PMI PMI-ACP - PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP)

To improve the team’s productivity, it is essential to keep both the product backlog and the iteration backlog up to date. The product backlog contains the overall product features and requirements, while the iteration backlog focuses on the work planned for the current iteration. Ensuring that both backlogs are updated as issues and new tasks arise will help maintain clarity and avoid confusion, enabling the team to prioritize and track progress more effectively. This will also help minimize delays and rework, as the team will have a clear, accurate view of what needs to be done and what has been accomplished.

The correct answer is C – Encourage the product owner and team to analyze the impact of the changes and prioritize the backlog.

Agile embraces change, even late in the development cycle, but it must be managed through value-driven prioritization. Instead of blindly accepting all changes or overrunning the budget, the product owner collaborates with the team and stakeholders to evaluate the impact, adjust priorities, and ensure high-value items are delivered within constraints.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile teams welcome change but balance it with value delivery by continuously prioritizing the product backlog. When scope increases, the team and product owner must evaluate trade-offs and adjust delivery accordingly.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.4 – Value-Based Prioritization)

Mike Griffiths affirms:

“Backlog grooming is a key mechanism to handle change. Product owners collaborate with stakeholders and the team to evaluate new requests, weigh impacts, and reprioritize as necessary.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 3 – Value-Driven Delivery)

Other options are incorrect:

A may be true in some organizations but is not an Agile principle.

B contradicts Agile’s emphasis on sustainable pace.

D may help clarify budgets but doesn’t resolve the issue collaboratively.

Answer: C

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The agile lead should evaluate the team ' s capacity and help them select user stories that align with around 80% of their available capacity for the iteration. This approach takes into account potential issues or interruptions and helps ensure the team is not overcommitting. By selecting user stories based on a realistic understanding of the team’s capacity, the team is more likely to meet their commitments and avoid incomplete work. This method promotes sustainable work practices and helps the team maintain a predictable velocity over time.

Creating a psychologically safe environment is a key agile principle. According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 4.3.2 Team Environment), leaders should build trust and inclusion, especially for new or hesitant team members. Demonstrating that input is respected and acted upon helps new members gain confidence.

Mike Griffiths in his PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance) emphasizes that inclusive collaboration and modeling desired behaviors in team settings are more effective than handling everything in private or through hierarchy.

Option B is correct because it combines assurance and public demonstration of team values.

Option A may violate psychological safety.

Option C implies isolation and reduces integration.

Option D is helpful but lacks the team visibility that builds mutual trust.

In Kanban, one of the most effective ways to reduce variability in cycle time is by ensuring a consistent size of work items. According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.7 Flow-based Agile - Kanban), maintaining uniformity in work item size helps stabilize the system and supports reliable forecasts. Large or complex stories increase variability and unpredictability.

Mike Griffiths in the PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Value-Driven Delivery) recommends splitting large user stories and maintaining size thresholds for items on the board to ensure flow efficiency.

Option C aligns best with this practice: establishing a policy for breaking down large stories and adjusting WIP accordingly will help standardize flow, minimize cycle time variation, and improve predictability.

The Definition of Done (DoD) is a shared understanding of what it means for work to be considered complete. It is typically defined by the project sponsor and project team in collaboration. The DoD outlines the criteria that must be met for user stories, features, or tasks to be considered done, ensuring alignment between stakeholders and the development team. While the product owner, Scrum master, and stakeholders may influence the criteria, the final agreement on what constitutes " done " is determined by the project team and sponsor.

In agile methodology, particularly in Scrum, it is essential to focus on delivering value through iterative, incremental development. Rather than planning everything upfront for the entire 2-year duration, the focus should be on delivering small, manageable releases on a regular cadence, allowing for flexibility and adaptability based on feedback from stakeholders. This approach helps to ensure that the team remains responsive to changing requirements and can continually improve the product over time.

Step 1: Identify Remaining MVP Story Points

The backlog lists the MVP-related stories that are not yet started:

Accessibility – color blind → 4 story points

Increase security → 21 story points

Add AI chatbot → 5 story points

Total remaining MVP story points = 4 + 21 + 5 = 30

Step 2: Consider Velocity and Sprint Progress

The risk register mentions a reduction of 1 story point per sprint from sprints 4 through 6 due to the holiday schedule.

If we assume the team ' s normal velocity is 10 story points per sprint (hypothetically), it would drop to 9 story points per sprint for sprints 4-6.

Step 3: Calculate Completion Sprint

If the team normally completes 10 story points per sprint, they would require approximately 3 sprints (Sprint 7, Sprint 8, and Sprint 9) to complete the remaining 30 story points.

Agile emphasizes just enough detail to start work and adapt through ongoing conversation. According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Requirements and User Stories), stories should be clear enough for estimation and discussion, but not over-specified. The INVEST model (Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimable, Small, Testable) supports this.

Mike Griffiths in the PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning) reiterates that stories should not contain exhaustive detail up front; rather, they evolve through collaborative dialogue with the product owner.

Option C is correct because it supports collaboration and adaptive planning.

Option A and B lead to over-specification and undermine agility.

Option D addresses testing but doesn’t resolve confusion about appropriate story detail.

Agile principles emphasize just-in-time (JIT) planning and design, meaning work should not begin until it ' s pulled into the current sprint or iteration. According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.4 Iteration Planning) and Mike Griffiths (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning), teams should focus on committed iteration work and avoid speculative work that is not yet planned or prioritized.

Designing item B early introduces unvalidated assumptions and risks rework if priorities or requirements change. Agile encourages deferring decisions until the last responsible moment to preserve flexibility.

Option A is correct: the team should wait until item B is formally planned before investing effort.

Option B violates agile principles by introducing premature work.

Option C and D suggest formal escalation that is unnecessary and not in the spirit of agile’s decentralized decision-making.