PMI ACP - Mindset Domain

An agile practitioner notices that, despite appropriate coaching, a team member regularly defaults on sprint commitments. What should the agile practitioner do?

• Collaborate with the team member to find a solution.

• Wait until the sprint is completed to make a decision.

• Alter the sprint backlog to accommodate the team member's deliveries.

• 1. D.Request that the team provide a solution and inform the team member.

Answer explanation

A. Collaborate with the team member to find a solution.

This is a situation where one person might be struggling and the first place to start is by having a conversation, with empathy, to discover what might be causing the issue and work together to find a solution.

Waiting until the sprint is completed to make a decision is incorrect because it ignores the problem. Also, the situation is nothing that requires a “decision” by the agile practitioner; it requires a collaborative discussion to identify a resolution.

Altering the sprint backlog to accommodate the team member’s deliveries is incorrect. The sprint backlog would have already included the commitments, and this action is not appropriate in the context of the core issue.

Asking the team for a solution is incorrect. This is not a team issue. If an individual is struggling continually, it is most appropriate to have a private conversation to understand the issue.

During a product’s release cycle, the product owner failed to inform the team that the solution needed to connect to another application before implementation. How should the product owner have conveyed this information to the team?

• Identification and prioritization communications.

• Regular sprint planning sessions.

• Communication via the project manager.

• 1. D.Announcing it in a daily coordination meeting.

Answer explanation

A. Identification and prioritization communications.

Using identification and prioritization communications aligns with the clear and transparent prioritized function communications approach for incremental value delivery of agile principles.

Attending the sprint planning session does not address how the information should be communicated.

Establishing communication via the project manager does not align with agile principles.

Announcing the information in a daily coordination meeting is helpful for general communication; it does not address prioritized incremental value delivery.

A globally dispersed project team is working on a large-scale project. While preparing a stakeholder report, a team member placed the executive summary at the end of the report, which confused a couple of the stakeholders.

What should the agile practitioner do to prevent this in the future?

• 1. A.Undergo cross-cultural training to understand stakeholders’ business practices

• Communicate to stakeholders how reports will be displayed

• Pay more careful attention to details when submitting reports

• Meet with the product owner to determine what should not be included in reports

Answer explanation

B. Communicate to stakeholders how reports will be displayed

Proactive communication is key. By proactively informing stakeholders about the report format, including the placement of the executive summary, the practitioner can avoid future misunderstandings. Communicating this information ensures stakeholders know where to find the information they need and how to interpret it. Only a couple of stakeholders are confused, indicating they may be unfamiliar with the formatting of the reports. Understanding the format and content of the reports will help confused stakeholders find the information they need and how to interpret it. Consistent reporting formats help stakeholders track progress, and a standardized reporting format allows them to find and review information quickly.

Cross-cultural research and training can be helpful in the long run, but in this specific situation, the focus should be on aligning expectations about report formatting.

Although paying closer attention to details is always important, it does not prevent the underlying issue of stakeholder confusion or misunderstanding. Clarity and communication are key in ensuring that stakeholders understand how reports will be displayed and avoiding confusion and frustration.

The responsibility for the report format usually lies with the team itself. The product owner focuses on product backlog items and user stories.

A developer has decided to implement a new customer-requested function without collaborating with the project team. What should the agile practitioner do?

• Refuse to test the added feature and escalate the issue

• Discuss this decision with the developer and the team.

• 1. Keep the feature and inform the team.

• 1. Place the feature in the product backlog.

Answer explanation

B. Discuss this decision with the developer and the team.

Discussing this issue with the developer will help to understand why they implemented the function without team collaboration and buy-in. This conversation should be non-confrontational and aimed at understanding the root cause. The agile practitioner should emphasize that all changes should be discussed and agreed upon by the team to ensure alignment and avoid issues.

Refusing to test the feature is incorrect. It sounds like this feature was already implemented and deployed and removing it would be detrimental in many ways.

Keeping the feature and informing the team is incorrect. This is not the agile practitioner's decision and the situation should be discussed and addressed appropriately.

Placing the feature in the product backlog is incorrect. The feature has already been built and this may have negative impacts.

Team members are questioning the value of participating in the daily coordination meetings, mentioning that this is wasting their focus time.

What should the agile practitioner do?

• Describe how coordination meetings increase the likelihood of detecting obstacles.

• Demonstrate how coordination meetings justify management goals and objectives.

• Explain how coordination meetings remove the need for multiple burndown charts.

• Show how coordination meetings eliminate the need for detailed status reports for the sponsor.

Answer explanation

A. Describe how coordination meetings increase the likelihood of detecting obstacles.

This is representative of many situations where someone is resistant to a process, and one of the first steps to take is to help them understand why and how it helps them.

Demonstrating how coordination meetings justify management goals would do nothing to help the team overcome the feeling that the meetings are wasteful.

Explaining how coordination meetings remove the need for multiple burndown charts would simply be incorrect reasoning. Daily meetings do not remove the need for appropriate progress charts, and the daily meetings have a different purpose for the team to synchronize and plan their day, not for progress visualization.

Showing how coordination meetings eliminate the need for detailed status reports for the sponsor is an incorrect concept because daily meetings have a different purpose for the team to synchronize and plan their day, not for progress reporting.

A new team member is invited to a decision-making planning meeting using anonymous voting. The agile practitioner notices that the new team member seems unfamiliar or inexperienced with this process and is reluctant to contribute.

What should the agile practitioner do?

• 1. Create a plan to personally coach the new team member on agile techniques and processes

• Require the new team member to be physically present for similar meetings to gain experience

• 1. Develop a dictionary of agile terms and distribute it electronically to all project team members

• Encourage the new team member to request to pause voting when they want to ask questions

Answer explanation

A. Create a plan to personally coach the new team member on agile techniques and processes

Proactive coaching by agile practitioners is crucial for developing the skills and confidence of team members, ensuring continuous improvement, and fostering a collaborative and self-sufficient team environment. It may be helpful to work with the team member in the meeting, but this may disrupt the flow of the meeting or embarrass the team member.

Coaching the new team member ensures that they are informed, understand the processes, and contribute effectively. This proactive approach can boost confidence and promote collaboration, productivity, and adaptability.

Requiring a team member to be physically present ignores the real issue of a lack of understanding of a process. There is no indication that the new team member is not physically present. Physical presence may not be possible, especially if the team is not co-located.

Creating and distributing a dictionary ignores the issue and is out of context. The problem is not a lack of understanding of the terms being used.

In general, it may be helpful to encourage questions, as long as they are not disruptive, but this is not comprehensive enough and may be counterproductive in some situations. Although a team member should feel safe asking questions, this ignores the opportunity to proactively coach the team member for a greater and more comprehensive understanding. Pausing the meeting every time the new team member has a question may cause tension and delays and make the new team member uncomfortable.

After a project sprint retrospective, the team members complained that the feedback discussed was mostly negative, making the meeting unproductive. What should the agile practitioner do?

• Tell the team to honor the principles of the Agile Manifesto because negative feedback lowers team morale

• 1. Advise the team to list their observations in the product backlog so that they can be added to user stories

• 1. C.Remind the team that the spirit of the sprint retrospective is to discuss both positive and negative feedback

• Implement alternative methods of facilitating the sprint retrospective to focus more on positive comments

Answer explanation

C. Remind the team that the spirit of the sprint retrospective is to discuss both positive and negative feedback

The agile practitioner should remind the team to reflect on the purpose and spirit of the retrospectives and to discuss what went well and also what might need improvement.

Continuous improvement is always the goal in agile, and encouraging both positive and negative comments ensures that feedback is balanced, comprehensive, and transparent. Positive feedback identifies and reinforces factors that went well. Negative feedback highlights areas for improvement, pinpoints areas for improvement, and enables the planning and implementation of changes that can improve performance. Both forms of feedback empower the team to make informed decisions on what practices to keep and where to implement change.

While reminding the team of the Agile Manifesto principles is important for maintaining agile values, it should not be the sole response to improving a perceived unproductive retrospective. The agile practitioner should focus on practical steps, such as reviewing the retrospective format, enhancing facilitation techniques, promoting constructive feedback, and ensuring actionable outcomes are derived from the retrospective discussions.

Advising the team to list their observations in the product backlog so that they can be added to user stories is incorrect because the product backlog is not used for capturing observations or issues. This option does not address the core purpose of retrospective meetings or facilitate the necessary discussions and actions for enhancing team performance and collaboration.

Implementing alternative methods of facilitating the sprint retrospective in a way that would be more suitable for the team is not the best option. It is important to reflect on and improve the way agile practices are being applied. Changing how retrospectives are facilitated to only focus on the positive would defeat their purpose as it lacks specificity and guidance on how to address the perceived unproductivity of the retrospective.

During a sprint, the team encounters a problem that might prevent them from completing their sprint objectives. What should the agile practitioner do?

• Add the issue to the issue log and keep it within the team until the sprint outcome is certain.

• 1. Cancel the current sprint and create a new one to ensure the problematic story is excluded.

• 1. Notify all stakeholders of the issue and discuss how to adjust the sprint backlog if needed.

• 1. Ask the team to work as many extra hours as needed to meet the original sprint commitment.

Answer explanation

C. Notify all stakeholders of the issue and discuss how to adjust the sprint backlog if needed.

This approach aligns with agile principles of transparency and collaboration. By notifying stakeholders and discussing possible adjustments to the sprint backlog, the team ensures that everyone is aware of the issue and can collectively decide on the best course of action, maintaining alignment with sprint goals and overall project priorities.

Adding the issue to the issue log and keeping it within the team until the sprint outcome is certain completely ignores the problem. Issue logs are not usually used in agile teams. However, in any case, just logging an impediment or issue and leaving it there to see what happens is certainly not an appropriate way of working in any method.

Canceling the current sprint and creating a new one completely ignores the problem, is an unreasonable action, and is a drastic option that should not be taken lightly. The only one who can cancel a sprint is the product owner, and usually, this would only occur if the current sprint goal is obsolete or there is a major issue.

Asking all team members to work as many extra hours as needed to meet the original sprint commitment is incorrect. Using sustainable practices is a key principle in agile ways of working, which means using overtime should be discouraged and teams should be able to sustain a healthy pace. Also, nothing in this scenario implies that the problem is due to insufficient capacity. Asking team members to put in extra hours is never a correct action.

A junior team member suggests a new approach for accomplishing team goals. What should the agile practitioner do?

• Decide as a group if the new approach should be adopted.

• Work with the team member to decide if the new approach should be adopted.

• Ask senior team members to decide if the new approach should be adopted.

• Speak to management about adopting the new approach.

Answer explanation

A. Decide as a group if the new approach should be adopted.

A self-organized team should have the freedom to decide how to accomplish tasks, creating increased ownership. Discussing potential changes as a team promotes collective ownership, leverages diverse perspectives, improves buy-in, enhances communication, supports continuous improvement, and ensures adaptability.

Discussions such as these are important for maintaining an effective and cohesive team.

Working with the team member to decide if the new approach should be adopted is incorrect. It is not the agile practitioner’s decision to make without involving the entire team.

Asking senior team members to decide if the new approach should be adopted does not include the entire team and suggests a unilateral or hierarchal approach. It is not the decision of only the senior team members. It should be a collaborative approach, without hierarchy.

Speaking to management about adopting the new approach is incorrect. There is no need to add this step at this stage. A self-organized team should have the freedom to decide how to accomplish tasks, creating increased ownership. There is a situation where perhaps if the organization has organizational standards that the team wants to change, this could be a reasonable action, but nothing in this scenario hints at this. The team should determine if the process is valuable and should be adopted before considering escalating the conversation to management.

A project team will be globally distributed. What should the agile practitioner do to build trust?

• Establish clear communication channels and promote transparency.

• Select a multilingual team member to assist with communications.

• Conduct kickoff meeting via conference call.

• 1. Arrange release planning via video conference.

Answer explanation

A. Establish clear communication channels and promote transparency.

Establishing clear communication channels facilitates better communication, fosters a sense of unity, and lays the groundwork for effective collaboration, even when team members are geographically dispersed.

Established and transparent communication channels and practices help to make all project information, including progress, challenges, and decisions, accessible to everyone no matter where they are located geographically.

Communication and openness help build trust as team members feel informed and included. This encourages a collaborative environment and a sense of team cohesion.

Having a multilingual team member can aid in overcoming language barriers, but it does not address the broader need for trust-building and team cohesion. Further, there is no indication that there is a language barrier.

Dispersed teams may share a common language despite being located in different areas.

Conference calls, while useful, often lack the personal connection and engagement that face-to-face meetings provide.

Video conferences are helpful, but it is important to establish team communication practices, particularly at the beginning of a project. This option is limited in nature and trust building is not limited to release planning meetings.