PMI-ACP PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP) Questions and Answers

Theproduct owneris responsible formaintaining and prioritizing the product backlogbased on stakeholder input. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.1: Product Backlog and Prioritization)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement), when a sponsor is dissatisfied, the product owner should confirm that their needs are clearly prioritized and represented in the backlog.

Option Bis correct: ensuring priorities are accurately captured aligns delivery with stakeholder expectations.

Option Ais reactive and not productive.

Option Cpresumes funding is the issue without confirming alignment.

Option Dundermines the product owner’s role.

The correct answer is D – Understand the impediments and facilitate issue resolution to enable the team to succeed.

The Agile Project Manager (or Scrum Master) acts as a servant leader by removing impediments and coaching the team toward improvement. Instead of dictating action or adjusting timeboxes, the right approach is to facilitate problem-solving and help the team meet its sprint goal.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The Scrum Master works to remove impediments and support the team’s progress. They do not give commands but instead facilitate improvement.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Roles and Responsibilities)

Mike Griffiths affirms:

“Agile leaders remove roadblocks and create an environment where the team can succeed. They support rather than direct.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 6 – Problem Detection and Resolution)

Other options are inappropriate:

A is command-and-control, not servant leadership.

B violates timebox principles of Scrum.

C misplaces responsibility for testing onto customers.

Answer: D

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

Thestorming phase(from Tuckman’s model: Forming–Storming–Norming–Performing) is marked byconflict and role negotiation. Theagile coach or Scrum Masterplays a critical role in guiding teams through this phase withstructured facilitation and conflict-resolution techniques.

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3.2: Team Development Stages)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance), the agile coach must providesupport, guidance, and toolsto help the team evolve toward self-organization and maturity.

Option Bis correct: effective facilitation helps the team progress toward high performance.

Option Apromotes dysfunction.

Option Crisks escalating unresolved conflict.

Option Dis overly individual-focused and not team-centric.

The correct answer is D – Set up a meeting with the stakeholder to modify the working agreement and ensure future engagement.

Agile values regular collaboration with stakeholders. When a stakeholder becomes disengaged, the first step is to address it through open communication and mutual agreement. Revisiting or modifying the working agreement helps reset expectations and reestablish commitment in a collaborative and respectful way.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams work closely with stakeholders and set expectations through working agreements that are revisited and refined as necessary. These agreements include communication preferences and participation expectations.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths reinforces this:

“Creating and maintaining stakeholder engagement requires ongoing alignment of goals and expectations. When participation drops, revisit agreements and reset expectations collaboratively.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Why the other options fall short:

A may help short-term but doesn’t address the root issue of misalignment or expectation gaps.

B comes across as directive rather than collaborative.

C escalates prematurely without attempting resolution directly with the stakeholder.

Answer: D

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

Task boards (or visual boards) are a great way to facilitate communication within the team. By using a task board, team members can easily see what work has been completed, what is currently being worked on, and what still needs attention. This visual aid helps keep everyone on the same page, ensures that information is shared transparently, and can help identify potential bottlenecks or communication gaps. It improves collaboration and visibility, making it easier for the team to coordinate and align on tasks, leading to fewer delays in the development process.

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Requirements and User Stories)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning),epics are large user storiesthat must be decomposed into smaller user stories for accurate planning and inclusion in sprints.

Thetwo main driversfor breaking down epics are:

Size– Epics are typically too large to be completed in a single iteration and must be divided to create manageable pieces of work.

Priority– High-priority epics are decomposed early to allow the team to work on the most valuable items first.

This makesOption Athe correct answer. The decision to decompose the epic is based on the need to fit it into sprint capacity and to align with backlog prioritization.

To promote transparency in an agile environment, the scrum master should ensure that key information about the team's work, progress, and velocity is easily accessible and visible to everyone. Radiating information in a common area, such as a team room or workspace, fosters openness and ensures that all team members and stakeholders can quickly understand the status of the project. This encourages shared understanding and promotes collaborative problem-solving.

The best approach for the agile coach would be to address the root cause of the concern immediately and help the team reflect on their current processes to identify ways to improve. This can be achieved by engaging the team in a discussion that focuses on understanding the issues related to the technical design and the definition of done (DoD).

This will allow the team to openly discuss and identify specific areas of the technical designs that do not meet the DoD. By understanding the underlying issues, the coach can help the team find solutions and ensure that future work aligns with the agreed-upon quality standards and expectations.

Value stream mapping is a powerful tool in Agile and Lean methodologies used to visualize and analyze the flow of materials and information across the entire process. By mapping the current state, the team can identify bottlenecks, delays, and inefficiencies, especially when multiple teams are involved in sequential activities. Once these gaps and constraints are identified, the team can work on improving the process, such as by finding ways to increase the number of systems migrated per day from two to three, thus improving overall efficiency.

As a servant leader, it is important to address the root cause of the disruption, which in this case is the director's repeated visits and distracting conversations. Coaching the company director on agile practices and good communication helps them understand the need to minimize interruptions and foster a productive environment for the team. This approach will help align the director's behavior with Agile principles, ensuring that the team can focus on delivering value without unnecessary distractions. By educating the director, the servant leader can improve overall team dynamics and project efficiency.

In Agile, estimates are initially based on previous experiences or expert opinions, but as the team progresses through sprints, they gain more insight into the project’s actual complexity and the team's capacity. Agile estimates evolve over time based on the team's velocity, which reflects how much work the team can realistically handle. This is why the actual scope and timelines can differ from initial estimates. The agile lead should emphasize that the initial estimates were helpful for understanding feasibility, but the true estimates are refined continuously as the team gains more experience and understanding of the work, and as complexities or dependencies become clearer during each sprint.

The correct answer is A — Provide feedback for completed user stories.

Stakeholder involvement in Agile is ongoing. Their primary role is to give timely and actionable feedback on delivered product increments to ensure alignment with their expectations and business value goals. This feedback is then used to refine the product backlog and guide future iterations.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Stakeholders should engage regularly to inspect product increments and provide feedback to guide value delivery.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths:

“In agile projects, stakeholders ensure their needs are met by actively reviewing completed work and providing feedback to influence upcoming work.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

B is the team's responsibility; stakeholders should focus on the “what,” not the “how.”

C is the product owner's responsibility.

D is a collaborative task but not solely a stakeholder responsibility.

Answer: A

—

The goal of each iteration in Agile is to deliver working software frequently, typically at the end of each iteration. This allows the team to gather feedback early and make improvements quickly. The emphasis is on delivering usable software that provides value to the customer, rather than just completing tasks or preparing timelines. This approach aligns with the Agile principle of delivering working software frequently to ensure continuous progress and customer satisfaction.

The correct answer is D — Discuss the issue with the team at the next project retrospective.

Fatigue and declining productivity are ideal topics for the sprint retrospective. Retrospectives provide a dedicated time for the team to reflect on what's working and what's not, and they promote continuous improvement in a psychologically safe environment.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Retrospectives allow teams to reflect on how they work and to continuously improve their practices, processes, and team dynamics.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.8 – Retrospectives)

Mike Griffiths:

“Retrospectives are opportunities to openly discuss issues such as burnout or fatigue and decide as a team what improvements to implement.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Incorrect options:

A (daily standup) is focused on immediate blockers, not deep reflection.

B might help but creates unnecessary ceremony; the retrospective is the correct venue.

C escalates the issue outside the team prematurely.

Answer: D

—

Capturing and reviewinglessons learnedis a vital practice in both agile and traditional environments. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.6: Retrospectives)andPMBOK® Guide (Lessons Learned Register), continuous learning from project execution helps teams and organizationsimprove predictability, quality, and efficiency.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 7: Continuous Improvement)highlights the importance of documenting insights and feeding them into future projects for organizational maturity.

Option Ais correct: creating and reviewing a lessons learned repository supportsorganizational learningand better delivery.

Option Bconfuses issue tracking with structured learning.

Option Cremoves responsibility from the team—agile encouragesteam ownership of improvement.

Option Dis helpful in some contexts but is not a repeatable organizational improvement tool like a lessons learned repository.

To prevent the issue of the customer declining to accept the final deliverable after the demo, the project manager should prioritize frequent releases and feedback loops. By releasing new features or updates frequently, customers have the opportunity to provide feedback earlier in the process, which allows for adjustments to be made during development rather than at the end. This iterative process ensures that the final product better aligns with the customer's expectations and requirements.

Planning Pokeris a well-known estimation technique where team members use numbered cards (usually Fibonacci series) to estimatestory point valuesbased on relative size. It’s aconsensus-based estimation method, as described in thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: Estimation Techniques)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Estimating Techniques).

Option Dis correct:Planning Pokeris explicitly designed for estimating stories in terms of points.

Option A (Parametric)is more common in traditional (predictive) planning.

Option B (One-to-one comparison)refers to relative sizing without collaboration.

Option C (Affinity)is another agile technique but typically used forgrouping stories into size buckets, not direct story point consensus estimation.

The correct answer is C – Seek regular input from project stakeholders, and reflect this input in the backlog’s priorities. Agile is a stakeholder-driven process, and backlog refinement should be informed by continuous feedback. The product owner maximizes value by regularly reviewing stakeholder needs and reprioritizing accordingly.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The product owner is responsible for maintaining the backlog and ensuring it reflects stakeholder priorities. Ongoing engagement with stakeholders ensures the product delivers maximum value.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Product Backlog Management)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Agile product owners engage stakeholders continuously to update priorities and deliver value incrementally.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

A is good practice but doesn’t address the stakeholder engagement challenge.

B confuses story size with business value.

D lacks the agility required in a fast-moving project.

Answer: C

────────────────────────────────────

The Scrum Master’s role as a servant leader is to support the team, not to resolve conflicts for them. It is important for the team to work through their disagreements themselves, as this fosters collaboration and improves their problem-solving skills. The Scrum Master should encourage open communication and guide the team toward healthy conflict resolution, ensuring that the disagreements are addressed constructively. This approach helps the team build trust, improves their cohesion, and strengthens their ability to handle challenges in the future.

The correct answer is D – Make use of a Kanban board so that the team will have a clear view of the work in progress (WIP) for the release.

Agile teams use information radiators like Kanban boards to visualize work, improve flow, identify bottlenecks, and maintain team focus. Visibility of work enhances self-organization and accountability while reducing ambiguity and delays.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Kanban boards provide visibility into the work in progress. They support collaboration, improve team focus, and are effective in both Scrum and Kanban approaches.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.1 – Visual Controls)

Mike Griffiths writes:

“Visual tools such as task boards and Kanban boards allow the team to manage their flow and workload. This enables collaboration and transparency without micromanagement.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Why the other options fall short:

A introduces unnecessary meetings, potentially disrupting flow.

B may lead to micromanagement and undermine team ownership.

C implies a command-and-control style, which is contrary to Agile principles.

Answer: D

The project lead should focus on creating a safe environment where all team members feel comfortable expressing their opinions without fear of judgment or repercussions. This can be achieved by encouraging open communication, showing appreciation for diverse perspectives, and actively ensuring that everyone's voice is heard. A safe environment fosters trust and collaboration, which is essential for the team's success. While other options may help in certain contexts, building a culture of safety and trust is the most effective long-term strategy to encourage team members to speak up.

The correct answer is A – Send the member to training. Agile encourages cross-functional teams and continuous improvement. When a team member identifies a skill gap that affects delivery, addressing it promptly through training or mentoring increases team capability and autonomy.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams strive for cross-functionality. When skill gaps hinder progress, organizations support learning to reduce dependencies and improve throughput.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.3 – Continuous Learning and Team Development)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Empowering team members through skill development enhances flexibility and velocity. Encouraging proactive learning improves team performance.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Incorrect options:

B defers ownership of the solution.

C unnecessarily delays action.

D delays learning due to unnecessary constraints.

Answer: A

────────────────────────────────────

The correct answer is A – Add a task to the product backlog to allow the team time to investigate and experiment prior to estimating.

When the team lacks experience or clarity around a new feature or technical solution, they should perform a time-boxed research activity, known as a spike. Spikes allow the team to explore unknowns, validate assumptions, and gather information needed to provide accurate estimates.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“When the team is unable to estimate due to uncertainty, a spike can be added to the backlog. This allows time for research, experimentation, or prototyping to enable informed estimation.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Adaptive Planning)

Mike Griffiths also writes:

“Spikes are used to investigate technical or functional elements. A spike helps reduce uncertainty and informs future planning and estimation.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Why other options are less effective:

B (Wideband Delphi), C (Planning Poker), and D (Three-point estimation) are techniques for estimation, not suitable when the team lacks enough information to estimate in the first place.

Answer: A

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is B – Invite the team to evaluate the suggestion and measure the effectiveness of the implementation.

In Agile, continuous improvement is a shared responsibility, and retrospectives are meant to be collaborative sessions where all team members—regardless of experience—can contribute. Ideas that could enhance performance should be discussed by the team as a whole and, when deemed valuable, tested and evaluated in upcoming sprints.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The team owns the process and should inspect and adapt at regular intervals. During retrospectives, the team identifies potential improvements and experiments with them in subsequent iterations.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.5 – Continuous Improvement)

Mike Griffiths states:

“Retrospectives empower teams to improve. All suggestions, regardless of origin, should be treated with respect. Teams test ideas and inspect outcomes to improve incrementally.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Why other options fall short:

A delays action and discourages innovation.

C makes the product owner responsible for a team process decision, which is outside their role.

D promotes hierarchy, which undermines team collaboration and Agile values.

Answer: B

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer isC – Encourage the team to more frequently interact with all stakeholders. When an agile team is struggling to meet commitments, one key cause is often alack of communication or feedbackfrom key stakeholders. Increasing interaction helps align the team's priorities, clarify requirements, and improve ownership and accountability.

From thePMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Teams that engage in regular, open communication with stakeholders are better able to align with the evolving needs of the business and take ownership of their commitments. Agile coaches support this behavior by facilitating frequent interactions and improving team dynamics.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement and 6.2 – Coaching the Agile Team)

Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Bookreinforces this:

“Encouraging frequent stakeholder interaction fosters a sense of ownership in the team. Agile coaches guide teams to seek clarity through communication rather than rely on assumptions.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 4 – Team Performance and Coaching)

Why the other options are incorrect:

A– Involving the sponsor in team-level performance issues may undermine team self-organization.

B– Providing a list of deliverables doesn’t address the root cause (lack of communication or clarity).

D– Upfront product design goes against agile principles and does not improve team ownership or delivery capability.

Answer: C

The Scrum Master should facilitate a conversation between the team and the senior manager to understand the purpose and expectations behind the request for real-time updates to the burndown chart. By aligning on the reporting requirements and discussing potential impacts on team productivity, the Scrum Master can ensure that the metrics are meaningful and do not interfere with the team's ability to deliver value. It's important to find a balance between transparency and efficiency, ensuring that the team’s workflow isn’t disrupted by unnecessary administrative tasks.

Relying solely on the developers' experience with similar systems to define functionality can be limiting and potentially result in misaligned expectations with actual user needs. Effective Agile teams should focus on understanding and addressing the needs of end users, leveraging continuous feedback from customers, and engaging stakeholders directly. This ensures the product is built to meet real user expectations and can evolve as necessary based on user input. Instead of relying on previous experience, the team should be focused on co-creating value with customers through collaboration, feedback, and agile practices like user stories and regular testing.

To kick off the project, especially when the idea is not yet clear, the agile lead should focus on understanding the needs and challenges of the end users—HR in this case. By applying the empathy map technique, the team can gather insights into the users' experiences, needs, and pain points. This helps in building a more focused and user-centered approach to solving the problem, which is the foundation for developing a product backlog. Engaging stakeholders early and understanding the problem space will clarify the project direction and lay the groundwork for creating meaningful user stories.

The correct answer is C – Work with product owners and turn product backlog items into potentially shippable product increments.

Agile is grounded in the principle of delivering value early and often. Agile teams deliver value by continuously converting high-priority product backlog items into working software or product increments. These increments are potentially shippable, meaning they meet the Definition of Done and could be released at any point if the business chooses. Collaboration with the product owner ensures that the most valuable features are prioritized and refined before development begins.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams focus on delivering small, valuable, and potentially shippable increments of working product on a regular basis. This allows for frequent feedback and ensures that teams are always working on the most valuable features.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Value-Driven Delivery)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Working software is the primary measure of progress in agile projects. Agile teams collaborate with product owners to break down backlog items into increments that can be developed, tested, and delivered within a single iteration.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Option A contradicts agile principles, which emphasize cross-functional teams capable of analysis, development, and testing.

Option B is a supporting activity but does not directly increase value delivery.

Option D reflects traditional project management thinking and does not align with the iterative, adaptive nature of agile.

Answer: C

Agile promotestransparency and ongoing communicationwith all stakeholders, including legal and compliance teams. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 7.1 Communications), one of the Scrum Master's responsibilities is tokeep stakeholders informedof project progress and projections using tools like burnup/burndown charts, velocity trends, or product roadmaps.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement)emphasizes thatsharing the trajectoryof progress and scope delivery builds trust and provides clarity to non-technical stakeholders.

Option Cis correct: sharing actual progress and trends with legal ensures alignment and transparency.

Option Amisplaces the responsibility—it's the stakeholders who need visibility.

Option Bshifts product decisions prematurely.

Option Dassumes satisfaction trumps contractual obligations—this can cause legal issues.

The correct answer is A – Ask the team for suggestions.

In Agile, the Scrum Master serves the team by facilitating problem-solving rather than dictating actions. When a team member falls behind, the first step is to bring the issue to the team (e.g., in a daily stand-up or task review session) and allow the team to self-organize around resolving the impediment—whether through swarming, pairing, or shifting workload.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Teams are empowered to self-organize and solve problems collaboratively. The Scrum Master supports this by facilitating discussion and removing impediments—not by reassigning work unilaterally.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.1 – Agile Mindset and Section 6.2 – Coaching Agile Teams)

Mike Griffiths also explains:

“The Scrum Master fosters a problem-solving culture. When issues arise, teams should explore solutions together—this builds ownership and improves trust.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Why other options are less suitable:

B circumvents team collaboration and may lead to resentment or overburdening.

C may be needed later, but collaborative resolution should be the first step.

D escalates prematurely and is not aligned with servant-leadership principles.

Answer: A

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is D – Estimating the relative size of stories by using story points.

Planning poker is a consensus-based estimation technique used in Agile to assign relative size (often using story points) to product backlog items. Each team member selects a card to indicate their estimate, and the group discusses discrepancies to reach agreement.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Planning poker is a consensus-based estimation technique that helps teams estimate the size of user stories using story points. It supports collaboration and shared understanding.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Estimation Techniques)

Mike Griffiths writes:

“Planning poker helps teams perform relative sizing using a modified Fibonacci sequence. The goal is not precision, but shared understanding and relative complexity comparison.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Why other options are incorrect:

A describes analogy-based estimation, not planning poker.

B refers to “bucket system” estimation, a separate technique.

C refers to dot voting, which is a prioritization—not estimation—tool.

Answer: D

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is C — During the retrospective, discuss the issue and create an action plan to avoid it in the future.

When teams misestimate or experience incomplete work, it’s important to reflect during the retrospective and create action items. This is a fundamental aspect of agile: continuous inspection, adaptation, and team-driven improvement.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Retrospectives help identify opportunities for improvement. The team reviews its estimation accuracy and adjusts processes or practices based on patterns observed.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.8 — Retrospectives)

Mike Griffiths elaborates:

“Estimating complexity is an area for ongoing learning. Teams use retrospectives to improve their sizing, identify knowledge gaps, and refine their planning techniques.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 5 — Adaptive Planning)

Other options:

A unnecessarily involves a project manager (non-agile).

B assumes one-size-fits-all rules, which limits team agility.

D ignores the structured opportunity the retrospective provides for team learning.

Answer: C

—

Story point estimation in agile is acollaborative team activity, and consensus is critical. Techniques likePlanning Pokerare designed to reveal differences in understanding. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Estimating Techniques)andMike Griffiths (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning), when there's adiscrepancy in estimates, it is essential todiscuss and understand the rationalebehind differing views.

Option Cis correct: the team shoulddiscuss and clarifyto reach a shared understanding.

Option Aignores potential misunderstandings.

Option Bunnecessarily delays estimation.

Option Dis incorrect—the team, not the customer, estimates the effort.

The correct answer is B — Create a spike story to determine what needs to be done to use the new interface.

A spike is a special user story designed to address technical uncertainty or risk. It allows the team to explore, research, or prototype solutions within a time-box. Spikes are particularly useful for investigating unknowns such as integration with vendor systems.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Spikes are used for research and exploration. They help teams gain knowledge about technology, functionality, or business domain that is necessary before estimating or implementing a feature.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Backlog Refinement)

Mike Griffiths notes:

“Spikes reduce uncertainty and are valuable tools for backlog refinement. They are especially helpful when the team is unsure how to implement a requirement or integrate external components.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Other options:

A may delay addressing the issue until the next monthly meeting.

C defers the issue rather than exploring it.

D assumes outsourcing is the only solution and may remove team ownership.

Answer: B

—

Spikes are meant forexperimentation and learning, not guaranteed outcomes. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Spikes), if a spike does not lead to a clear solution, the team can extend or reframe it, especially when aiming for asustainable long-term solution. Agile supportsencouraging experimentationand learning from failure.

Mike Griffiths (PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 7: Problem Detection and Resolution) recommends adapting when a spike’s results are inconclusive—redefining the scope and collaborating as a teamincreases the chance of a valuable outcome.

Option Bis correct: it continues learning and promotes team collaboration.

Option Aundercuts team ownership.

Option Cprioritizes a short-term fix and undermines agile values.

Option Dis not needed at this early stage—root cause analysis is better for recurring or systemic issues.

To assessprocess efficiency, agile teams usevalue stream mappingto identifywaste, delays, and non-value-adding steps. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.5 Process Analysis and Value Stream Mapping), value stream analysis helps determine how efficiently a process converts inputs into valuable outputs, making it ideal for supporting customer inquiries on operational performance.

Mike Griffiths (PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 7: Continuous Improvement) reinforces the value of usingvalue stream mappingfor both software development processes and operational workflows to increase transparency and drive improvements.

Option Bis correct: reviewing thevalue streamprovides a structured way to evaluate efficiency.

Option AandDare important for team improvement and performance but don’t focus onprocess activity efficiency.

Option Crelates tovalue prioritization, not operational efficiency.

The correct answer is B – Manage communication between all team members and the customer to promote effective and transparent collaboration. Agile values open, direct, and frequent communication, particularly between team members and stakeholders. Transparency, collaboration, and shared understanding reduce misunderstandings and promote customer satisfaction.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile values individuals and interactions over processes and tools. Frequent, open, and direct communication with stakeholders is essential. Agile teams are encouraged to engage stakeholders frequently to ensure alignment and transparency.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths emphasizes:

“Agile fosters transparency and trust through direct communication. Information should flow freely between all team members and stakeholders to facilitate quick feedback and mutual understanding.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Incorrect options:

A and C limit communication and transparency.

D is useful for conflict resolution, but not for broad issue management or stakeholder communication.

Answer: B

────────────────────────────────────

The correct answer is B – Align with stakeholder expectations and releasable product increments.

In Agile, sprint or iteration reviews provide an opportunity for the team to present completed work and validate it against stakeholder expectations. Demonstrations should showcase working, potentially shippable increments that align with business goals and value delivery.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The purpose of iteration reviews is to showcase a working product increment. The review should focus on what was completed and how it aligns with stakeholder expectations and business objectives.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.5 – Iteration Review)

PMBOK® Guide further reinforces this point:

“The team should deliver functional product increments that are valuable to stakeholders. These should be validated for alignment with scope and business value.”

(PMBOK® Guide, 6th Edition, Section 5.5 – Validate Scope)

Mike Griffiths notes:

“Product demonstrations should confirm stakeholder needs are being met. The team’s focus should be on verifying value delivery, product completeness, and stakeholder alignment.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery / Stakeholder Feedback)

Why other options fall short:

A is valuable context, but doesn’t directly ensure demonstration success.

C reflects team improvement but is not the purpose of a product demo.

D speaks to collaboration, not validation of stakeholder alignment.

Answer: B

The correct answer is A – Refocus the sprint review meetings to demonstrate working software and seek feedback on the product.

Sprint reviews are designed to showcase the completed product increment to stakeholders and receive feedback. The primary goal is to validate that the work delivered provides value to the customer—not to present technical details. Demonstrating working software is one of the core tenets of Agile.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Sprint reviews are working sessions designed to elicit feedback and foster collaboration. Teams demonstrate completed work and adjust the backlog based on stakeholder input.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Value Delivery)

Mike Griffiths confirms:

“The output of every iteration should be potentially shippable product. The sprint review is for stakeholders to see that output and provide feedback to inform future development.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 2 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Other options explained:

B may be helpful, but it doesn’t solve the immediate issue of misaligned sprint reviews.

C misunderstands the purpose of the sprint review—it’s not about architecture.

D changes the audience instead of correcting the approach.

Answer: A

══════════

Agile emphasizestransparency and team self-organization. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3.3: Self-Organizing Teams)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance), a common practice is tomake work and issues visible to everyoneand allow the team to collaboratively manage their workflow. Using ashared workspace or boardhelps prevent redundant efforts and improves efficiency.

Option Dis correct: shared visibility and self-allocation promote team ownership.

Option Amisuses the backlog—issues aren't typically prioritized by customers.

Option Bis directive and may reduce collaboration.

Option Cfocuses on analysis, not immediate resolution or coordination.

The correct answer is D – Write tests that will be used to know when a story has been correctly developed. This practice aligns with Test-Driven Development (TDD) and Acceptance Test-Driven Development (ATDD), which are common in agile environments. Agile promotes defining “done” through clear acceptance criteria and tests before coding begins.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams use test-first practices, such as TDD or ATDD, where acceptance tests are written before development begins. This ensures that functionality is built to meet agreed expectations.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.5 – Agile Testing and Quality Strategies)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Defining acceptance criteria or tests before development is a core agile practice. It ensures the team understands what success looks like and builds quality in from the start.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 6 – Problem Detection and Resolution)

Option A may be useful but is unrelated to the new requirements.

Option B is not standard—customers help define acceptance criteria but rarely write tests.

Option C skips an important quality control step and doesn’t align with test-first practices.

Answer: D

────────────────────────────────────────────

A clear, sharedvision statementis essential foralignment, motivation, and guidance. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 2.3.1: Product Vision Statement), a strong vision statement enables team members and stakeholders to stay focused on what matters most, even as requirements evolve.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 2: Agile Principles and Mindset)stresses the importance of ashared understandingand active participation when forming the vision.

Option Ais correct: it reinforces the value of shared vision and encourages stakeholder engagement.

Option Bis helpful but doesn't ensureshared understanding across the team.

Option Crisks misinterpretation and omits team collaboration.

Option Ddismisses a core agile practice—vision clarity is crucial, even in a change-friendly environment.

The correct answer is D – Communicate the risk of a negative ROI to the stakeholders, and update the release plan. Agile values transparency and collaboration. When the team identifies risks to business outcomes such as ROI, they must promptly inform stakeholders and work collaboratively to reassess scope, value, and strategy.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams provide ongoing visibility to stakeholders. If delivery metrics reveal financial concerns, the product owner and stakeholders evaluate whether to pivot, persevere, or stop.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Value-Driven Delivery and Transparency)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Agile planning is value-based. If ROI is unlikely to be achieved, stakeholders must be informed early so informed decisions can be made.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

A assumes trimming scope is sufficient without stakeholder input.

B contradicts team stability and morale principles.

C helps identify inefficiencies but doesn’t replace transparency.

Answer: D

Based on the velocity chart, the team has completed 43, 42, 44, and 46 story points in previous sprints. The average number of completed story points is 43.75, and committing to 44 story points for the upcoming sprint aligns closely with this average. It offers a realistic target that takes into account the team's capacity while providing a reasonable chance of completing the planned work within the sprint.

Velocity is ateam-specific metricand cannot be reliably estimated until the team has worked together forseveral sprints. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.4 Sprint Planning and Velocity Tracking), velocity should bemeasured empirically, not predicted based on assumptions or external input.

Mike Griffiths (PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning) emphasizes thatnew teams need to run a few sprints to establish a reliable velocitythrough real performance data, not estimation.

Option Dis correct: actual performance determines true velocity.

Option AandBrely on speculation.

Option Cincorrectly uses sponsor input for team planning, which goes against agile principles.

The agile lead should evaluate the team's capacity and help them select user stories that align with around 80% of their available capacity for the iteration. This approach takes into account potential issues or interruptions and helps ensure the team is not overcommitting. By selecting user stories based on a realistic understanding of the team’s capacity, the team is more likely to meet their commitments and avoid incomplete work. This method promotes sustainable work practices and helps the team maintain a predictable velocity over time.

The correct answer is A — Communicate the importance of the business need to the team and refine the product backlog.

One of Agile’s core strengths is responding to change. The product owner owns the product backlog and should adjust it when external factors shift priorities. Transparent communication about the business need ensures that the development team understands the context and can support the new direction.

PMI Agile Practice Guide states:

“The product owner is responsible for maintaining and adjusting the product backlog to reflect new information and changes in business needs. Agile welcomes changing requirements, even late in development, to provide competitive advantage.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 2.2 — Agile Manifesto Principles)

Mike Griffiths supports this:

“When market or customer needs change, the product owner refines the backlog and communicates the business context to the team so priorities are adjusted accordingly.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 5 — Adaptive Planning)

Other options:

B and C shift product owner responsibilities elsewhere.

D involves the team but omits the critical first step — communicating business rationale and refining the backlog accordingly.

Answer: A

—

The Scrum Master should facilitate open discussions between the product owner and the development team to help them align on the initial features and the first stages of implementation. By encouraging dialogue, the Scrum Master can ensure that both parties understand each other’s perspectives and collaborate to find a solution that meets the goals of the project. This approach fosters a collaborative environment and ensures that everyone is aligned on what needs to be delivered, promoting shared ownership of the product’s success.

In this situation, the most practical solution is to reduce the scope of the release to meet the deadline. Since one team member will be absent, causing a reduction in velocity, the team may not be able to complete all planned work in the time remaining. By reducing the scope, the team can focus on delivering the most critical features for the industry fair and ensure that the release is still valuable and on time. This aligns with Agile principles of prioritizing the most valuable work and delivering iteratively based on available capacity.

The Definition of Done (DoD) is a shared understanding of what it means for work to be considered complete. It is typically defined by the project sponsor and project team in collaboration. The DoD outlines the criteria that must be met for user stories, features, or tasks to be considered done, ensuring alignment between stakeholders and the development team. While the product owner, Scrum master, and stakeholders may influence the criteria, the final agreement on what constitutes "done" is determined by the project team and sponsor.

The correct answer is A – Facilitate a team discussion to identify knowledge gaps and determine the best way to address them.

The agile coach's role is to foster team ownership and encourage collaborative problem solving. When knowledge gaps are uncovered, the first step is to create transparency and engage the team in identifying how to resolve the gap—through pairing, mentoring, spikes, or backlog adjustments.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile leaders coach teams to self-identify impediments and explore solutions collaboratively. Coaching helps teams build awareness and take ownership of their development and process improvements.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.2 – Coaching the Agile Team)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Rather than providing direct solutions, agile coaches should help teams uncover their own improvements through retrospection, facilitated discussion, and group problem solving.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement / Coaching)

Why the other options fall short:

B & C externalize the problem instead of building team capability.

D may be part of the solution, but the team should explore it collectively—not as a unilateral decision.

Answer: A

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is B – How much money the organization will earn or save by having the MMF.

Minimally Marketable Features (MMFs) are the smallest set of functionality that deliver value and can be released to generate revenue or realize benefits. Prioritization of MMFs is typically done based on expected business value—such as cost savings, revenue potential, or customer satisfaction.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“MMFs help teams focus on delivering value early and frequently. They are prioritized based on expected value to the customer or organization, return on investment (ROI), and business impact.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Delivering Value Frequently)

Mike Griffiths also emphasizes:

“MMFs should be prioritized based on business value—how much benefit they bring to the customer or organization. Value-based prioritization ensures the right features are built first.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Why the other options are incorrect:

A refers to risk but doesn’t address business value.

C addresses stakeholder involvement, not delivery prioritization.

D refers to development time, which is considered but secondary to value.

Answer: B

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is C – Ensure that members begin to self-organize as small teams with efficiently distributed skills.

Agile emphasizes self-organizing teams. When teams are too large, splitting into smaller teams is a good practice (Scrum recommends 5–9 members per team). However, rather than top-down assignment, the Scrum Master should enable and support self-organization. Teams should be encouraged to form organically while ensuring knowledge-sharing and cross-functional capabilities.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile leaders support team self-organization by creating an environment of trust and encouraging the team to determine how best to accomplish their work.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Team Composition)

Mike Griffiths writes:

“Agile teams are self-organizing, and the role of the leader is to facilitate the conditions for that to occur, not to direct assignments.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Why other options are less appropriate:

A suggests command-and-control behavior, which is contrary to Agile values.

B makes assumptions about comfort levels and may ignore skill diversity.

D disregards team input and imposes a solution, limiting buy-in and trust.

Answer: C

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

Analyzing theburndown chart, we see:

Points Planned(gray squares): decreasing steadily from 50 to 0 over 10 days (ideal burn).

Points Completed(gray triangles):plateau between days 3–6, lagging significantly behind planned completion.

This indicates that theteam is behind schedule, and unless they accelerate, they mayfail to complete all committed work.

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.4: Burndown Charts)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Monitoring Progress), such divergence between the ideal and actual burn lines indicates that the iteration isat risk.

Option Ais correct: the iteration isin jeopardydue to lack of progress mid-sprint.

Option Bis incorrect—scope removal would show a downward shift in planned points.

Option Cis false—the team isbehind, not ahead.

Option Dis misleading—velocity appears inconsistent (e.g., plateau from day 3–6).

Transparency is key in agile. ThePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 7.1 Communications)emphasizes the use ofinformation radiators—visual displays such as task boards, burndown charts, or Kanban boards thatimmediately communicate project status. These tools make progress visible to all stakeholders without needing detailed documentation.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement)reinforces thatcollocated displays or shared online boardsreduce misunderstandings and keep stakeholders aligned.

Option Dis correct: a public project board offersreal-time visibilityand promotes transparency.

Option Acontradicts agile by emphasizing documentation over working software.

Option Blimits visibility to a subset of stakeholders and is passive.

Option Cdisrupts the team’s daily focus—stand-ups are not intended for stakeholder participation.

In Agile, flexibility and adaptability are key, especially when dealing with uncertain or changing requirements like evolving government regulations. The agile coach should ensure that the team is building the product incrementally, allowing for adjustments as needed. This way, when the regulatory changes occur, the team can adapt quickly without disrupting the entire release process. By focusing on delivering small, workable increments, the team can respond to changes more efficiently.

The correct answer is B — Create a spike story to analyze the impact of the threshold requirement on current stories.

A “spike” is a research activity used in Agile to investigate a technical or functional uncertainty. In this case, the performance threshold requires exploration to understand its impact on multiple backlog items. Creating a time-boxed spike allows the team to analyze without prematurely committing to changes.

PMI Agile Practice Guide describes spikes as:

“A spike is a user story for time-boxed research or exploration. Teams use spikes when they need more information to estimate or deliver a story.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 — Types of Backlog Items)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“When a new requirement introduces uncertainty, such as performance constraints, creating a spike helps the team determine scope, risk, and impact before incorporating it into backlog stories.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 5 — Adaptive Planning)

Other options:

A prematurely alters acceptance criteria before understanding the impact.

C leans toward big upfront design (non-agile).

D skips the exploration phase and directly breaks into tasks.

Answer: B

—

The correct answer is C – Ask the team to restate the requirements and review them with the client.

Clear communication and shared understanding are core Agile values. The best way to resolve confusion is through direct collaboration. Restating and reviewing requirements with the client fosters alignment and transparency, which reduces rework and frustration.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile encourages frequent interaction with stakeholders to clarify requirements and reduce misunderstanding. Requirements are best elaborated through collaboration.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Backlog Refinement)

Mike Griffiths supports:

“User stories and acceptance criteria should be understood by both team and stakeholders. If confusion arises, revisit and clarify together.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Why not others?

A may boost morale but doesn’t resolve the confusion.

B is speculative and not customer-centric.

D risks building something without validation.

Answer: C

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

In this scenario, the team faced delays due to the absence of a single tester. To prevent similar issues in the future, the team should work on becoming more cross-functional, where team members are skilled in multiple areas (e.g., testing multiple data sources). Encouraging team members to become general specialists reduces bottlenecks and dependency on a single individual, ensuring that the team can continue to make progress even if someone is unavailable. This fosters greater flexibility and resilience within the team, improving overall efficiency and minimizing disruptions in future implementations.

In agile environments, planning should be flexible and adaptable to changing circumstances. Just-in-time (JIT) refinement refers to the practice of refining the backlog and details of the product features as they become more relevant, rather than attempting to plan everything upfront. This allows the team to respond to changes and new information as they emerge, which aligns with agile principles of iterative development and adaptability.

Iteration reviews (or sprint reviews) are designed to demonstratecompleted, potentially shippable product increments. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.3 Sprint Review and Acceptance), the purpose of the iteration review is toshowcase work that meets the Definition of Done (DoD)and to receivestakeholder feedback. Demonstrating incomplete or in-progress stories can mislead stakeholders about progress and reduce trust in the team.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery)emphasizes the importance of showing only completed work to maintain transparency and clarity in stakeholder communication.

Option Ais correct: only completed stories should be demoed to ensure expectations are managed effectively.

Option BandCare not part of the typical iteration review agenda unless explicitly required.

Option Dis incorrect, as it blurs the line between done and in-progress work.

The correct answer is C – Work with the stakeholder directly rather than go through different layers of people. Agile emphasizes direct communication and collaboration with stakeholders to reduce miscommunication and ensure clarity. When requirements differ depending on who is asked, the agile practitioner must go directly to the source for clarification and alignment.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Face-to-face conversation is the most effective method of conveying information to and within a development team. Agile encourages working directly with stakeholders and product owners to minimize miscommunication.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement; Agile Manifesto Principle #6)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“To reduce noise and confusion, agile practitioners are encouraged to engage stakeholders directly rather than relying on intermediaries or second-hand interpretations.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 1 – Agile Principles and Mindset)

Option A contradicts agile’s value of responding to change. Option B is an indirect solution that does not eliminate confusion. Option D is internal to the team and doesn’t resolve inconsistencies from stakeholder communication.

Answer: C

=========

Velocity is a measure of the amount of work a team can handle during a sprint, typically measured in story points. While it can fluctuate slightly from sprint to sprint, the goal is to have velocity stabilize over time, as this helps in forecasting future sprints and planning. An increase in velocity from 27 to 35 could indicate an improvement in the team's capacity to deliver, which should be celebrated if it aligns with the team's capabilities. However, a stable velocity over time is what typically matters for predictability and planning.

The correct answer isC – Facilitate a conversation about the user story between the development team and the product owner.In Agile,collaboration,self-organization, andface-to-face conversationare foundational principles for resolving disagreements and achieving a shared understanding.

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The agile practitioner facilitates healthy communication and constructive dialogue between the product owner and the development team to align understanding and priorities. Agile coaches and Scrum Masters serve the team by removing obstacles to collaboration, not by acting as decision-makers.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.3 – Facilitating Agile Practices)

Further, the guide emphasizes:

“Effective teams discuss issues collaboratively. When disagreements arise, the agile leader’s role is to facilitate communication and resolution through shared understanding, not to dictate decisions.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.1 – Agile Mindset and Behaviors)

Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Bookalso states:

“Agile encourages close collaboration between business and technical teams. When conflicts arise regarding a user story, the agile practitioner’s role is to facilitate meaningful discussions to ensure mutual understanding and team-driven resolution.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Why the other options are incorrect:

Aundermines team self-organization and implies a command-and-control model.

Bis confrontational and goes against agile values of respect and collaboration.

Dcontradicts the facilitative role of the agile practitioner, who should not act as an authoritative decision-maker.

Thus, the most agile-consistent approach is toenable conversation and clarity between roles.

Answer: C

To identify the features that offer the maximum value, the product owner should focus on understanding the needs and priorities of the product's end users. By identifying the users and their key activities, the product owner can ensure that the features included in the roadmap directly address the most important user needs and deliver the highest value. This user-centric approach ensures that the product delivers tangible benefits to its intended audience and aligns with their requirements.

The correct answer is C — Ask the team to determine how to adapt to this increase in the next retrospective.

The retrospective is the ideal agile forum to inspect and adapt. It allows the team to identify root causes of issues (such as rising defects), reflect on their quality practices, and collaboratively propose solutions like adding more testing, refining definitions of done, or changing working agreements.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Teams should use retrospectives to analyze quality issues, adapt processes, and commit to continuous improvement.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.8 – Retrospectives)

Mike Griffiths:

“Quality issues like increasing defect rates should be addressed through team introspection and adaptation in retrospectives, not by command-style fixes.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Incorrect options:

A is reactive and bypasses team collaboration.

B encourages unsustainable practices.

D disrupts the team’s current sprint focus and contradicts agile flow.

Answer: C

—

Step 1: Identifying Remaining MVP Story Points

From the backlog, the MVP-related stories that are not started include:

Accessibility – color blind (4 story points)

Increase security (21 story points)

Add AI chatbot (5 story points)

Total remaining MVP story points = 4 + 21 + 5 = 30

Step 2: Projected Sprint Completion

MVP Completion: The risk register mentions a burn reduction for sprints 4-6 due to holiday schedules.

If the burn rate is consistent after sprint 6, the MVP will be completed by sprint 9.

The entire backlog is projected to complete by sprint 16 assuming no further deviations.

Pull communication is most effective for a distributed team working across multiple locations, especially when task-oriented communications and discussion boards are involved. With pull communication, team members can access information when needed, such as through shared documents, wikis, or discussion boards. This ensures that communication is effective and available asynchronously, allowing the team to collaborate and stay informed without needing to be online at the same time. This method is particularly useful when managing a geographically dispersed team.

The correct answer is B — Communicate this to the product owner, and offer to help facilitate discussions with the team.

Agile promotes collaboration, transparency, and continuous improvement. The agile practitioner (e.g., Scrum Master) should first address challenges at the team level. Facilitating better communication and helping the product owner articulate requirements clearly is part of fostering a high-performing team environment.

PMI Agile Practice Guide states:

“Agile practitioners serve the team by removing impediments and improving communication. When conflicts or misunderstandings occur, the practitioner should engage with team members to resolve issues collaboratively before escalating externally.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.2 — Coaching the Agile Team)

Mike Griffiths further explains:

“Scrum Masters or Agile Coaches are servant-leaders. Their role includes helping product owners improve interactions and serve the development team more effectively.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 4 — Team Performance)

Other options:

A and D involve escalation without first attempting resolution.

C avoids direct action and leaves responsibility to someone else.

Answer: B

—

The correct answer is A – Create a user story for this new improvement and put it in the product backlog for prioritization and validation by the customer. Agile is iterative and feedback-driven. New requirements or enhancements identified during reviews are treated like any other backlog item: they are created as user stories, evaluated, and prioritized collaboratively.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Feedback during review meetings may lead to new stories. These are added to the product backlog and prioritized based on value, risk, and customer need.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Product Review and Feedback)

Mike Griffiths explains:

“Agile welcomes change—even late in development. New feedback should be captured as stories, then reviewed and prioritized by the Product Owner in alignment with business goals.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

B assumes premature prioritization.

C implies scope creep, which contradicts agile’s flexibility.

D contradicts team empowerment and planning integrity.

Answer: A

────────────

────────────────────────────────────

The correct answer is B – Ensured the early engagement of key stakeholders. Agile emphasizes early and continuous stakeholder involvement. In this case, engaging enterprise architects and standards stakeholders early in the design process would have helped detect conflicts before sprint execution.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Key stakeholders should be engaged early in the development cycle to ensure alignment with organizational policies, standards, and expectations.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths notes:

“Involving stakeholders early helps mitigate the risk of late surprises and rework. Enterprise architects should be consulted during backlog grooming or prior to sprint planning.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Incorrect options:

A is reactive and escalatory.

C presumes the standards are flawed without analysis.

D ignores necessary compliance and does not solve the issue proactively.

Answer: B

────────────────────────────────────

The correct answer is B – Prioritizing stories.

The MoSCoW method is a prioritization technique used in Agile to categorize requirements and backlog items based on their business value. It helps stakeholders and teams agree on what is essential to deliver versus what is desirable or optional.

MoSCoW stands for:

M – Must have

S – Should have

C – Could have

W – Won’t have (this time)

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The MoSCoW prioritization method helps stakeholders classify backlog items based on their criticality and desired delivery timing. This enables better alignment with business objectives.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Prioritization)

Mike Griffiths explains:

“MoSCoW is a simple but effective method for clarifying which features are essential and which can be deferred. It enhances transparency during prioritization discussions.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Why the other options are incorrect:

A – Estimating story size involves techniques like planning poker or T-shirt sizing.

C – Product validation is done via demos, acceptance criteria, and stakeholder feedback.

D – Progress tracking uses tools like burndown charts or cumulative flow diagrams.

Answer: B

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

Agile teams operate on the principle ofinspect and adapt. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.6 Retrospectives)andPMBOK® Guide 6th Edition (Section 3.7), retrospectives are designed forexperimentation and safe failure. Teams should be encouraged to try new process improvements and assess their impact. If the result is not positive, it’s an opportunity for collective learning—not for blame.

Mike Griffiths states in hisPMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 7: Continuous Improvement)that leaders shouldfoster a culture of experimentation, where teams are praised for trying new approaches, even if they fail. This maintains psychological safety and continuous learning.

Thus,Option Ais correct: Commending the attempt and facilitating a team discussion to explore alternatives is consistent with agile values and promotes team maturity.

Spikes are valuable for reducing uncertainty, but agile discouragesspending multiple sprints solely on spikeswithout delivering value. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Spikes and Exploration)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning), learning and delivery should occurconcurrentlywhenever possible. Teams should strive toinclude high-priority deliverables alongside spikes, particularly in early sprints, to build momentum and maintain stakeholder engagement.

Option Cis correct: executing high-priority stories in parallel with spikes promotes learning and value delivery.

Option AandDsupport spikes but ignore the risk ofdelayed value.

Option Bis valid but administrative; the better choice is to avoid needing prolonged spike sprints at all.

In agile, work is considered “done” only when it meets the agreed-uponDefinition of Done (DoD), which includes all aspects like coding, review, testing, and documentation. If there's disagreement about completion, thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.3 Sprint Review and Acceptance)recommends revisiting and aligning the DoD between the team and product owner.

Mike Griffiths in hisPMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery)explains that without aclear and shared Definition of Done, misunderstandings about completion status can occur, especially with quality-related tasks like testing.

Option Ais correct because aligning on the DoD resolves current and future misunderstandings.

Option Bintroduces unnecessary escalation.

Option Cpostpones resolution and does not solve the core issue.

Option Dincorrectly assumes testing isn’t part of the story’s completion criteria.

In Agile, transparency and communication within the team are key. The team member should log the concern into the risk register to formally track the issue and share it with the team at the next standup. This allows the entire team to discuss and assess the situation collaboratively, ensuring that the concern is addressed and managed collectively. This approach aligns with the self-organizing nature of Agile teams, where team members are responsible for working together to find solutions.

InKanban, one of the most effective ways to reduce variability in cycle time is by ensuring a consistent size of work items. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.7 Flow-based Agile - Kanban), maintaining uniformity in work item size helps stabilize the system and supports reliable forecasts. Large or complex stories increase variability and unpredictability.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery)recommendssplitting large user storiesand maintaining size thresholds for items on the board to ensure flow efficiency.

OptionCaligns best with this practice:establishing a policyfor breaking down large stories and adjusting WIP accordingly will help standardize flow, minimize cycle time variation, and improve predictability.

The correct answer is C – Request that the Product Owner include a spike in the next iteration's backlog so they can perform an initial investigation.

A spike is a time-boxed activity that allows teams to research or experiment to gain knowledge about technical or functional aspects of an upcoming feature or integration. Since the team lacks experience with the new component, using a spike will allow them to explore and reduce uncertainty before actual development begins.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Spikes are research activities that help teams gain the knowledge needed to reduce uncertainty and risk in upcoming stories.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Backlog Refinement)

Mike Griffiths writes:

“Spikes are used when the team is not confident about how to implement a story due to technical or domain uncertainty. Spikes help mitigate risk and inform estimation.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Other options are suboptimal:

A involves team extension, which contradicts Agile's preference for stable, cross-functional teams.

B is misaligned—technical investigation is a team responsibility, not the Product Owner's.

D avoids learning and may compromise solution quality.

Answer: C

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

The correct answer is A – The team will be unable to understand the iteration's status. Agile relies on transparency and timely updates to progress tracking tools such as task boards, burndown charts, and digital boards. Incomplete or delayed updates obscure the team's true progress, making it difficult to inspect and adapt.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Visibility of progress is key to agile. Without timely updates to task boards or status indicators, teams lose the ability to inspect and adapt effectively during iterations.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Information Radiators)

Mike Griffiths emphasizes:

“If user stories or tasks are not updated, burndown charts and velocity metrics become inaccurate. This compromises team transparency and decision-making.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 6 – Problem Detection and Resolution)

Incorrect options:

B is not directly impacted by status updates.

C might result as a side effect, but A is more fundamental.

D misrepresents the problem—it is about progress tracking, not collaboration metrics.

Answer: A

────────────────────────────────────

The presence of asingle point of knowledgeis a significant risk in agile teams. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3.3: Team Structure and Cross-functionality)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance), agile teams shouldavoid role silosand promoteknowledge sharing. Adding another database administrator helps with bothworkload distributionandknowledge retentionthrough pairing or mentoring.

Option Cis correct: it ensuresredundancy and knowledge spread, reducing project risk.

Option Adoes not address knowledge transfer or team development.

Option Bremoves the knowledge resource, worsening the risk.

Option Dlimits knowledge-sharing and still creates a bottleneck.

The correct answer is C – Invite the new release manager to the sprint demo and ask for help. Agile encourages stakeholder collaboration and visibility. Sprint reviews (also known as demos) are key opportunities for stakeholders, including release managers, to engage directly with the team and provide feedback. Since the issue is related to environmental instability and the new release manager is a key stakeholder, involving them in the sprint review enables mutual understanding and sets the stage for collaboration.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams use the sprint review to present completed work to stakeholders and receive direct feedback. It is also an opportunity to engage stakeholders who can influence the delivery environment.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Agile encourages frequent stakeholder collaboration. Sprint reviews should include key stakeholders who are responsible for operational and release matters to ensure alignment.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Options A and D are passive approaches and may not lead to effective communication. Option B (attending daily standups) may be helpful but is not the best opportunity for strategic involvement compared to a sprint demo.

Answer: C

=========

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 7.1 Communication)andPMBOK® Guide (6th Edition, Section 13.3 Manage Stakeholder Engagement),transparency with stakeholdersis fundamental in agile environments. Delays or deviations from expected outcomes must bepromptly communicatedto affected stakeholders to adjust expectations and plans.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement)emphasizes that one of the key values in agile isresponding to change over following a plan, and that includes openly discussing risks and delays with impacted parties.

Thus,Option Dis correct: the agile coach shouldproactively engage marketing stakeholdersto inform them about the delay and support revised planning.

The correct answer is B – Facilitate an open and focused team discussion that reinforces team agreements. Agile teams are built on collaboration, mutual respect, and self-organization. When conflict arises about role expectations or task assignments, the Scrum Master should create a safe space for open discussion to reinforce working agreements and promote shared accountability.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile leaders support team collaboration by encouraging open conversations. When team dynamics are strained, the Scrum Master facilitates discussions to reinforce team norms, self-organization, and equality of contribution.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.3 – Team Performance and Working Agreements)

Mike Griffiths further states:

“Agile teams succeed when responsibilities are shared and roles are not rigidly defined. The Scrum Master should facilitate a discussion that encourages shared ownership and mutual respect for all tasks.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Incorrect options:

A imposes action without addressing the root issue or respecting roles.

C brings external authority into a team matter, weakening self-organization.

D is partially correct but doesn’t resolve the immediate team conflict.

Answer: B

────────────────────────────────────

When the team is facing difficulties in estimating the scope of work due to unclear or ambiguous requirements, the product owner should collaborate closely with the client to ensure that the requirements are clear and well-defined. By refining the product backlog with more detailed and clarified requirements, the product owner can help the team generate more accurate estimates and better understand the scope of work. This is a fundamental step in ensuring the team can properly plan and execute the project on time.

Stated understanding of the release goal

The release goal provides clarity on the purpose and objectives of the release. It helps stakeholders understand the value the team aims to deliver.

List of the user stories that will be part of the next releases

A well-defined list of user stories ensures that stakeholders know which features and functionalities are planned for upcoming releases.

Agile valuesactive stakeholder collaboration and transparency. The best way to address stakeholder concerns is toengage them directlyin the feedback loop. ThePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 7.2: Stakeholder Engagement)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement)both recommend inviting stakeholders toiteration reviewsor demos to provide updates and gather feedback.

Option Cis correct: inviting the regional sales manager to the review fosters transparency and collaboration.

Option AandBdismiss valid stakeholder input, which goes against agile principles.

Option Dis overly cautious and does not proactively resolve the issue.

In the scenario described, the team is discussing the root causes of the technical problems that led to delayed deliverables, which indicates they are being proactive. One of the agile principles is to deliver working software frequently and adapt to change, and this situation shows the team is reflecting on their issues to improve future performance by identifying ways to balance the demands placed on the team (workload, deadlines, etc.) with their available capacity and necessary competencies.

The correct answer is B — The stakeholder who can prevent the project from achieving its goals.

Stakeholder prioritization is based on power and influence. Those who can significantly impact or block project success (positively or negatively) should be prioritized. This ensures their concerns are addressed and their support is cultivated early.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Stakeholder engagement is critical in agile. The team must identify those who have the most influence over project outcomes and ensure early and frequent communication.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.1 – Stakeholder Engagement)

PMBOK® Guide:

“Stakeholder prioritization involves assessing who has the greatest influence on project success.”

—

The scrum master should first remind the team of the purpose and goals of each scrum event (such as the daily standup, sprint planning, sprint review, and retrospective) to ensure that they remain focused on their intended outcomes. The scrum master can then implement a policy that ensures discussions that deviate from the scope of the event are stopped. This approach keeps the team on track, prevents time-wasting conversations, and helps maintain the efficiency of the events.

This method empowers the team to stay focused on what is essential for each event and encourages self-management while still providing room for relevant discussions. In doing so, the team can achieve the desired outcomes of each scrum event without unnecessary delays.

The correct answer is A — Capture risks and make them visible, and use a burndown chart to focus on reducing risks early in the project.

Technical uncertainty is a key area of risk in Agile projects. These risks should be clearly communicated, visualized, and prioritized early in the project to allow timely mitigation. Agile teams are empowered to make decisions and highlight blockers rather than delay work or seek hierarchical intervention.

PMI Agile Practice Guide states:

“Agile teams actively manage risk through transparency and continuous feedback. Risks should be made visible on information radiators and addressed early in the project to prevent impact on value delivery.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 7.3 – Risk Management)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Teams facing uncertainty must surface risks openly and early. Using charts such as risk burndown and dashboards helps keep focus on managing these risks iteratively.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 6 – Problem Detection and Resolution)

Incorrect options:

B contradicts the time-boxing principle of sprints.

C raises awareness but lacks proactive risk mitigation.

D introduces a command-and-control dynamic, which is not agile.

Answer: A

—

Agile encouragesteam collaborationandself-organization. If a team member feels underutilized, the team should be encouraged to engage that person more fully, leveraging their skills across tasks. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3: Team Performance)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Development), the agile practitioner supports healthy team dynamics and facilitatesinclusive participation.

Option Cis correct: promoting team-level inclusion helps resolve underutilization and fosters engagement.

Option Ais a last resort and undermines team stability.

Option Breframes the issue as a performance problem when it may not be.

Option Dunnecessarily escalates what should be resolved within the team.

The correct answer is B — Chair a weekly team retrospective focusing on identifying areas for continuous improvement.

Retrospectives are a core Agile practice used to inspect and adapt the team’s process, foster self-improvement, and enhance performance. If productivity is flat, the best approach is to collaboratively reflect with the team to uncover bottlenecks, identify areas for experimentation, and implement process adjustments.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Retrospectives are a key feedback loop that allow the team to assess their performance and decide how to improve it. The retrospective is a cornerstone for continuous improvement and high-performing teams.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.8 – Retrospectives)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Rather than externally imposed metrics, agile teams should drive performance improvements through retrospectives where they inspect their own work and collectively identify opportunities for efficiency.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Incorrect options:

A is diagnostic but insufficient for process improvement without team involvement.

C introduces hierarchy and undermines team empowerment.

D introduces extrinsic motivation, which may damage team collaboration and intrinsic ownership.

Answer: B

—

The correct answer is B – Discuss the value of the change for the project with the customer.

Agile encourages ongoing collaboration with the customer, even if changes occur late in development. The contractor should not immediately reject or escalate the request. Instead, the first step is to assess the value of the requested change, collaborate on its importance, and then determine the best path forward—whether through backlog reprioritization or contractual adjustment.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile welcomes changes in requirements, even late in development. Collaborate with the customer to explore the value of the change and its impact on schedule, cost, and scope.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Delivering Value Frequently)

Mike Griffiths emphasizes:

“Before resorting to contract changes or governance processes, teams should talk with the customer to understand the reason behind the change and its value.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Why the other options are suboptimal:

A assumes the change must go through legal channels without exploring its business value.

C may be necessary later but not as a first step.

D passively ignores the change and risks stakeholder dissatisfaction.

Answer: B

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

In agile, especially under conditions ofuncertainty or anticipated changes, teams should focus oncollaborative product development, includingongoing backlog refinement and continuous product reviews. This approach is endorsed by thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.1 Product Backlog and Refinement)andSection 7.2 (Engaging Stakeholders), which emphasizefrequent interaction with the product owneranditerative feedback loopsto adapt quickly.

Mike Griffiths in hisPMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 4: Stakeholder Engagement)supports the practice ofrefining the backlog regularlyand conductingfrequent reviewsto stay aligned with stakeholder expectations.

Option Bis correct: continuous collaboration with the product owner supports flexible, value-driven delivery.

Option Ais only a partial measure.

Option Cpromotes a waterfall mindset.

Option Dignores the nature of changing requirements.

The correct answer is A — A formalized agile approach offers controlled flexibility in dealing with unknown variables in a manner that adds business value.

Agile is designed to operate effectively under conditions of high uncertainty. It allows for controlled experimentation, feedback loops, and adaptive changes, all while maintaining a focus on delivering business value. This makes it ideal for environments reliant on data analytics and frequent changes.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile approaches provide the flexibility to respond to changing conditions and unknowns while ensuring that value delivery remains aligned with stakeholder needs.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 2.2 – Agile Principles)

Mike Griffiths:

“Agile’s incremental delivery model enables teams to validate assumptions and adapt based on feedback and data—making it a natural fit for data-driven organizations.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 1 – Agile Principles and Mindset)

Incorrect options:

B is factually incorrect and overly simplistic.

C misrepresents agile as a formal change-control process.

D is an opinion, not a principle.

In an Agile environment, fostering a culture of collaboration and effective communication is key to success, especially when working with a diverse team. By creating a shared vision, the project manager aligns the team towards common goals, which helps reduce misunderstandings. Using techniques to increase empathy and positive interaction ensures that team members understand and respect each other's different perspectives. This approach promotes a collaborative environment where diverse ideas can be valued and conflicts can be addressed constructively.

The correct answer is C — Ask the team member to update daily progress on the information radiators.

In Agile, transparency and self-organization are key. Information radiators (e.g., task boards, digital dashboards) allow all team members and stakeholders to see the current state of work at any time. If a team member cannot attend stand-ups, they should still update their tasks on the board so that others are informed.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Information radiators ensure transparent communication of progress, risks, and blockers to all team members and stakeholders. These should be updated in real-time or daily by those responsible.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.6 – Information Radiators)

Mike Griffiths:

“Task boards and progress charts allow anyone to see project status without waiting for meetings. Team members must take responsibility for keeping them current.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Incorrect options:

A punishes the team for one member’s lack of participation and doesn’t solve the communication issue.

B reintroduces a command-and-control model, reducing team ownership.

D is dishonest and violates agile principles of transparency.

Answer: C

—

The correct answer is D – Confirm managers and stakeholders are invited to product review meetings. Agile promotes early and continuous feedback from stakeholders through regular reviews (e.g., sprint reviews or demos). Their active engagement ensures alignment with evolving business needs.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Demonstrating working product increments at iteration reviews allows stakeholders to inspect progress, provide feedback, and align expectations. Agile teams rely on these sessions to validate whether the product meets business requirements.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement and 5.2 – Reviews)

Mike Griffiths emphasizes:

“Frequent stakeholder reviews reduce risk by capturing early feedback. Stakeholder participation in iteration reviews ensures alignment and continuous validation of business goals.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

A includes only the team; stakeholders are critical to product validation.

B is insufficient—product owner alignment alone doesn’t ensure business alignment.

C refers to documentation, not collaboration.

Answer: D

────────────────────────────────────

In Agile, it's important to maintain focus on the current sprint's goals and scope. Since the sprint deadline is approaching, adding additional features may compromise the team's ability to deliver the planned work on time. The best approach is to explain to the client that the new features can be considered for the next sprint, ensuring that the team can finish the current work and deliver value on time. This also allows the team to properly plan for the new features in the next iteration without overloading the current sprint.

The Scrum retrospective is the appropriate place for the team to reflect on what went well and what didn’t, including the missed sprint goals. The Scrum master should facilitate an open and constructive discussion about the impediments faced during the sprint, such as the unavailability of the specialist, and help the team find ways to avoid or mitigate similar issues in future sprints. This helps the team continuously improve and ensures that they are better prepared for future challenges.

The correct answer is C – The users can help the team understand if the feature adds value, avoiding the risk of building the wrong product.

Prototyping in agile serves as a lightweight modeling technique that supports discovery and stakeholder validation. It helps clarify uncertain requirements, encourages collaboration, and ensures that the solution being developed meets user needs and delivers value.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Prototypes allow teams to explore solutions before committing to full development. They support value delivery by engaging users early to verify what is needed.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Exploring and Confirming Requirements)

Also:

“Engaging stakeholders in early solution validation through techniques such as wireframes or mockups reduces the risk of developing the wrong product.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Delivering Value Frequently)

Mike Griffiths reinforces this approach:

“Prototyping enhances discovery. It supports feedback loops that validate whether a feature adds value before it's built—especially useful when requirements are unclear.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Why other options are less correct:

A is a secondary benefit but not the primary goal of prototyping.

B is speculative and does not reflect the sponsor's actual recommendation.

D misrepresents the purpose of prototyping, which is for discovery, not accelerated deployment.

Answer: C

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

In Agile, collaboration is important, but it should not disrupt the team’s ability to focus on sprint goals. The Scrum Master can address this situation by designating a single team member to represent the team in external meetings, which reduces the impact on the rest of the team’s working time. Additionally, establishing a capacity buffer helps ensure that the team has enough time for their tasks while accounting for the time needed for meetings. This solution maintains both collaboration and productivity without overwhelming the development team.

At this point in the planning process, the team has not yet gathered enough data to provide a precise release date. The team's velocity (the amount of work they can complete in each iteration) has not been established, and the team needs some iterations to stabilize and gather insights. However, they can offer a broad range based on the current understanding of the backlog and priorities. This allows the sponsor to have a rough expectation while also managing the uncertainty involved at this stage in the process.

The correct answer is A — Foster stronger communication by hosting cross-organizational meetings between the two teams.

Integration issues often result from mismatched expectations, lack of alignment, or asynchronous collaboration. A practical solution is to improve communication via cross-functional and cross-team meetings, which support transparency, alignment, and shared understanding.

PMI Agile Practice Guide states:

“Strong communication is essential in hybrid environments. Agile practitioners must foster collaboration between diverse teams to ensure integration points are clear and timely.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.3 — Communications and Collaboration)

Mike Griffiths notes:

“When agile and non-agile teams must work together, agile leaders facilitate boundary-spanning conversations to ensure mutual understanding and coordinated delivery.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 4 — Team Performance)

Other options:

B oversimplifies the solution and may create unnecessary disruptions.

C contradicts agile's principle of just-enough documentation.

D is rarely practical in hybrid or large-scale environments.

Answer: A

—

The correct answer is C – Passive-aggressive. When a team delivers work but avoids open discussion or interaction, especially in meetings, it may indicate passive-aggressive behavior. This behavior might reflect unresolved tension, lack of engagement, or unwillingness to collaborate transparently.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“High-performing agile teams thrive on open communication and collaboration. Passive-aggressive behavior, where communication is avoided despite task completion, can hinder trust and team health.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.3 – Team Performance and Collaboration)

Mike Griffiths warns:

“Silence or avoidance in agile teams may signal underlying issues. While work might be completed, lack of transparency and communication should be addressed early to maintain team cohesion.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Incorrect options:

A refers to real-time communication and is unrelated to emotional dynamics.

B is contradicted by the lack of vocal interaction.

D implies disorder or lack of structure, which is not evident here.

Answer: C

────────────────────────────────────

The product owner is responsible for managing the product backlog and ensuring that it reflects the priorities and vision of the product. While the Scrum team can suggest changes or improvements during the refinement process, the product owner has the final say on what changes are made to the backlog. This ensures that the product backlog aligns with business needs, stakeholder expectations, and the overall product vision. Therefore, the product owner can reject changes to the backlog if they believe the changes do not align with these priorities.

The correct answer is A – Reduced or improper customer collaboration.

One of the core principles of Agile is continuous collaboration with the customer. If multiple feature changes are only identified during a late-stage review, it typically indicates that the customer was not involved sufficiently throughout the development process.

From the Agile Manifesto (cited in the PMI Agile Practice Guide):

“Customer collaboration over contract negotiation.”

“Working software is delivered frequently… with a preference to the shorter timescale.”

And from the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Ongoing engagement with the customer helps align product features with actual needs and reduce surprises during late-stage reviews.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths also emphasizes:

“When customers are involved in iteration reviews and backlog grooming, their evolving needs are captured in real time. Surprises during release reviews usually reflect a failure of ongoing communication.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Other options don’t directly address the root cause:

B may contribute, but customer collaboration is the key differentiator in agile.

C and D are traditional causes of waterfall-style failure, not typically root causes in agile.

Answer: A

‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾

The correct answer is A – Perform value stream analysis to eliminate the processes with wastage. Value stream mapping is a lean and agile technique used to identify and eliminate non-value-adding activities, optimize flow, and increase delivery efficiency—especially crucial when facing tight deadlines.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Value stream mapping is used to analyze the flow of materials and information required to bring a product or service to a consumer. It helps teams eliminate waste and improve speed and quality.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.4 – Continuous Improvement and Feedback Loops)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Value stream analysis is a lean technique that helps agile teams identify delays, bottlenecks, and handoffs that waste time. When velocity lags behind expectations, understanding the end-to-end process is essential to improvement.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 7 – Continuous Improvement)

Option B (removing high-risk stories) may introduce more long-term risk and undermine value.

Option C suggests manipulating metrics instead of addressing root causes.

Option D may help identify risks early, but it doesn’t address why velocity is low.

Answer: A

According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.3 Sprint Review and Acceptance)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery), stories areonly marked complete if they meet the Definition of Done (DoD) and are accepted by the product owner and stakeholders. If the customer (or their representative) raises a legitimate concern during the review, the story should be treated asincompleteuntil consensus is reached or it meets expectations.

Option Ais correct: if the story does not meet customer expectations, it should be reprioritized for the next sprint or refined.

Option BandDincorrectly assume that product owner or team authority overrides customer feedback.

Option Csuggests discarding the story, which is inappropriate if the customer still needs the functionality.

Stakeholder feedback is critical in agile, and the goal isdelivering value, not simply completing a checklist.

The correct answer is B – Set expectations regarding the appropriate level of details requested during this stage. In Agile, early project stages are focused on vision, strategy, and high-level planning, not detailed documentation. The agile practitioner must educate stakeholders on progressive elaboration and set realistic expectations about how information is delivered over time.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“In the early stages of an agile project, requirements and plans are intentionally kept at a high level. Agile practitioners work closely with stakeholders to set appropriate expectations and explain how details will emerge iteratively.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 2.4 – Agile Project Initiation and Stakeholder Expectations)

Mike Griffiths reinforces this:

“During project inception, agile practitioners should clarify that detailed specifications evolve through iterative planning. Setting appropriate expectations is critical to building trust and maintaining alignment.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 2 – Agile Principles and Stakeholder Engagement)

Incorrect options:

A contradicts agile principles of just-in-time elaboration.

C is too rigid and may alienate stakeholders.

D abdicates responsibility and doesn’t help manage expectations.

Answer: B

────────────────────────────────────

The purpose of the daily standup (or daily coordination meeting) is to help the development team stay aligned with the sprint goal and actively manage any risks or impediments that may be blocking progress. It allows the team to quickly discuss their progress, share potential issues, and identify dependencies that could affect the sprint's success. The focus is on team collaboration and ensuring that everyone is on track.

The correct answer is C – Use class of service. In Kanban, the Class of Service (CoS) model is a key technique for prioritization and flow management. It helps teams decide which work items should be expedited, delayed, or treated as standard. Using CoS enables teams to handle tasks based on urgency, business value, and risk.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Classes of service define the rules by which work is selected, prioritized, and delivered. They help make prioritization policies explicit and transparent to stakeholders and team members.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.4 – Kanban and Flow-Based Approaches)

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Class of service models—such as ‘Expedite’, ‘Fixed Delivery Date’, ‘Standard’, or ‘Intangible’—allow teams to prioritize tasks by business value, risk, and urgency. This is particularly useful in Kanban systems where items flow continuously.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery / Kanban Practices)

Option A (involving the product owner) is more applicable to Scrum teams; Kanban teams often have shared ownership of flow.

Option B (reviewing WIP limits) affects flow but doesn’t guide task prioritization.

Option D (measuring lead time) helps with process analysis but not immediate prioritization.

Answer: C

────────────────────────────────────────────

The correct answer is D – Facilitate a just-in-time exploration of the functionality by the customer and the team.

Agile promotes emergent planning and just-in-time elaboration. When a customer cannot clearly define how a feature should function, collaborative exploration at the point of need (just-in-time) ensures shared understanding, timely feedback, and minimized waste.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“User stories are deliberately kept light to encourage conversation. These conversations often occur just before the story is scheduled for development—known as just-in-time elaboration.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Backlog Preparation and Refinement)

Andy Crowe also explains:

“Agile teams defer detail until the last responsible moment. This supports flexibility and better understanding through collaboration. Facilitating exploration sessions when needed helps clarify expectations and reduce uncertainty.”

(Andy Crowe, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 5 – Value Delivery)

Why other options are less suitable:

A may be helpful for technical uncertainty, but the issue here is lack of functional clarity from the customer.

B (iteration 0) is more of a preparatory stage; it is not typically used mid-project.

C suggests decomposition but without resolving the lack of understanding; it assumes the problem is granularity, not clarity.

Hence, the correct agile action is to engage collaboratively at the point of need: D

‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾

A user story that is too large to complete in one sprint is considered anepic. Agile teams shouldsplit it into smaller, valuable, testable stories. ThePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: User Stories and Decomposition)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning)recommendbreaking down large storiesand renegotiating sprint scopecollaborativelywith the product owner.

Option Cis correct: this aligns withcollaborative planning and story decomposition.

Option Ais rigid and dismisses collaboration.

Option Bpromotes unsustainable practices.

Option Dviolates the principle offixed-length iterations.

The correct answer is C – Risk-value quadrant. This technique is a prioritization matrix that helps teams identify and rank backlog items by evaluating their business value against their risk. This ensures early delivery of high-value and high-risk features, supporting fail-fast learning and reducing uncertainty.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The risk-value matrix helps prioritize features by plotting them based on business value and implementation risk. High-value/high-risk items are often addressed first.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Prioritization Techniques)

Mike Griffiths emphasizes:

“The risk-value quadrant is a powerful tool to guide agile prioritization. It ensures the most valuable and uncertain items are tackled early to deliver insights quickly.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

A is used for estimation, not prioritization.

B is a scheduling concept, not a prioritization method.

D refers to story quality (Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimable, Small, Testable), not prioritization.

Answer: C

────────────────────────────────────

In agile, theProduct Owner is the ultimate decision-makerregarding backlog prioritization and scope changes. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.1: Backlog Prioritization), any changes thataffect value delivery, schedule, or scopeshould be discussed with the Product Owner, who evaluates the business impact.

Mike Griffiths in thePMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery)reinforces that product direction and scope decisions must be handled through collaboration between the team and the Product Owner.

Option Dis correct: seeking Product Owner input ensures value-based decision-making and customer alignment.

Option A(re-estimating the entire project) is unnecessary and burdensome.

Option Brejects valuable input and ignores iterative flexibility.

Option Cgoes against agile principles of focus and sustainable pace.

In Agile, ensuring that the product works without bugs or missing features can be achieved through continuous testing and validation of the product. Test-driven development (TDD) is an approach where tests are written before the code is developed. This helps ensure that each feature is fully tested as it is built, focusing on customer requirements from the start and preventing issues from accumulating. By using TDD, the product owner ensures the product is being tested incrementally, which reduces the risk of defects and aligns with customer expectations for a high-quality product upon release.

In agile,teams are empowered to identify and solve problems collaboratively. When a technical concern arises, such as a limitation in the current technology stack, it is common practice to initiate aspikeor research activity to explore alternative solutions. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: Spikes and Technical Investigation)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 7: Problem Detection and Resolution), the best approach is to encourage theteam to investigate the issuecollaboratively.

Option Ais correct: engaging the team in research fosters ownership and solution-based thinking.

Option Bcircumvents team decision-making and undermines self-organization.

Option Cis premature—this is a technical issue, not a user requirement.

Option Dmay be helpful, but action should start with the team exploring options.

The correct answer is D – Ask QA team members experienced with the new automation framework to cross-train the other QA members. Agile emphasizes shared ownership, continuous learning, and eliminating skill silos. Cross-training is an effective way to improve team capability and reduce dependencies.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile encourages cross-functional teams and skills sharing. When skill gaps are discovered, team members with the knowledge are encouraged to cross-train others to increase the team’s flexibility and productivity.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.3 – Team Performance and Learning)

Mike Griffiths adds:

“Cross-training improves team resilience and reduces bottlenecks. When expertise is limited to a few people, risks increase. Agile teams overcome this by mentoring and shared learning.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Incorrect options:

A and C are reactive and delay resolution.

B encourages overwork and can lead to burnout.

Answer: D

────────────────────────────────────

Sprint planning or any task-level technical meeting should involve thedevelopment team and the product owner, as they are the key players in delivering and clarifying work. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 3.3: Agile Roles and Responsibilities)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance), the Scrum Master facilitates the meeting, while thedevelopment teamandproduct ownercollaborate on the details.

Option Dis correct: the core team (developers) and product owner are the correct participants for story elaboration and commitment.

Option AandCinvolve the customer and sponsor unnecessarily for a technical planning meeting.

Option Bincludes "key stakeholders," which may be overkill unless specific business input is needed.

The correct answer is D — A list of questions for the team and customer representative.

In Agile, creating a shared product vision is a collaborative effort that begins with open dialogue. The team should prepare insightful, value-driven questions to understand the customer’s needs, pain points, desired outcomes, and business drivers. This supports co-creation of the vision rather than relying on rigid documentation.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“A shared product vision aligns the team and stakeholders. Early collaboration and asking the right questions help establish understanding and purpose.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 2.2 – Agile Mindset)

Mike Griffiths:

“Visioning meetings are facilitated conversations where teams and stakeholders explore product goals and user needs. Questions—not documents—drive clarity.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 1 – Agile Principles and Mindset)

Incorrect options:

A implies a rigid, document-driven mindset—contrary to Agile.

B assumes the backlog exists before visioning.

C is too early for acceptance criteria before vision alignment.

Answer: D

—

The correct answer is C – Agile leader (e.g., Scrum Master). One of the key responsibilities of an agile leader is to protect the development team from external interruptions so that the team can maintain focus and maximize productivity.

From PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“The agile leader shields the team from outside disruptions to allow them to remain focused on their commitments. They work to establish working agreements, communication protocols, and help manage stakeholder access to the team.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.1 – Responsibilities of the Agile Leader)

From PMBOK® Guide – 7th Edition (tailoring for agile environments):

“Leaders in agile environments facilitate communication, clear obstacles, and protect teams from disruptions and distractions that can compromise the team’s ability to deliver value.”

From Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book:

“Scrum Masters and agile leaders act as gatekeepers to the team, ensuring that stakeholder interactions are managed and that the team can focus on iteration goals.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Option A (Product owner) is responsible for backlog clarity, not for shielding the team from distractions.

Option B (Project manager) is not a standard agile role; agile uses roles such as Scrum Master or Agile Coach.

Option D (Developers) may address distractions, but it is the agile leader's role to proactively prevent them.

Answer: C

=========

Reducing test automation in agileundermines quality and slows down feedback loops, contradicting agile principles. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.5 Quality Management in Agile Projects)andPMBOK® Guide (6th Edition, Section 8.1), agile projects aim forbuilt-in quality, and test automation is critical in achieving that.

Mike Griffiths (PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery) strongly advocates fortest automation to support sustainable developmentand improve predictability, quality, and speed. Rather than comply blindly with the product owner’s request, the agile practitioner shouldengage stakeholdersand clarify the long-term trade-offs of reducing quality practices.

Option Ais correct: consulting stakeholders ensures transparency, alignment, and helps prevent short-sighted compromises that could undermine the product.

The correct answer is D – Advise the team of the risks and invite them to change.

Agile teams are encouraged to self-organize, but this should not result in the formation of silos, which can hinder collaboration and shared knowledge. As a servant leader, the Agile practitioner or Scrum Master should coach the team by facilitating discussions about the risks of silos (e.g., dependency bottlenecks, reduced flexibility) and encourage cross-functional collaboration.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile leaders help teams reflect and improve. When silos form, the coach facilitates awareness of the impacts and invites the team to adopt knowledge sharing practices.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.2 – Coaching the Agile Team)

Mike Griffiths states:

“Silos reduce adaptability and team learning. A coach should raise awareness and help the team find new behaviors that support agility and collaboration.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Why other options fall short:

A escalates prematurely and undermines team self-management.

B enforces rules instead of fostering understanding.

C imposes a solution instead of empowering the team to solve its own issues.

Answer: D

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

To support quick feature delivery while maintaining quality, the best approach is to automate integration, testing, and deployment activities. This aligns with the principles of Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD), which streamline processes and reduce the manual effort required to test and deploy software. This approach can help the team to quickly release features with confidence that they meet quality standards, reducing manual errors and speeding up the delivery cycle.

The correct answer is D — Suggest an iterative approach including timely engagement of all key stakeholders and hold regular review meetings.

Engaging stakeholders continuously and using iteration reviews to validate deliverables ensures that misunderstandings are addressed early. This is especially critical in situations where expectations were not met in previous projects. Agile thrives in environments that require responsiveness to feedback.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Early and continuous stakeholder engagement and regular reviews help ensure alignment and satisfaction, especially when past experiences were negative.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths:

“Agile promotes iterative delivery and early validation, minimizing the risk of misaligned expectations and unmet requirements.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Incorrect options:

A and C are useful, but don’t directly prevent recurrence of the problem.

B is vague and lacks concrete action.

Answer: D

A cumulative flow diagram (CFD) is a powerful tool to visualize the flow of work across different stages of the process and identify where bottlenecks are occurring. By using a CFD, the team can see the buildup of work in specific columns, such as the "Ready to be tested" queue, and determine where delays are happening. Identifying bottlenecks is the first step in improving flow and addressing the slower delivery. Once the bottleneck is identified, the team can make adjustments to improve speed, such as optimizing the testing process or redistributing workload.

The root cause of the issue seems to be a focus on process and planning meetings, which may be impacting the team's ability to deliver effectively. Implementing Kanban, which emphasizes a pull system and focuses on continuous delivery without overwhelming the team with unnecessary meetings, allows for smoother workflow and can address bottlenecks. It helps the team focus more on value delivery rather than rigid planning and process constraints, thus potentially improving the quality and reducing unnecessary delays.

The sponsor is looking at the product roadmap, which is a visual representation of the product's planned features and their expected delivery timelines across multiple releases. It typically shows the major milestones, planned releases, and features grouped by their respective release numbers. This aligns with the sponsor's inquiry about when a specific feature will be ready, as the roadmap provides a high-level view of the product's development and release schedule.

The daily coordination meeting (often referred to as the daily standup) should be a brief check-in where each team member quickly shares their updates and impediments, focusing on the status of work and immediate blockers. If a detailed discussion arises during the meeting, the agile facilitator should politely stop the discussion and suggest scheduling a separate meeting to dive deeper into the issue. This ensures the daily meeting stays focused, time is used efficiently, and team members aren't distracted from their updates. By handling the issue separately, the facilitator helps maintain the flow and productivity of the team while still addressing the impediment effectively.

Velocity is a measure of how much work a team completes in a given sprint, typically measured in story points or other units of effort. While velocity can be useful for tracking progress and forecasting future work, it has some limitations when it comes to accurate capacity planning.

Velocity can vary from sprint to sprint due to multiple factors, such as the complexity of the tasks, interruptions, or even external influences. This variability can make it difficult to predict how much work a team can handle in future sprints, leading to inaccurate capacity planning.

Once scope and acceptance criteria are known, the next step is toestimate the size and effort of backlog items, which enables planning. ThePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: Backlog Estimation)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning)recommend using estimation techniques (e.g., story points, T-shirt sizing) to determine therelative effort of each backlog itembefore performing release or sprint planning.

Option Dis correct: backlog estimation enables velocity-based forecasting.

Option AandBcome after estimation is complete.

Option Cis too narrow—iteration planning comes later.

Creating apsychologically safe environmentis a key agile principle. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3.2 Team Environment), leaders should build trust and inclusion, especially for new or hesitant team members. Demonstrating that input isrespected and acted uponhelps new members gain confidence.

Mike Griffiths in hisPMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance)emphasizes thatinclusive collaborationand modeling desired behaviors in team settings are more effective than handling everything in private or through hierarchy.

Option Bis correct because it combines assurance and public demonstration of team values.

Option Amay violate psychological safety.

Option Cimplies isolation and reduces integration.

Option Dis helpful but lacks the team visibility that builds mutual trust.

The correct answer is C — Update current user stories.

Acceptance criteria are part of a user story’s definition and describe the specific conditions under which the story is considered complete. As user stories evolve and more clarity is gained, acceptance criteria must be updated within the user story itself to ensure mutual understanding of scope and expectations between the product owner and the development team.

According to PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Acceptance criteria are detailed during backlog refinement and are commonly added to user stories to define the done conditions. These are updated throughout the lifecycle of the story as more details emerge.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 — Backlog Refinement)

Mike Griffiths reinforces this:

“Acceptance criteria serve as the test conditions for confirming user stories. They are not fixed and can be elaborated collaboratively during grooming or development, and are updated directly in the user story.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 — Value-Driven Delivery)

Other options:

A refers to adding more stories, not updating existing ones.

B (retrospectives) are used for process improvement, not for editing user stories.

D (project plan) reflects a traditional mindset and not applicable in Agile.

Answer: C

—

The correct answer is C – Conduct retrospectives at the end of every sprint.

According to the Agile framework, regular retrospectives are a key practice to inspect and adapt the process. If team members have concerns about the Scrum Master's processes, the appropriate time and space to bring up and resolve such issues is the Sprint Retrospective.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Retrospectives are a time-boxed event that enables the team to inspect itself and create a plan for improvements to be enacted during the next iteration. It provides a structured opportunity for feedback and reflection.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.5, Iteration Retrospectives)

Mike Griffiths further adds:

“Teams must take ownership of their process. The role of the agile leader, such as a Scrum Master, is to facilitate improvement via mechanisms like retrospectives. They are not responsible for enforcing process, but for enabling continuous improvement.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 4 – Team Performance)

Why the other options are incorrect:

A may undermine the team's self-organization and brings hierarchy into team-level process adjustments.

B may address some confusion, but doesn’t actively involve the team in process improvement.

D is inappropriate—sprint planning is for work planning, not process feedback.

Therefore, the most agile-appropriate and validated solution is: C

‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾

The correct answer is D – Create a risk burndown chart showing the reduction of risks over time.

In Agile, risk management is integrated into each iteration. A risk burndown chart is a visual information radiator that tracks the total risk exposure and how it changes over time, making risk transparent and easy for the team to understand.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“A risk burndown chart can be used to communicate the decreasing level of project risk over time and encourage discussion on risk mitigation strategies.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.4 – Risk Management)

Mike Griffiths also states:

“Agile teams use tools like risk burndown charts to visualize risks and track mitigation. They provide real-time understanding of current and remaining risks.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 6 – Problem Detection and Resolution)

Other options:

A is a responsibility assignment matrix (not risk-focused).

B and C are traditional (predictive) methods and don’t align with Agile risk communication.

Answer: D

══════════════════════════════════════════════════

Standup meetings are meant to be brief and focused on providing updates, not on resolving issues in detail. The best approach is to allow team members to raise issues during the standup and then schedule separate discussions with the relevant individuals to work through resolutions. This ensures the standup stays on track while still addressing concerns efficiently. It prevents wasting time for the entire team when only a few members need to engage with a particular issue.

A key agile principle is that user stories should includeclear acceptance criteria, which must bereviewed and accepted by the product owner. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: User Stories and Acceptance Criteria)andMike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery), acceptance criteria ensure that the team and product ownershare a clear understandingof what constitutes “done.”

Option Ais correct: having the product owner validate acceptance criteria ensures alignment.

Option Baddresses technical quality but not stakeholder dissatisfaction.

Option Cunfairly shifts blame without addressing communication.

Option Dgoes against agile’s iterative and flexible nature.