PMI-ACP Mindset Practice Test 2 — 15 Questions

Question 1

During a sprint, the team realizes the current technical approach won't work. What is the most Agile action?

Accepted Answer

Pivot the approach and communicate the impact to the PO.. Agile embraces change and empirical learning — when the technical approach is proven unworkable, the team should pivot, adapt the plan, and transparently communicate the impact to the Product Owner. This preserves the sprint goal's value and allows the PO to re-prioritize scope if needed. Hiding or persisting with a broken approach violates transparency and wastes effort.

Answer

Continue the current path to avoid missing the sprint deadline.

Answer

Hide the issue and fix it next sprint.

Answer

Blame the architect for the bad design.

Question 2

A team is struggling to finish their stories. How can you help them improve their Agile mindset?

Accepted Answer

Help them refine their stories to be smaller and clearer.. The core issue is that stories are too large or ambiguous, which prevents the team from completing them within a sprint. By helping the team refine stories to be smaller and clearer, you address the root cause: large stories increase uncertainty, make estimation harder, and often lead to carryover. This aligns with Agile principles of incremental delivery and continuous improvement, enabling the team to finish work and gain a sense of accomplishment, which reinforces the Agile mindset.

Answer

Tell them to work faster.

Answer

Assign more work to fill their time.

Answer

Extend the sprint.

Question 3

Which of the following is a sign of a healthy team?

Accepted Answer

Team members feel safe to voice concerns.. A healthy agile team is characterized by psychological safety — members feel safe to raise concerns, admit mistakes, and challenge ideas without fear of retribution. This is a prerequisite for transparency, continuous improvement, and self-organization, and it is a well-documented predictor of team performance. The other options describe compliance or perfection rather than health.

Answer

The team always completes 100% of the work.

Answer

No one ever disagrees.

Answer

The team follows the manager's instructions.

Question 4

A team has a high turnover rate. What should the servant leader focus on?

Accepted Answer

Investigating the team culture and working conditions.. High turnover is a systemic signal, not a recruiting problem, so a servant leader must investigate the root causes in team culture and working conditions. Servant leadership means removing impediments and creating an environment where people can succeed, which starts with diagnosing why people are leaving. Only after understanding the drivers — workload, conflict, lack of autonomy, poor tooling — can the leader act effectively.

Answer

Replacing people faster.

Answer

Lowering the performance expectations.

Answer

Hiring more senior developers.

Question 5

What is the importance of 'transparency' in Agile?

Accepted Answer

To enable empirical process control.. Transparency in Agile enables empirical process control — the ability to inspect and adapt based on accurate, visible information. Without transparency, inspections are misleading and adaptations are ineffective, undermining the three pillars of Scrum (transparency, inspection, adaptation).

Answer

To satisfy auditors.

Answer

To make the team work harder.

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So everyone knows who to blame.

Question 6

A stakeholder asks to change a completed feature. What is the correct response?

Accepted Answer

Evaluate the change's value and discuss the impact with the PO.. In Agile, changes are welcome even late in development, but they must be evaluated for value and impact. The correct response is to assess the change's business value and discuss it with the Product Owner, who owns backlog prioritization. This ensures the change is weighed against other work and aligned with product strategy.

Answer

Tell them it's too late.

Answer

Charge the stakeholder for the rework.

Answer

Do the change immediately without question.

Question 7

Your organization is transitioning to Agile. Some managers are resisting. How do you handle this?

Accepted Answer

Engage the managers in conversations about the benefits and address their concerns.. Resistance to Agile transformation is best addressed through engagement, education, and empathy — understanding managers' concerns (e.g., loss of control, unclear metrics) and demonstrating benefits with data. This aligns with the Agile principle of building trust and collaboration across the organization. Ignoring, escalating, or waiting out resistance are passive or coercive approaches that undermine sustainable change.

Answer

Ignore the managers and proceed with the team.

Answer

Escalate to the CEO.

Answer

Wait for them to retire.

Question 8

A team is doing 'Agile in name only' (Water-Scrum-Fall). What is your first step?

Accepted Answer

Assess current practices against Agile principles.. When a team is doing 'Agile in name only' (Water-Scrum-Fall), the first step is to assess current practices against Agile principles to identify gaps and understand the root causes. This diagnostic approach respects the team's context and avoids imposing changes without understanding the current state.

Answer

Fire the team and start over.

Answer

Force them to adopt a specific framework.

Answer

Do nothing, as long as they deliver.

Question 9

A team member is consistently late for meetings. How do you address this?

Accepted Answer

Discuss the impact on the team with them privately.. The correct approach is to address the behavior privately with the team member, focusing on the impact their lateness has on the team's collaboration and productivity. This aligns with PMI-ACP principles of servant leadership, emotional intelligence, and direct, respectful communication. By discussing the issue one-on-one, you avoid public embarrassment and create a safe space for the team member to explain any underlying issues, while still holding them accountable. This approach fosters trust and maintains team morale, which are critical for agile team success.

Answer

Do nothing.

Answer

Start the meeting without them every time.

Answer

Bring it up in the daily stand-up.

Question 10

What is meant by 'customer collaboration over contract negotiation'?

Accepted Answer

Prioritize shared goals and understanding over rigid adherence to contracts.. 'Customer collaboration over contract negotiation' is one of the four values of the Agile Manifesto. It means that while contracts still matter, the relationship, shared understanding, and working toward mutual goals with the customer take precedence over rigidly enforcing every clause. Option A captures this balance correctly.

Answer

Stop charging the customer for work.

Answer

Always give the customer whatever they want.

Answer

Ignore contracts entirely.

Question 11

Which of the following is a key component of psychological safety?

Accepted Answer

Being able to take risks without fear of punishment.. Psychological safety, as defined by Amy Edmondson, is the shared belief that team members can take interpersonal risks—speaking up, admitting mistakes, asking questions, proposing ideas—without fear of punishment or humiliation. Being able to take risks without fear of punishment is the core component that enables learning, innovation, and honest communication in Agile teams.

Answer

Having clear instructions.

Answer

Working in a quiet environment.

Answer

Having high pay.

Question 12

A team is hesitant to share their 'Velocity'. Why might this be?

Accepted Answer

They fear it will be used against them as a productivity metric.. Velocity is a planning and forecasting tool, not a productivity measure, and teams often resist sharing it because they've seen or fear it being weaponized in performance reviews or cross-team comparisons. That fear is rational: once velocity becomes a management metric, teams start gaming it by inflating estimates rather than improving delivery.

Answer

They are lazy.

Answer

They are hiding secrets.

Answer

They don't know what it is.

Question 13

During a retrospective, the team is silent. How do you encourage participation?

Accepted Answer

Use a facilitation technique like 'silent brainstorming' or 'anonymous cards'.. When a team is silent during a retrospective, the Scrum Master or facilitator should use techniques that create psychological safety and encourage input without pressure. Silent brainstorming or anonymous cards allow individuals to contribute ideas without fear of judgment or speaking over others, which often breaks the silence and surfaces diverse perspectives.

Answer

Call on people one by one.

Answer

Threaten to report the team's silence to the manager.

Answer

End the meeting early.

Question 14

A team wants to change their way of working. How do you support this?

Accepted Answer

Support their experiment and help them measure the outcome.. In Agile, the team owns its process and is empowered to inspect and adapt its way of working. The correct response is to support their experiment and help them measure the outcome, because continuous improvement is driven by empirical feedback rather than top-down mandates. This aligns with the PMI-ACP principle of self-organizing, empowered teams that use retrospectives to evolve their practices.

Answer

Tell them what to change.

Answer

Say no, because the current process works.

Answer

Wait for management approval.

Question 15

A team is struggling with technical debt. What is the most Agile way to handle it?

Accepted Answer

Incorporate technical debt reduction into the product backlog.. The most Agile way to handle technical debt is to make it visible and incorporate it into the product backlog, where it can be prioritized alongside other work based on business value and risk. This allows the team and Product Owner to make informed trade-offs and address debt incrementally. It ensures technical debt is not ignored or treated as a separate, low-priority project.

Answer

Wait for a dedicated 'refactoring' project.

Answer

Blame the developers.

Answer

Ignore it.