Agile & Scrum Questions, Answers

## Q1

**Question:** What measure does NOT provide relevant or useful information about a team's ability to deliver value to the user/customer in the future? 

**Answer:** A. Story points delivered trends 

**Explanation:**

- Velocity (story points) measures effort completed, not customer value.

- Story points are team-relative and non-comparable; trends can be gamed and don’t predict future value.

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## Q2

**Question:** Developers are close to the end of a Sprint and ask for 3 extra days to complete their work. What should you do? 

**Answer:** C. Do not extend the Sprint and stick to the original timebox. Work with stakeholders to explain why transparency and openness are important. 

**Explanation:**

- Sprints are fixed timeboxes to enable predictability and empirical control.

- Be transparent about what’s done vs. not done; use it to inspect & adapt.

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## Q3

**Question:** Which statement best describes a Product Owner’s responsibilities? 

**Answer:** B. Maximizing the value of the work the Scrum Team delivers. 

**Explanation:**

- PO owns product value, orders backlog by value/risk, and ensures clarity.

- Not a project manager; Developers are self-managing.

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## Q4

**Question:** What is a primary benefit of an agile approach? 

**Answer:** D. It helps organizations better deliver value and satisfy customers. 

**Explanation:**

- Agile prioritizes customer value through iterative delivery and feedback.

- Speed/cost improvements are secondary outcomes of value focus.

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## Q5

**Question:** The primary benefit of an Agile approach is: 

**Answer:** C. It enables a team to inspect and adapt their results by delivering a working product. 

**Explanation:**

- Empiricism: frequent working increments → inspection & adaptation.

- Real feedback beats upfront assumptions.

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## Q6

**Question:** One of the newest and least experienced Scrum Teams is distributed (London, Paris, Mumbai). What outcome would you expect? 

**Answer:** C. The team will likely need help with communication and knowledge sharing challenges. 

**Explanation:**

- Distance/time zones introduce collaboration friction.

- Facilitation, tooling, and explicit working agreements are key.

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## Q7

**Question:** The Scrum Master asks you to route communications to the team through her. What do you do? 

**Answer:** A. Agree to her request, yet indicate that there may be occasions where you may still communicate directly with the Scrum Team. 

**Explanation:**

- SM helps protect team focus; fewer external interrupts.

- Maintain transparency; direct communication may sometimes be necessary.

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## Q8

**Question:** How can Scrum provide you insight without extra status meetings? 

**Answer:** A. Stay informed about the Product Backlog items and pay attention to the improvement items that come from the Sprint Retrospectives. 

**Explanation:**

- Scrum artifacts and events provide built-in transparency.

- Retrospective actions signal health and improvement focus.

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## Q9

**Question:** Which of the following statements is true? 

**Answer:** B. Delivering a solution and gathering feedback provides valuable information to plan the next step. 

**Explanation:**

- Empirical learning from working software guides better decisions.

- Short feedback cycles reduce risk of building the wrong thing.

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## Q10

**Question:** PO availability is very low; Developers struggle to deliver value. Best way to help the Scrum Master? 

**Answer:** B. Work with the PO and his manager to ensure the PO’s participation level is high enough. 

**Explanation:**

- PO engagement is critical for backlog clarity and value decisions.

- Solve root capacity/prioritization issues; avoid proxies.

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## Q11

**Question:** Which statement is NOT true of cross-functional teams? 

**Answer:** D. Cross-functional teams help team members develop deep technical specializations. 

**Explanation:**

- Cross-functional teams favor T-shaped skills (breadth + some depth).

- Goal is end-to-end delivery without external dependencies.

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## Q12

**Question:** A Developer feels her expertise isn’t respected and asks for manager help to force consultation. What should you do? 

**Answer:** C. Ask if she has discussed the issue with her team and raised it with the Scrum Master. 

**Explanation:**

- Scrum values self-management and open team communication first.

- Use the SM to coach facilitation; escalate only after team attempts.

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## Q13

**Question:** Most effective way a Scrum Master can keep a Scrum Team highly productive? 

**Answer:** A. Facilitate Scrum Team decisions and remove impediments. 

**Explanation:**

- SM serves teams by coaching, facilitating, and eliminating blockers.

- Developers own the Daily Scrum; SM ensures it happens effectively.

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## Q14

**Question:** Primary benefit of an agile approach vs. traditional up-front approach? 

**Answer:** D. To maximize value. 

**Explanation:**

- Agile optimizes for outcomes over plan conformance.

- Iterative prioritization and feedback maximize customer value.

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## Q15

**Question:** Scrum Team is constantly interrupted by production incidents for a legacy app unrelated to their product. How manage? 

**Answer:** B. Work with the Scrum Team to help transfer the knowledge to other teams better aligned with the application support mission. 

**Explanation:**

- Protect product team focus; route support work to appropriate owners.

- Reduce single-expert dependency via documentation/training.

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## Q16

**Question:** Organization rewards individual performance; teams want team bonuses. What should be done? 

**Answer:** A. Allocate the bonus to the team and let them decide how to split it. 

**Explanation:**

- Encourages collective ownership and self-management.

- Reduces unhealthy competition; aligns incentives with team outcomes.

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## Q17

**Question:** Which is NOT a good reason to keep a team together long-term? 

**Answer:** C. To improve utilization. 

**Explanation:**

- Agile prioritizes value/flow over resource utilization.

- Stability improves collaboration, focus, and forecasting—not “utilization.”

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## Q18

**Question:** Your manager asks for a plan for next fiscal year. Best way to proceed? 

**Answer:** C. Work with the Product Owner(s) to analyze delivery capability vs. demand, then build a probabilistic forecast. 

**Explanation:**

- Use empirical data (throughput/lead time) and uncertainty ranges.

- Avoid normalizing points across teams or rigid Gantt commitments.

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## Q19

**Question:** Stakeholders can’t agree on product vision. As PO, what helps reach consensus? 

**Answer:** C. Run experiments by building and delivering selective aspects to test the market and get feedback. 

**Explanation:**

- Validated learning aligns stakeholders using evidence.

- Short experiments clarify needs faster than debate.

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## Q20

**Question:** One team’s velocity (15–20) is much lower than others (35–40). Is this cause for concern? 

**Answer:** D. No, velocity is not a meaningful measurement of the value delivered by agile teams. 

**Explanation:**

- Story points are team-relative; cross-team comparisons are meaningless.

- Focus on outcomes, quality, and impediments—not raw velocity.

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## Q21

**Question:** Value stream mapping is useful to: 

**Answer:** D. Identify sources of waste and activities that do not add value in a process. 

**Explanation:**

- VSM visualizes flow to expose bottlenecks, queues, delays, rework.

- Leads to streamlined delivery and shorter lead times.

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## Q22

**Question:** Heated disagreement between Developers on technical approach—how proceed? 

**Answer:** A. The Developers should run an experiment to test the alternative approaches. 

**Explanation:**

- Developers own technical decisions in Scrum.

- Empirical testing de-risks choices and builds alignment.

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## Q23

**Question:** SME suggests replacing members due to skill gaps in a new team—manager action? 

**Answer:** D. Recommend that the SME raise the concern with the Scrum Team and support them; leave decisions to the team. 

**Explanation:**

- Teams are self-managing; they choose training, pairing, or staffing options.

- Manager enables and supports, not dictates team membership.

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## Q24

**Question:** CMO hears several customers want a feature not in next release; PO disagrees. What should you do? 

**Answer:** C. Connect the PO with the customers for firsthand insights, but leave the decision to the PO. 

**Explanation:**

- Improve information quality while respecting PO accountability.

- Avoid pressure tactics that undermine Scrum roles.

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## Q25

**Question:** Operations frequently interrupts a team member due to legacy expertise—manager help? 

**Answer:** C. Work with the Scrum Team to transfer the knowledge to someone outside the Scrum Team for future occurrences. 

**Explanation:**

- Build redundancy and move support burden outside the product team.

- Protect focus and Sprint Goals from external demands.

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## Q26

**Question:** Who is responsible for managing the progress of work during a Sprint? 

**Answer:** E. The Developers. 

**Explanation:**

- Developers self-manage progress toward the Sprint Goal.

- SM facilitates; PO orders backlog—neither manages Sprint progress.

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## Q27

**Question:** Sales rep wants a feature to close a deal; PO believes higher-value items should be prioritized. Manager response? 

**Answer:** D. Support the PO’s decision to focus on broader market needs in the long run. 

**Explanation:**

- PO maximizes long-term product value; short-term deals shouldn’t override strategy.

- Lobbying undermines role clarity and cohesion.

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## Q28

**Question:** New agile initiative; how decide team membership? 

**Answer:** D. Bring together interested people, discuss product goals, remind teams they need balanced skills/experience, and let them self-organize. 

**Explanation:**

- Self-organization builds ownership and better fit.

- Managers provide context/constraints, not top-down assignment.

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## Q29

**Question:** Developers lack engagement and feel disconnected from the work. What should you do? 

**Answer:** D. Help the team to create a shared and compelling vision for the product. 

**Explanation:**

- Purpose and customer impact drive intrinsic motivation.

- Rewards/events rarely fix lack of meaning.

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## Q30

**Question:** Your organization wants to improve Time-to-Market. Which improvement helps best? 

**Answer:** B. Reducing the size of each release to deliver fewer features. 

**Explanation:**

- Smaller batches decrease cycle time and increase feedback speed.

- Lower risk and faster value realization.

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## Q31

**Question:** Several agile teams on one product—how find the “best performing” team? 

**Answer:** C. Comparing team performance often leads to unhealthy behaviors. Instead, focus on removing impediments. 

**Explanation:**

- Comparisons incentivize gaming and harm collaboration.

- Help each team improve flow, quality, outcomes.

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## Q32

**Question:** What traditionally “good” behavior can impede the adoption of an agile culture? 

**Answer:** F. All the above. 

**Explanation:**

- Specialization, individual rewards, rigid standards, high utilization, fixed-scope management conflict with agility.

- Agile favors cross-functional collaboration, adaptability, and value focus.

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## Q33

**Question:** Team fails Sprint Goals due to interruptions from other teams. Best two actions? 

**Answer:** D and E. 

**Explanation:**

- (D) Reassign interrupting work outside the Scrum Team to protect focus. 

- (E) Coach the team to set realistic Sprint Goals considering known constraints.

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## Q34

**Question:** When a Scrum Team fails to deliver a working product Increment for several Sprints in a row, who is accountable for resolving this? 

**Answer:** E. The Scrum Team. 

**Explanation:**

- PO, SM, and Developers share accountability for a usable, valuable Increment each Sprint.

- Root-cause analysis and improvements should be owned collectively.

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