SSM Supporting ART Events Practice Question
A team is struggling to draft their PI Objectives during the first Team Breakout session of PI Planning. They have listed all their Stories on the team board but cannot agree on the objectives. How should the Scrum Master coach the team?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often assume PI Objectives are just a summary of User Stories. This leads to selecting options that suggest simply grouping Story titles rather than identifying the underlying business value or purpose.
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
✓
Encourage the team to synthesize their planned work into business-oriented summary statements.
PI Objectives provide a common language for communicating with business stakeholders. The Scrum Master must guide the team to move beyond a simple list of technical tasks or Story titles. By focusing on the intended business value and outcomes, the team can create a summary that aligns their technical work with the overall mission of the ART.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Suggest the team use the titles of their highest-priority User Stories as the objectives.
Why it's wrong here
User Story titles are often too granular and technical for business stakeholders to understand. Objectives must provide a higher-level summary of what the team intends to achieve. Simply copying titles fails to communicate the actual business value or the 'why' behind the iteration's planned development work.
- ✓
Encourage the team to synthesize their planned work into business-oriented summary statements.
Why this is correct
Effective PI Objectives translate technical intent into business language that stakeholders understand. This synthesis helps the team clarify their goals and provides a basis for the business value assignment by the Business Owners. It ensures that everyone on the ART is aligned on the expected outcomes of the work.
- ✗
Advise the team to wait until the Draft Plan Review to receive objectives from the Product Manager.
Why it's wrong here
PI Objectives are authored by the team itself to reflect what they can realistically commit to during the PI. Waiting for the Product Manager to provide them violates the principle of decentralized decision-making. The team must take ownership of their plan and its communication to ensure a realistic commitment.
- ✗
Direct the team to list every Story as an individual objective to ensure full transparency.
Why it's wrong here
Listing every Story as an objective creates too much detail and noise for the PI Planning event. It obscures the primary goals and makes it difficult for Business Owners to assign value effectively. High-level objectives are designed to simplify communication and focus on the most important delivery outcomes.
About these practice questions
This SSM question is part of Courseiva's 385-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Scaled Agile exam blueprint
This SSM practice question is part of Courseiva's free Scaled Agile 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 SSM exam.