The correct answer is A — Practicing the servant leadership style of working with an agile team.

Servant leadership is foundational to Agile. The agile project leader serves the team by removing impediments, supporting their needs, and promoting transparency. Using information radiators and being involved in team progress reflects servant leadership in action.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Agile leaders act as servant leaders. They support the team, remove obstacles, and foster a transparent, collaborative environment.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 6.2 – Coaching and Servant Leadership)

Mike Griffiths:

“Servant leadership is about enabling the team to succeed. Agile leaders serve by ensuring the team has what it needs, while maintaining visibility through information radiators.”

(PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 1 – Agile Principles and Mindset)

Incorrect options:

B and C are valid Agile behaviors but not the most specific or complete match.

D references feedback loops but not leadership style.

Answer: A

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The correct answer is C — The team should have conducted more demonstrations with the product owner during the iteration.

Continuous feedback is essential in Agile. Regular product demos or interim check-ins during the sprint (not just at the end) allow the product owner to validate progress and course-correct early. This ensures that expectations are aligned and surprises are avoided at the sprint review.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Stakeholder feedback should be gathered continuously throughout the sprint. Regular engagement and interim demos reduce the risk of misalignment at iteration end.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.7 – Reviews and Demos)

Mike Griffiths:

“Waiting until the sprint review to validate features with the product owner increases risk. Frequent collaboration and demonstrations ensure the work remains on target.”

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

Incorrect options:

A is helpful but doesn ' t guarantee alignment.

B is testing-focused and misses early collaboration.

D places all responsibility on the product owner, ignoring shared ownership.

Answer: C

Once scope and acceptance criteria are known, the next step is to estimate the size and effort of backlog items, which enables planning. The PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2: Backlog Estimation) and Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning) recommend using estimation techniques (e.g., story points, T-shirt sizing) to determine the relative effort of each backlog item before performing release or sprint planning.

Option D is correct: backlog estimation enables velocity-based forecasting.

Option A and B come after estimation is complete.

Option C is too narrow—iteration planning comes later.

The correct answer is D – It helps to quickly resolve issues using the sponsor ' s influence. A sponsor ' s presence in Scrum ceremonies (like sprint reviews or retrospectives) helps escalate and resolve high-level issues, remove organizational blockers, and reinforce alignment between the team and the business.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Active sponsor engagement can accelerate issue resolution, remove organizational impediments, and provide vital support to the team. Sponsors are valuable allies in ensuring team success and organizational alignment.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 4.2 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Mike Griffiths explains:

“When sponsors are visible and engaged, teams benefit from faster decision-making, quicker escalation of issues, and improved morale. Their influence can break through bureaucratic barriers.”

(Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 – Stakeholder Engagement)

Incorrect options:

A misattributes sprint discipline to sponsor involvement—this is a team responsibility.

B is passive and doesn’t reflect tangible benefits.

C is useful but not the primary advantage of sponsor participation.

Answer: D

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Even if a team is high-performing and stable, the Scrum Master’s role remains valuable in facilitating continuous improvement, removing impediments, and protecting agile principles. However, in mature teams, a Scrum Master can support other teams or initiatives while still offering guidance to the original team.

The PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 3.3: Agile Roles) and Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 3: Team Performance) both emphasize that Scrum Masters evolve into more strategic, cross-team roles as teams mature.

Option A is correct: it reflects a strategic redeployment of a seasoned Scrum Master while maintaining light support to the current team.

Option B risks losing agile momentum and undermines continuous improvement.

Option C and D confuse roles—Scrum Master and Product Owner must remain distinct.

The correct answer is C – Initiate an estimation session because agile planning is iterative and collaborative. When delivery timing is in question, especially during a release planning session, the team must first estimate the size of the work (epics and user stories). Once estimates are made (often using story points or relative sizing techniques), velocity can be used to forecast delivery timelines.

From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Estimation is typically performed at the beginning of a release or iteration planning session to determine how much work can be completed. Teams use estimation to size items and then apply their known or projected velocity to forecast completion.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.3 – Estimation and Velocity)

Mike Griffiths’ PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book also states:

“Before making any delivery commitments, teams should first engage in collaborative estimation to understand the scope and effort of the work. These estimates then inform velocity-based forecasting.”

(Mike Griffiths, Chapter 5 – Adaptive Planning)

Why the other options are incorrect:

A – Scrum Masters do not estimate work; estimation is a team activity.

B – You cannot determine deliverables based on velocity until the work has been estimated.

D – Historical data can support forecasting but must be preceded by proper estimation of current backlog items.

Answer: C

The correct answer is A — Conduct a requirements gathering workshop.

In Agile, workshops such as story-writing or backlog refinement sessions help the team and stakeholders collaboratively explore requirements. These sessions are interactive and iterative and allow for joint discovery, prioritization, and clarification of user needs.

PMI Agile Practice Guide:

“Collaborative workshops enable teams to gather requirements and clarify expectations in an iterative fashion. They engage stakeholders in prioritizing and decomposing work into user stories.”

(PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 – Backlog Refinement)

Mike Griffiths writes:

“Workshops are a key practice for backlog development. They are particularly useful when initiating complex projects with minimal requirements, allowing the team to iteratively develop stories with stakeholders.”

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

Incorrect options:

B assumes delivery before refinement, risking misalignment.

C places the burden on the product owner alone.

D is waterfall-oriented and contradicts iterative backlog evolution.

Answer: A

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