POPM Practice Test 5 — 25 Questions

Question 1

Which THREE factors should a Product Manager consider when updating the Vision for the upcoming PI Planning event?

Accepted Answer

Strategic themes of the enterprise.. Updating the Vision requires aligning with the enterprise strategy, reviewing current market trends, and analyzing feedback from the previous PI. These three factors ensure the direction remains relevant and compelling to stakeholders. Effective preparation prevents ambiguity, aligns the organization on common goals, and ensures that the upcoming PI planning sessions are focused on strategic priorities rather than debating fundamental objectives and long-term targets.

Answer

The detailed task list for every iteration.

Answer

Individual developer salary budgets.

Question 2

Which THREE factors are essential to consider when determining the 'readiness' of the Program Backlog before PI Planning?

Accepted Answer

The features have clear, defined acceptance criteria.. Readiness means the backlog is actionable. Acceptance criteria clarify scope, WSJF-based priorities ensure value, and identified cross-team dependencies prevent unforeseen blockers. Without these, planning is just guessing. By ensuring these factors are addressed, the PM provides the necessary information for teams to plan effectively, creating a realistic, high-confidence plan that aligns with the organization's strategic goals and ensures a predictable flow of value throughout the upcoming PI.

Answer

The features have been assigned to specific developers.

Answer

The backlog is completely fixed for the next twelve months.

Question 3

Refer to the exhibit. As a Product Manager, what should you do regarding Feature X?

Accepted Answer

Coordinate with the System Architect to review the feature before finalizing the backlog.. Technical viability is a requirement for feature readiness. If a policy mandates a System Architect review, the Product Manager must ensure that this review occurs before the feature is finalized for planning. By adhering to this process, the PM avoids planning for work that may be technically impossible or require significant rework, thus ensuring a more reliable and successful plan for the team.

Answer

Include Feature X in the plan anyway to avoid delays.

Answer

Ask the Scrum Master to sign off on the technical viability instead.

Answer

Mark the feature as 'ready' and note that the Architect will review it during the sprint.

Question 4

Refer to the exhibit. The ROAMing session has not yet been conducted. What is the leader's next step?

Accepted Answer

Lead the ROAMing session to ensure every identified risk is categorized and owned.. The ROAMing session is mandatory for addressing risks identified during PI Planning. By using the ROAM technique—Resolved, Owned, Accepted, Mitigated—leadership ensures that every risk is accounted for and assigned an action or owner. Leaving risks unaddressed means they are ignored, which is a major danger. Leadership must drive this session to categorize each risk so that teams know exactly how to manage potential threats to their PI objectives.

Answer

Have the teams document the risks in their own backlogs and resolve them individually.

Answer

Ignore the risks as they are just possibilities and not actual work items.

Answer

Assign all risks to the Product Manager to handle during the next sprint.

Question 5

How should a Product Manager handle a critical dependency from another team that cannot be resolved during PI Planning?

Accepted Answer

Escalate the issue through the proper program channels.. If a critical dependency remains unresolved, the PM must escalate it to the Release Train Engineer (RTE) and the Program Management Office (PMO) for visibility and assistance. The goal is to ensure the dependency is tracked on the Program Board and that a clear mitigation plan is established. Transparency is crucial here to ensure stakeholders understand the risk and the potential impact on the PI objectives.

Answer

Ignore the dependency and hope it resolves itself.

Answer

Automatically remove the affected feature from the backlog.

Answer

Instruct the team to work on the dependency themselves.

Question 6

Refer to the exhibit. How should the PO interpret this drop in velocity for future planning?

Accepted Answer

Discuss the impact with the team and adjust the capacity plan accordingly.. The drop in velocity is clearly correlated with a systemic change (team turnover). The PO should not treat this as a permanent reduction but as a period of adjustment. Planning for the next PI should factor in the historical trend while acknowledging the new team composition. The PO should facilitate a discussion with the team to understand the impact of the turnover before making assumptions about future capacity.

Answer

Permanently lower the team's capacity for all future iterations.

Answer

Ignore the I4 data as an anomaly and use the average of I1-I3.

Answer

Request the Scrum Master to force the team to return to a velocity of 30.

Question 7

An Agile Release Train is conducting its first PI Planning event. During the draft plan review, management observes that multiple teams have unresolved cross-team dependencies that threaten their proposed objectives. Which TWO leadership behaviors are critical to support the teams in resolving this challenge? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Facilitate cross-team discussions during the management review and problem-solving meeting to realign dependencies and adjust priorities.. Leadership must actively facilitate cross-team collaboration and empower teams to negotiate realistic adjustments during PI Planning. Unresolved dependencies threaten the entire Program Increment and require active executive intervention to clear roadblocks. By fostering a transparent environment, leaders help teams synchronize their plans and establish reliable commitments without relying on top-down escalation channels.

Answer

Instruct the affected teams to work independently and resolve their integration conflicts retroactively during the execution phase.

Answer

Advise the Agile Teams to drop all cross-functional features that rely on external suppliers to simplify their immediate planning scope.

Answer

Escalate the dependency issues directly to the enterprise executive board and pause PI Planning until a new architecture is designed.

Question 8

Refer to the exhibit. A team has completed their code and verified it passes all unit tests, but they have not yet run the QA automation suite. Can the Product Owner accept this story?

Accepted Answer

No, because the QA automation step has not been completed.. Refer to the exhibit. The Definition of Done (DoD) is a shared understanding of the quality standards required to consider a story complete. Since the policy dictates that 'qa_automation' must occur before 'po_acceptance', the PO cannot formally accept the story. This adherence to the DoD is crucial for preventing the accumulation of technical debt and ensuring that every piece of work meets the organization's quality expectations.

Answer

Yes, because unit tests have passed and the code is functionally complete.

Answer

Yes, but only if the PO manually tests the story first.

Answer

Yes, as long as the team promises to run automation later.

Question 9

During an Iteration, the team realizes that a committed Story is significantly more complex than anticipated and will not be completed. What is the most appropriate action for the Product Owner?

Accepted Answer

Collaborate with the team to remove the Story from the current Iteration and move it back to the Team Backlog.. In SAFe, the Product Owner must maintain transparency and collaboration. By removing the Story from the current iteration scope, the team avoids carrying over incomplete work and preserves the integrity of the team's velocity. This allows the team to refocus on high-value items that can actually be finished, ensuring that the Iteration Goal remains achievable and that the team maintains a predictable cadence of delivering quality, working software.

Answer

Ask the team to work overtime to ensure the Story is finished by the end of the Iteration.

Answer

Keep the Story in the Iteration and hope the team finds extra time to complete it later.

Answer

Immediately replace the Story with a new, smaller Story that the team can finish in the remaining days.

Question 10

Refer to the exhibit. The build failed due to a coverage policy. What should the Product Owner do first?

Accepted Answer

Collaborate with the team to identify why the coverage is insufficient.. The PO's immediate priority is to understand the impact of the policy violation on the team's workflow and quality standards. By discussing this with the team, the PO ensures that they understand the policy requirements and identifies if the coverage gap is due to missing tests or technical issues. This is a critical step in maintaining the Definition of Done and ensuring the team's automated testing strategy is robust.

Answer

Lower the coverage policy requirements to allow the build to pass.

Answer

Ask the team to ignore the policy and push the build manually.

Answer

Escalate the failure to management as a blocked team.

Question 11

Which THREE of the following are essential for a successful Iteration Review? (Choose three)

Accepted Answer

Showing only working, tested software.. A successful Iteration Review requires active participation, transparency, and a focus on reality. By demonstrating actual working software, teams prove their progress. Honest assessment of what was completed, combined with stakeholder input, creates a foundation for the next planning session. This feedback loop is essential for maintaining the alignment between the team's output and the business's evolving needs, ensuring that resources are always directed toward the highest-value work.

Answer

Presenting a slide deck showing the team's planned velocity.

Answer

Discussing how to improve the team's internal development processes.

Question 12

What is the Product Owner's main focus during the Iteration Planning event?

Accepted Answer

Ensuring the team commits to a realistic plan based on prioritized work.. During Iteration Planning, the PO's primary focus is to ensure the team understands the 'what' and 'why' of the work, and that they collectively agree on the goals. By presenting a prioritized backlog and clearly articulating the value of each story, the PO enables the team to commit to a realistic plan. This collaborative event is critical for establishing a shared understanding and commitment for the upcoming work.

Answer

Assigning every task to individual team members.

Answer

Writing the code for the most complex stories.

Answer

Deciding the technical architecture for the iteration.

Question 13

Refer to the exhibit. The current board configuration shows a WIP violation in the QA column. What is the most appropriate action for the PO?

Accepted Answer

Help the team focus on finishing existing work before starting new stories.. The PO should support the team in stopping new work to focus on clearing the bottleneck in QA. By honoring WIP limits, the team ensures flow and avoids multi-tasking, which is critical for PI execution. The PO plays a key role by helping the team reprioritize their focus to address the constraint, ensuring that the team finishes items before starting new ones to maintain consistent delivery velocity.

Answer

Ignore the WIP limit and ask the team to start the next set of features.

Answer

Increase the WIP limit to allow the team to keep moving.

Answer

Reassign developers to the QA team to bypass the bottleneck.

Question 14

Refer to the exhibit. The system log indicates a dependency blocker for 'Team_Alpha_API_Integration'. What is the most effective way for the PO to handle this blocker?

Accepted Answer

Escalate the issue through the ART Sync to get cross-team support.. The PO should immediately raise this issue during the Scrum of Scrums or ART Sync. By exposing the dependency blocker, the PO utilizes the ART's governance structure to get the support needed from other teams or management. This transparency ensures that the blocker is visible to the Release Train Engineer and other POs, enabling collaborative problem-solving to unblock the team's progress effectively.

Answer

Wait until the next PI Planning to discuss this blocker with the other team.

Answer

Tell the developers to ignore the API and build a temporary mock service.

Answer

Contact the Team Alpha PO directly to demand a fix.

Question 15

Who is responsible for accepting Stories as 'Done' during the PI Execution?

Accepted Answer

The Product Owner. The Product Owner has the primary responsibility for accepting stories. They must ensure that each story meets its specific Acceptance Criteria and the team's Definition of Done. This ensures that the work delivered by the team aligns with the PO's expectations and the overall goals of the iteration.

Answer

The Scrum Master

Answer

The Release Train Engineer

Answer

The System Architect

Question 16

A Product Owner is working with a team that has a high volume of unplanned work, causing them to miss their Iteration Goals. The team's velocity has dropped, and stakeholders are becoming concerned. What is the most effective action for the Product Owner to take?

Accepted Answer

Work with the team and stakeholders to identify the sources of unplanned work and establish a buffer for it in the team's capacity.. The most effective action is to identify the sources of unplanned work and establish a capacity buffer. This enables the team to handle interruptions while maintaining predictable delivery. It also promotes transparency and collaboration with stakeholders to manage expectations and reduce future unplanned work.

Answer

Increase the team's capacity for the next Iteration to compensate for the lost velocity.

Answer

Ask the Release Train Engineer to enforce a code freeze to prevent unplanned work from entering the Iteration.

Answer

Reduce the team's Iteration Goals to only include high-priority items and ignore unplanned work.

Question 17

A Product Manager is defining the roles across a new Agile Release Train. Which two responsibilities belong specifically to the Product Management function rather than to the team-level Product Owner? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Defining and communicating the Solution Vision and Solution Intent for the upcoming Program Increment.. Product Management operates at the program and solution level, owning the Solution Vision, Solution Intent, and the Program Backlog of features. These responsibilities require a cross-team, market-facing perspective that differs from the team-level focus of the Product Owner. Team Backlog prioritization, story acceptance, retrospectives, and story-level acceptance criteria remain with the team and its Product Owner.

Answer

Writing detailed acceptance criteria for every user story in the Team Backlog.

Answer

Prioritizing the Team Backlog and accepting user stories at the end of each Iteration.

Answer

Facilitating the Iteration Retrospective and tracking team improvement actions.

Question 18

A Product Manager in a SAFe ART is defining the role's responsibilities. Which two activities are primary functions of the Product Management role? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Defining and maintaining the Program Vision and roadmap.. Product Management is accountable for the Program Vision, roadmap, and Program Backlog, including defining and prioritizing Features. Managing the Team Backlog, facilitating daily events, and running the Inspect & Adapt workshop are responsibilities of the Product Owner, Scrum Master, or Release Train Engineer.

Answer

Managing the Team Backlog and defining iteration goals.

Answer

Conducting the Inspect & Adapt workshop and tracking ART metrics.

Answer

Facilitating the Daily Stand-up and removing team impediments.

Question 19

During the fourth iteration of a Program Increment, the Product Owner learns that a competitor has just released a feature that directly threatens the ART's main revenue stream. The team is currently working on a different, lower-value Feature. What should the Product Owner do first?

Accepted Answer

Evaluate the new Feature against the current PI objectives and the ART's economic framework, then bring it to the relevant stakeholders for a decision on whether to pivot.. When a competitive threat emerges mid-PI, the Product Owner must balance responsiveness with the ART's commitments and economic framework. The correct approach is to evaluate the new Feature's cost of delay and strategic fit, then engage the right stakeholders to decide whether to adjust the PI. This preserves alignment and ensures decisions are made with full context.

Answer

Wait until the next PI Planning event to raise the competitive Feature, because mid-PI changes are not allowed in SAFe.

Answer

Immediately stop all current work and instruct the team to begin developing the competitive Feature, since speed to market is the highest priority.

Answer

Add the new competitive Feature to the team's backlog and ask the team to start working on it immediately, without involving other stakeholders.

Question 20

A Product Owner is working with a team that has a high degree of technical debt, causing frequent defects and slowing down new feature development. The team's velocity has dropped by 30% over the last two PIs. What is the most appropriate action for the Product Owner?

Accepted Answer

Allocate a portion of each Iteration's capacity to address technical debt, making it visible in the team backlog as enablers.. Technical debt should be addressed continuously, not through separate hardening phases or overtime. The Product Owner can make debt visible as enablers in the team backlog and allocate a percentage of each Iteration's capacity to pay it down. This maintains a sustainable pace, reduces defects, and gradually restores velocity without sacrificing all feature delivery.

Answer

Ask the team to work overtime for the next few Iterations to catch up on feature delivery.

Answer

Escalate to the System Architect to refactor the entire codebase before any new features are developed.

Answer

Request that the Release Train Engineer add a separate hardening Iteration at the end of the next PI.