project?

1. Prioritize Quality
2. Define Quality
3. Categorize Quality
4. Manage Quality

Answer 14

Answer: Manage Quality

Explanation
Manage Quality is the missing process, and it occurs during the Executing phase of a project, when your job is to manage the quality of whatever it is that’s being executed. The other three options are not PMBOK processes.

Question 15

How many Knowledge Areas are encompassed within the Closing process group?

1. 10
2. 4
3. 6
4. 1

Answer 15

Answer: 1

Explanation
Only Knowledge Area 4, Project Integration Management, has a component within the Closing process group, and that is: Close Project or Phase.

Question 16

As you monitor project progress, you begin to realize that some of the assumptions the team made about resource availability at the time the Assumption Log was created may have been incorrect. Which of the following project documents might you need to update now, as an output to Monitoring and Controlling Project Work?.

1. Risk Register
2. Milestone List
3. issue Log
4. Issues log and risk register

Answer 16

Answer: Issues log and risk register

Explanation
Both the Issue Log and Risk Register are project documents that are outputs of the Monitoring and Controlling Project Work process, along with Cost Forecasts, Lessons Learned Register and Schedule Forecasts. The Milestone List is an Input only, while the others are both Inputs AND Outputs.

Question 17

The very first of a Project Manager’s 7 responsibilities is to develop the project charter. What is the next major milestone that you as a Project Manager are expected to deliver?

1. Risk Management Plan
2. Work Breakdown Structure
3. Project Management Plan
4. Project Change Request

Answer 17

Answer: Project Management Plan

Explanation
While all of these are indeed project deliverables required at one point or another in the project life cycle, they are not all authored by the project manager, nor are they all major milestones. The Project Management Plan is both, as well as being the very next focus point of the Project Manager, whose Work Breakdown Structure, project schedule and other related artifacts will all become necessary components of said plan.

Question 18

Which of the following does not describe a Project Manager’s role in Managing Project Resources?

1. The project manager should be both the leader and the manager of the project team.
2. The project manager should suitable effort in acquiring, managing, motivating, and empowering team members.
   3.The project manager is responsible for proactively developing team skills and competences while retaining and improving team satisfaction and motivation.
3. The project manager should ensure that all procurements meet the specific needs of the project, while working with procurement specialists to ensure organizational policies are followed.

Answer 18

Answer: The project manager should ensure that all procurements meet the specific needs of the project, while working with procurement specialists to ensure organizational policies are followed.

Explanation
While procurements include project resource management, the key to knowing that it was NOT one of the truths of Project resource management is that this is explicitly called out as part of the project procurement process. That procurement might be one of the ways that the project manager accomplishes their need to acquire team members or obtain equipment required to complete the project.

Question 19

Your project to overhaul your office’s temperature regulation system had an original, approved budget of $575,200. By the time you were halfway through project you had estimated the budget at completion would be $582,760. After all invoices had been paid, as you were performing the final checks in preparation for writing your project close report, your calculations indicated that the actual expenditure was $596,231. What is the Variance at Completion of this project?

1. ($13.47)
2. $13, 471
3. $20, 031
4. ($21, 031)

Answer 19

Answer: $13, 471

Explanation
To calculate the Variance at Completion (VAC) you use the following formula: VAC = BAC (Budget At Completion) - EAC (Estimate At Completion). Using the amounts provided in the question, then, BAC ($596,231) minus EAC ($582,760) = VAC ($13,471).

Question 20

While Sophie is updating the cost and schedule forecasts for the project she’s managing, she realizes that as they proceed with executing the project management plan there are three other project documents she needs to keep updated. Which of the following is NOT one of those she should be updating while monitoring and controlling her project?

1. Issue Log
2. Risk Register
3. Project Charter
4. Lessons Learned Register

Answer 20

Answer: Project Charter

Explanation
Project documents that may be updated as a result of this process include but are not limited to: -Cost forecasts, -Issue log, -Lessons learned register, -Risk register, and -Schedule forecasts. A project charter is a one-and-done point-in-time document that is not ever updated after it is signed off.