CSM Scrum Team Roles and Accountabilities Practice Question
A Product Owner is unavailable for three consecutive Sprints due to a medical emergency. Who is responsible for managing the Product Backlog during this absence?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often assume the Scrum Master takes over the Product Backlog or that the team can simply ignore it. Both are incorrect as the organization must ensure the PO's accountabilities are fulfilled.
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
✓
The organization must ensure the Product Owner accountabilities are fulfilled through temporary delegation or reassignment.
The Scrum Guide states that the Product Owner is accountable for effective Product Backlog management. If the Product Owner is unavailable, the organization must ensure this accountability is fulfilled. While others may help with the mechanics, the accountability remains with the Product Owner role or requires an explicit handover. This ensures the team remains focused on value delivery while maintaining clarity on product direction despite unforeseen personnel changes.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
The Scrum Master takes over all Product Owner accountabilities until they return.
Why it's wrong here
The Scrum Master focuses on the effectiveness of the Scrum Team, not the product strategy. Taking over Product Owner duties creates a conflict of interest, as the Scrum Master must remain neutral to coach the team and facilitate Scrum events effectively without being biased by specific product requirements.
- ✗
The Developers collectively decide on the priority of the Product Backlog items.
Why it's wrong here
While Developers refine items, they lack the organizational authority to manage the Product Backlog's strategic value. Giving them this power often leads to technical-focused backlogs rather than customer-value-focused backlogs, undermining the specific intent of separating business accountability from technical delivery within the Scrum framework.
- ✓
The organization must ensure the Product Owner accountabilities are fulfilled through temporary delegation or reassignment.
Why this is correct
Accountability for the Product Backlog cannot simply vanish during an absence. The organization must take responsibility to ensure someone is empowered to make decisions regarding value and priority. This maintains the flow of the Scrum process and prevents the team from becoming stalled or directionless during the gap.
- ✗
The Sprint remains frozen until the Product Owner returns to manage the backlog.
Why it's wrong here
Freezing a Sprint violates the core Scrum principle of continuous delivery and empiricism. A Scrum Team must be able to continue delivering value. Relying on a single person to the extent that the entire team stops working indicates a lack of organizational support and poor contingency planning.
About these practice questions
This CSM question is part of Courseiva's 312-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 Scrum Alliance exam blueprint
This CSM practice question is part of Courseiva's free Scrum Alliance 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 CSM exam.