Hiro Takashimya

Several Sprints into a project, the Product Owner tells the Scrum Master that a key stakeholder just started using the product. The stakeholder is unhappy with the slow performance, a complaint that the Product Owner agrees on. How will you move this forward?
(choose the best answer)
A. Wait to bring this up in the next Sprint Retrospective as this is the appropriate
time for the Scrum Team to re-consider the Definition of Done.
B. Bring the concern to the testers in the Scrum Team and ask them to improve how the system is tested.
C. Explain to the Product Owner that it’s up to the Developers to decide on acceptable performance standards as they own the Definition of Done.
D. Encourage the Product Owner to bring the performance concerns to the Developers and work with them on how to improve performance, and ultimately have stronger Definition of Done.

During a Sprint Review, the Product Owner determines that she is going to release the current Increment to production. The stakeholders ask to stop the Sprint to react more quickly to the user feedback that is expected after this release. The Product Owner prefers to continue the Sprint to make progress with the next release. You facilitate a discussion on how to proceed. What are two acceptable results of this discussion?
(choose the best two answers)
A. Continue sprinting and include the customer feedback in the Product Backlog.
B. Stop sprinting and let the Developers work on new customer requests as they arise.
C. Continue sprinting but shorten the Sprint length to allow for shorter feedback loops.
D. Continue sprinting but allow customer feedback to change the Sprint Goal within the Sprint.

Towards the end of the Sprint Planning meeting, the Product Owner and the Developers have not been able to reach a clear, mutual understanding about the highest order Product Backlog items. Because of this, the Developers could not figure out how many Product Backlog items they could forecast for the upcoming Sprint. The Product Owner did make clear what business objective he is hoping to achieve with this Sprint. Which of the following two actions would you support?
(choose the best two answers)
A. The Developers forecast the most likely Product Backlog items to meet the business objective and create a Sprint Backlog based on a likely initial design and plan. Once the timebox for the Sprint Planning event is over, they start the Sprint and continue to analyze, decompose, and create additional functionality during the Sprint.
B. If all agree they can continue the Sprint Planning meeting as a team past its timebox, until an adequate number of Product Backlog items are well enough understood for the Developers to make a complete forecast. Then start the Sprint.
C. The team splits up and everybody takes as much time as they need to study the Product Backlog items first. The Product Owner should be available to answer individual questions. The group reconvenes when all team members are better prepared and restart the Sprint Planning meeting before the Sprint can start.
D. They discuss in the upcoming Sprint Retrospective why this happened and what changes will make it less likely to recur.

What is the way to determine if the Product Owner is interacting with the Developers enough throughout a Sprint?
(choose the best answer)
A. Check the Daily Scrum reports to see whether the Product Owner was present at the majority of the Daily Scrum meetings.
B. Observe whether the Product Owner is satisfied with the Increment at the Sprint Review.
C. Observe whether the Developers need to ask the Product Owner questions at times other than during the Daily Scrum.
D. Determine the percentage of time the Product Owner is required to be present with the Developers. Control whether the Product Owner’s average presence is around this figure.

What are two ways in which technical debt relates to velocity?
(choose the best two answers)
A. They are not related because technical debt should be resolved by the support or operations department, not by the Scrum Team.
B. Velocity may unexpectedly drop when the Developers run into technical debt while attempting to complete new Product Backlog items.
C. A Scrum Team can artificially increase its velocity by incurring technical debt.
D. Adding technical debt items to the Product Backlog to get estimated and added to your velocity forecasts can guarantee predictability.

A Scrum Team has been working together for nine Sprints. A new Product Owner comes in, unsure about his responsibilities. As the Scrum Master you have observed how the functional and business insights of the Developers have grown over the past Sprints. The Product Owner however is relatively new to the company and to the product. What are two activities you would direct the new Product Owner towards focusing on?
(choose the best two answers)
A. You advise the Product Owner to start building a good relationship with the stakeholders of the product. On-going interaction with them is important to regularly align with changing organizational or market expectations. The Product Owner is also expected to invite the best-placed stakeholders to the Sprint Review.
B. You inform the Product Owner that, in today’s highly competitive markets, it is important that the Developers are updated on changing business priorities on a daily basis. It is why Scrum has this daily meeting. At this Daily Scrum the Developers can adapt to the changes in scope without delay.
C. You tell the Product Owner to make sure that there are no ambiguities or possible misunderstandings in the items on the Product Backlog when they are handed over to the Scrum Team. This is best done by capturing the functional requirements during an analysis phase, resulting in documents that are considered as the working product of such analysis Sprints.
D. You advise the Product Owner to rely on others in the Scrum Team and the stakeholders to formulate the Product Backlog, as they are the ones that are up to speed. By questioning them and working with them the Product Owner will quickly be most productive.