CAPM Agile Frameworks and Methodologies Practice Question
A software development team has been using a feature branch workflow with long-lived branches. They frequently experience merge conflicts and integration delays. The team wants to adopt a more agile approach to reduce these issues. Which practice should the team adopt?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap is that feature flags and pair programming sound like agile improvements, but the question's root cause is branch divergence — only continuous integration (frequent merging) directly fixes merge conflicts and integration delays.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Adopt continuous integration, integrating code at least daily
Long-lived feature branches cause merge conflicts and integration delays because code diverges for weeks; continuous integration (CI) requires developers to merge to a shared trunk at least daily, which surfaces conflicts early and keeps the codebase integrable. This directly addresses the root cause of the team's pain. CI is a core agile engineering practice that shortens feedback loops.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Adopt continuous integration, integrating code at least daily
Why this is correct
Daily integration into a shared trunk forces small, frequent merges, directly eliminating the long-lived branch divergence causing conflicts and integration delays. This is the defining practice of continuous integration, and it addresses the stem's constraint of frequent merge conflicts.
- ✗
Implement timeboxed iterations for each feature
Why it's wrong here
Timeboxing each feature constrains duration but keeps work isolated on its own branch until completion, so branches still diverge and conflicts accumulate. Timeboxing suits managing scope and cadence, not the integration frequency that trunk-based development addresses.
- ✗
Implement feature flags to hide incomplete work
Why it's wrong here
Feature flags hide unfinished functionality from users but leave long-lived branches intact, so merges still diverge and conflicts persist. Flags suit releasing decoupled code safely in production; they do not shorten branch lifetime, which is the actual cause of the integration delays described.
- ✗
Use pair programming to improve code quality
Why it's wrong here
Pair programming raises code quality through continuous review but does not shorten branch lifetime, so divergent branches still produce the same merge conflicts and delayed integration. It suits defect-prone or knowledge-sharing work, not the branch-duration problem this team faces.
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Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official PMI exam blueprint
This CAPM practice question is part of Courseiva's free PMI certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CAPM exam.