PMI-ACP Leadership Practice Test 2 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A team member is consistently late to the daily stand-up, disrupting the meeting. How do you handle this?

Accepted Answer

Encourage the team to discuss the impact of lateness on their collaboration during a retrospective.. Agile favors team-level, self-correcting conversations over managerial discipline. Raising the issue in a retrospective lets the team discuss how lateness affects collaboration, stand-up effectiveness, and mutual respect, and lets them own the solution. This aligns with the principle of self-organizing teams and continuous improvement.

Answer

Issue a formal warning to the team member.

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Change the stand-up time to suit that member's schedule.

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Stop the stand-up whenever they are late.

Question 2

The organization is pressuring the team to commit to a date for a major release that the team feels is impossible. What is your role?

Accepted Answer

Help the team explain the trade-offs (scope, quality, or time) based on their current velocity to the stakeholders.. The Scrum Master/Agile coach's role is to help the team and stakeholders make trade-offs transparent using empirical data such as velocity and historical throughput. Rather than accepting an impossible date or hiding behind optimism, you facilitate a conversation where scope, quality, and time are explicitly balanced. This preserves transparency and lets the business make an informed decision.

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Tell management that the team will work hard to make it happen.

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Tell the team to stop providing estimates to management.

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Accept the date to avoid conflict with management.

Question 3

How do you handle a scenario where two teams have a dependency that is slowing both of them down?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a joint session for the two teams to map the dependency and negotiate a timeline for resolution.. When two teams have a dependency that slows both down, the agile approach is to make the dependency visible and let the teams jointly solve it. Facilitating a joint session allows both teams to map the dependency, understand each other's constraints, and negotiate a timeline for resolution. This preserves team autonomy while removing the impediment collaboratively, which is the core of servant-leadership in agile.

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Merge the two teams into one large team.

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Assign a single manager to oversee both teams.

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Tell the teams to stop relying on each other.

Question 4

A team is struggling to understand the Product Owner's vision. What should you do?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a visioning workshop where the PO presents the product roadmap and goals to the team.. When the team doesn't understand the PO's vision, the root cause is usually a communication gap, not a lack of capability, so the right move is to create a structured forum where the PO can articulate the roadmap and goals directly. A visioning workshop aligns everyone on purpose and priorities while keeping the PO as the authoritative source of product direction.

Answer

Create your own vision for the team.

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Ask the developers to interview the customers themselves.

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Tell the team to just focus on completing their tasks.

Question 5

Your team is constantly arguing about how to handle technical debt. How do you facilitate?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a discussion on the impact of technical debt on velocity and quality, and help them define a sustainable approach.. An agile leader facilitates rather than dictates. By guiding the team to discuss how technical debt affects velocity and quality, the leader helps them own the problem and co-create a sustainable approach, which aligns with self-organization and continuous improvement.

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Ask the stakeholders to decide which technical tasks are important.

Answer

Ignore the debt and focus on new features.

Answer

Order the team to dedicate 50% of every sprint to technical debt.

Question 6

How can you best support a newly formed agile team in developing trust?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate team-building activities and retrospectives that focus on openness and safety.. Trust in a new Agile team is built through repeated, safe interactions that demonstrate reliability and openness. Facilitating team-building activities and retrospectives focused on openness and safety creates the conditions for trust to develop organically. Option C directly supports this by giving the team structured opportunities to be vulnerable and honest with each other.

Answer

Monitor their work constantly to ensure everyone is working.

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Assign them complex work immediately to see who excels.

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Create a formal document outlining everyone's roles and responsibilities.

Question 7

An agile team has become complacent and is no longer looking for ways to improve during retrospectives. How do you intervene?

Accepted Answer

Introduce new retrospective formats and invite outside observers to provide fresh feedback.. When a team becomes complacent during retrospectives, the Scrum Master/Agile Coach should intervene by changing the format or injecting fresh perspectives rather than imposing control. Introducing new retrospective formats (e.g., Start-Stop-Continue, 4Ls, Sailboat) and inviting outside observers stimulates new thinking and re-engages the team. This preserves the team's ownership of the improvement process while breaking the rut.

Answer

Mandate a new process that they must follow.

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Berate the team for their lack of progress.

Answer

Cancel the retrospectives until they have something to report.

Question 8

A team member is consistently distracting others during pair programming. What is the most appropriate action?

Accepted Answer

Coach the team to discuss collaboration norms, including focus and respect, during a retrospective.. In Agile, team dynamics and collaboration norms are best addressed by the team itself during a retrospective, where members can openly discuss behaviors like focus and respect. Coaching the team to surface and resolve the distraction through shared norms aligns with self-organization and continuous improvement principles.

Answer

Remove the pair programming practice.

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Tell the team member to be quiet.

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Move the team member to a different project.

Question 9

The team is consistently underestimating their tasks, leading to unfinished work at the end of sprints. How do you coach them?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a discussion on why the estimates were off and how to refine their definition of 'done' and estimation criteria.. When a team consistently underestimates, the best coaching approach is to facilitate a discussion on why estimates were off and how to refine their definition of 'done' and estimation criteria. This promotes learning, transparency, and collective ownership of the estimation process, rather than imposing a fix.

Answer

Assign the tasks yourself to ensure they are estimated correctly.

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Change the estimation unit to hours instead of story points.

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Increase their story points by a fixed multiplier.

Question 10

A stakeholder is consistently demanding 'quick fixes' that bypass the team's quality process. How do you address this?

Accepted Answer

Explain the long-term cost of 'quick fixes' and negotiate for a sustainable pace that includes quality.. The agile leader should make the long-term cost of bypassing quality visible and negotiate a sustainable pace that includes quality practices. This respects the stakeholder relationship while protecting technical excellence, which is a core agile principle. It reframes the conversation from 'quick fix vs. no fix' to 'sustainable delivery vs. accumulating technical debt.'

Answer

Tell the developers to ignore the stakeholder.

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Agree to the requests to maintain stakeholder satisfaction.

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Ask the team to work extra hours to fix the 'quick fixes' later.

Question 11

What is the best way to handle a team member who is not adhering to the agile values?

Accepted Answer

Provide consistent, private feedback and coaching to help them understand and adopt the values.. Providing consistent, private feedback and coaching is the most constructive way to help a team member understand and adopt agile values. This approach respects the individual, fosters psychological safety, and aligns with the servant-leader role of an agile practitioner. It addresses the behavior directly while supporting the team member's growth.

Answer

Shame them in the daily stand-up.

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Ignore the behavior, as everyone has their own way of working.

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Remove them from the team immediately.

Question 12

A team is struggling to maintain focus due to 'firefighting' requests from the business. How do you coach them?

Accepted Answer

Work with the Product Owner to create a clear backlog policy for incoming requests and protect the sprint.. Working with the Product Owner to establish a clear backlog policy for incoming requests and protecting the sprint is the correct coaching action because it addresses the root cause: unmanaged work entering the team's workflow. The Product Owner is responsible for backlog prioritization, so collaborating with them ensures that firefighting requests are evaluated against sprint goals rather than disrupting the team ad hoc. This preserves the team's focus and maintains the integrity of the sprint commitment.

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Suggest the team work on these requests at night.

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Ask the team to switch to a Kanban approach.

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Tell the team to stop accepting any outside work.

Question 13

A stakeholder is unhappy with the product's progress. How do you address this?

Accepted Answer

Invite them to the next sprint review to see the progress and discuss the product roadmap.. Inviting the stakeholder to the sprint review lets them see working product increment and discuss the roadmap directly with the team. This provides transparency, builds trust, and gives the stakeholder accurate information rather than filtered reports. It is the agile-correct way to address dissatisfaction with progress.

Answer

Show them a more optimistic report.

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Stop the project.

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Tell them the team is doing their best.

Question 14

A team is struggling with the transition to a new agile tool. How do you help?

Accepted Answer

Provide training and time for the team to experiment and adapt to the new tool.. Tool transitions fail when imposed without support. The agile-correct approach is to provide training and protected time for the team to experiment, make mistakes, and build fluency with the new tool. This respects the team's self-organization and leverages the empirical learning loop that agile promotes.

Answer

Ask the IT department to force the migration.

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Force them to use the new tool starting tomorrow.

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Use the old tool and the new one simultaneously.

Question 15

A team is having difficulty with the 'Definition of Done'. How do you facilitate?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a workshop to help the team agree on quality standards and criteria for completion.. Facilitating a workshop (D) lets the team collaboratively define what 'done' means for their context, building shared ownership and clarity. The Definition of Done must be created by the team, not imposed, because it reflects their quality standards and working agreements. A workshop format ensures all voices are heard and the resulting criteria are realistic and agreed upon.

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Define the 'Definition of Done' for them.

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Ignore the 'Definition of Done' and focus on finishing features.

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Copy a 'Definition of Done' from another team.