SSM Introducing Scrum in SAFe Practice Test 4 — 15 Questions

Question 1

Refer to the exhibit. As a Scrum Master, how should you address the situation described in the log?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a re-planning session to adjust the plan based on velocity.. The team is over-committing, as evidenced by the gap between their average velocity (42) and their planned capacity (60). The Scrum Master must guide the team to use historical data for realistic planning. This is important because over-committing leads to burnout, technical debt, and missed commitments, which destabilize the entire ART's predictability and value delivery for the PI.

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Encourage the team to work overtime to meet the 60-point commitment.

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Assign the extra 18 points of work to Team B to balance the load.

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Ignore the velocity discrepancy as it is common for teams to overestimate.

Question 2

When should the Iteration Retrospective occur in a SAFe team?

Accepted Answer

Immediately following the Iteration Review, before the next Iteration Planning.. The Iteration Retrospective must occur after the Iteration Review and before the next Iteration Planning. This timing is essential because it allows the team to reflect on the results of the review and incorporate lessons learned into their next planning cycle. This creates a continuous improvement loop that directly informs how the team organizes and executes their work in the subsequent iteration.

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During the System Demo to ensure maximum attendance.

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At the end of the Program Increment only, to save time.

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Whenever the team feels they have enough to discuss.

Question 3

What is the main benefit of having a cross-functional team in SAFe?

Accepted Answer

It enables the team to deliver value independently and faster.. A cross-functional team possesses all the skills necessary to define, build, test, and deploy a feature from start to finish. This minimizes handoffs and wait times, which are the primary enemies of fast flow. By enabling the team to be self-sufficient, SAFe increases the speed of value delivery and allows the team to maintain a higher degree of focus and accountability for their outcomes.

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It allows individual team members to specialize deeply in one area.

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It eliminates the need for any external dependencies on other teams.

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It forces team members to do work they are not trained for.

Question 4

What is the primary role of the Scrum Master during the Daily Stand-up?

Accepted Answer

To ensure the meeting is focused on the team's progress toward the goal.. The Daily Stand-up is a team event for synchronization and identifying blockers, not a status report to the Scrum Master. The Scrum Master's role is to ensure the meeting happens, stays within the timebox, and focuses on the iteration goals. They facilitate the process, helping the team stay disciplined, and take notes of blockers that require their intervention outside of the meeting.

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To listen to status updates from each member and update the Jira board.

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To decide who works on which story for the day based on skill sets.

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To resolve every blocker discussed during the meeting immediately.

Question 5

When a team struggles to meet their Definition of Done (DoD) because of external infrastructure dependencies, what should the Scrum Master do?

Accepted Answer

Escalate the dependency to the RTE to find a systemic solution.. The Scrum Master's role is to ensure the team can succeed and maintain quality. If external factors prevent the team from meeting their DoD, the Scrum Master must escalate the issue to the Release Train Engineer to seek help. Ignoring the issue or lowering the standard compromises the team's quality and the integrity of the integrated system increment.

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Adjust the Definition of Done to exclude those infrastructure items.

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Ask the team to work overtime to manually handle the infrastructure needs.

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Ignore the DoD and focus only on completing the user stories.

Question 6

A new Agile Release Train (ART) is struggling to synchronize their iterations because teams follow different cadences. As the Scrum Master, what is the primary benefit of enforcing a common cadence for all teams on the ART?

Accepted Answer

It ensures that all teams integrate their work simultaneously for the System Demo.. Standardizing the iteration cadence is a foundational requirement in SAFe to ensure alignment, enable cross-team planning, and simplify synchronization. By having all teams start and end on the same day, the ART can conduct system demos predictably, coordinate dependencies effectively, and maintain a steady flow of value. This synchronization reduces the overhead of managing disparate schedules and provides a reliable heartbeat for the entire train to measure progress and adapt.

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It allows teams to choose their own iteration lengths based on velocity.

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It facilitates the assessment of team velocity by comparing individual team performance.

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It eliminates the need for the Scrum of Scrums meeting.

Question 7

Which TWO of the following are responsibilities of the Scrum Master in a SAFe environment? (Choose two)

Accepted Answer

Facilitating the team's ceremonies and processes.. Scrum Masters in SAFe act as servant leaders who facilitate team events and remove impediments. They also play a crucial role in the ART, contributing to the Scrum of Scrums to surface dependencies and blockers. Their primary focus is to foster high-performing teams, coach them on SAFe practices, and ensure the team is continuously improving their processes to deliver value efficiently within the larger framework.

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Defining the Program Vision and Roadmap.

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Prioritizing the Team Backlog.

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Assigning individual tasks to team members.

Question 8

A Scrum Master notices that a team is consistently failing to complete their User Stories during the iteration. What is the most effective first step for the Scrum Master to take?

Accepted Answer

Facilitate a team discussion to analyze the root cause of the incomplete work.. The Scrum Master must first facilitate a discussion within the team to identify the root cause of the failure to meet the Definition of Done. Rather than blaming the team, the Scrum Master encourages transparency and empirical observation. By understanding whether the issue is related to technical debt, scope creep, or poor estimation, the team can implement targeted process improvements that directly address the specific challenges causing the delays.

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Report the team to the Release Train Engineer for poor performance.

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Assign the incomplete work to the next iteration automatically.

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Require the team to work longer hours to finish the current stories.

Question 9

During PI Planning, a team identifies a significant dependency on another team that is not available until the second iteration of the PI. How should the Scrum Master handle this?

Accepted Answer

Document the dependency on the Program Board and coordinate with the other team.. Effective dependency management is a key Scrum Master responsibility. The Scrum Master must ensure the dependency is documented on the Program Board and communicated to the other team's Scrum Master immediately. By raising this early, the teams can negotiate a solution, such as rearranging the order of work, creating a mock, or adjusting their plans, ensuring that the dependency does not become a blocker that halts progress later in the PI.

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Ignore the dependency and hope the other team completes their work.

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Ask the Product Owner to remove the story from the plan entirely.

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Instruct the team to build a placeholder component themselves.

Question 10

Which of the following best describes the Scrum Master's role in the Daily Stand-up (DSU)?

Accepted Answer

To ensure the meeting remains timeboxed and focused on the iteration goal.. The Scrum Master's role in the DSU is to facilitate the event, ensuring it stays within the timebox and focuses on alignment toward the iteration goal. They do not report to management but rather listen for blockers and dependencies that the team needs help resolving. By keeping the meeting brief and focused, the Scrum Master ensures the team remains synchronized and empowered to manage their daily execution effectively.

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To act as the manager who assigns tasks for the day.

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To collect individual progress reports for external stakeholders.

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To solve all technical problems raised during the meeting.

Question 11

An enterprise is transitioning to SAFe and introducing Scrum at the team level. The Release Train Engineer wants to ensure that the newly formed Agile Teams understand how Scrum integrates with the broader framework. Which TWO activities are critical for the Scrum Master to champion during this introduction phase? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Facilitating team participation in Program Increment Planning and execution events.. Championing relentless improvement through effective retrospectives and ensuring alignment with PI planning are vital Scrum Master responsibilities. These activities bridge the gap between team-level Scrum execution and enterprise-level value delivery. Mastering these foundational practices accelerates team maturity and fosters sustainable value streams across the Agile Release Train.

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Establishing independent team financial budgets and standalone profit-and-loss statements.

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Redefining corporate governance policies to bypass traditional HR performance reviews.

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Replacing the Product Owner with an enterprise portfolio manager for backlog prioritization.

Question 12

An Agile Release Train is launching, and the teams are struggling to establish their first Team Backlogs because they are attempting to decompose all solution epics down to user stories before PI Planning. What is the primary role of the Scrum Master in addressing this anti-pattern?

Accepted Answer

Coach the team and Product Owner to apply Just-In-Time refinement, focusing story elaboration only on the upcoming iterations.. The Scrum Master must coach the team to embrace Just-In-Time refinement, explaining that only the top features for the upcoming Program Increment need detailed decomposition, leaving downstream work as higher-level backlog items. This approach prevents analysis paralysis and aligns with Lean principles of delaying decisions until the last responsible moment while maintaining team flow.

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Escalate the issue to the Release Train Engineer to pause the PI Planning event until all backlogs are fully groomed.

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Take over backlog refinement directly by writing all user stories for the team to ensure they meet the definition of ready.

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Instruct the Product Manager to remove all epics from the program backlog until the team finishes writing their first stories.

Question 13

A newly formed Scrum team in a SAFe enterprise is experiencing low engagement during Daily Stand-ups. Team members spend most of the time reporting status updates directly to the Scrum Master instead of collaborating on meeting their iteration goals. What should the Scrum Master do?

Accepted Answer

Coach the team to focus their discussion on how they will collaborate to achieve the iteration goals using the Kanban board.. The Scrum Master must redirect the focus of the Daily Stand-up from a status reporting ritual to a collaborative synchronization meeting centered on the iteration board. By coaching the team to talk to each other about impediments and progress toward goals, the Scrum Master fosters self-organization and accountability.

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Cancel the Daily Stand-up and replace it with a daily email status report sent directly to the Release Train Engineer.

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Run the Daily Stand-up personally by asking each team member individual questions about their completed tasks.

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Report the unengaged team members to the functional manager so that formal performance counseling can be initiated.

Question 14

During an Iteration Review for a team adopting SAFe Scrum, a stakeholder expresses frustration that a major user story was not completed because the team spent unexpected time fixing architectural defects. The Product Owner accepted the partial work. How should the Scrum Master address this?

Accepted Answer

Coach the team and Product Owner on the Definition of Done, ensuring only fully completed stories are accepted and counted.. The Scrum Master must coach both the Product Owner and the team on the strict definition of done, emphasizing that incomplete stories cannot be accepted as done simply because some work was performed. Unfinished stories must return to the backlog for re-prioritization in future planning cycles.

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Instruct the Product Owner to mark the story as complete in the tracking tool so the velocity metrics remain artificially high.

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Advise the team to skip writing automated unit tests in future iterations so they can deliver features faster under pressure.

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Blame the System Architect for failing to provide clear technical guidelines before the iteration started.

Question 15

An enterprise is introducing Scrum within SAFe, and leadership wants to understand how Scrum teams integrate with the broader Agile Release Train cadence. Which TWO statements accurately describe this relationship? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Scrum teams synchronize their iteration boundaries to align with the Program Increment and participate in train-level events.. In SAFe, Scrum teams operate on short timeboxed iterations that synchronize within a larger Program Increment cadence, ensuring continuous delivery alignment. Furthermore, team backlogs are derived from and aligned with the program backlog and train vision, connecting team execution directly to strategic themes.

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Team iterations are decoupled from the Program Increment cadence and can run on completely random lengths.

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Team backlogs operate completely independently without needing any traceability to the program backlog or train objectives.

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Scrum Masters are strictly prohibited from attending Program Increment planning events to protect team focus.