Developing People and Teams

PSM-I · 40 questions

At a home-robot company, the hardware program manager tells the firmware Developers which of them should fix a battery-driver bug this Sprint. What should the Scrum Master do?
A robotics company's Developers decide, on their own, that they no longer need to run the automated firmware regression suite before calling firmware work "Done," since it slows them down. Is this a valid use of self-management?
A home-robot company's Scrum Team can design, build, and test its firmware and app changes, but every Sprint it must wait for a separate compliance department to review any change touching wireless radio settings before it can be released. What does this suggest about the team?
As a home-robot company grows from one Scrum Team to three (app, firmware, and cloud), the app team is repeatedly blocked each Sprint waiting for the firmware team to expose a new sensor API before the app team can build anything visible. What is the most useful thing for the Scrum Master to do?
During a Sprint Review, the app and firmware Developers disagree about which stakeholder feedback to act on first. The Scrum Master steps in to keep the conversation structured and make sure every voice is heard, without stating a preference. Which Scrum Master stance is this?
A newly hired firmware Developer at a home-robot company has never worked with Scrum before and keeps asking why the Sprint Backlog can change during the Sprint. The Scrum Master sits down and walks them through what the Scrum Guide says about the Sprint Backlog belonging to the Developers. Which stance is the Scrum Master using?
A firmware Developer who already understands the Scrum Guide well complains that the Daily Scrum "never helps" the team. Instead of telling the Developer what to change, the Scrum Master asks, "What would make the next fifteen minutes worth your time?" Which stance best describes this?
A Scrum Master who previously worked at another consumer-electronics company tells a struggling Product Owner, "When I was in a similar spot with a smart-speaker launch, here's the approach that worked for us and why." Which stance is this?
Partway through a Sprint, the app Developers realize their original plan for reworking the pairing screen won't work and want to change their approach to the remaining Sprint Backlog items. Who decides whether that change happens?
During the Daily Scrum, a Scrum Master notices the Developers haven't discussed the firmware flashing task that's most at risk of missing the Sprint Goal, so the Scrum Master decides who should pick it up next. Was this an appropriate action?
A Scrum Team keeps needing a mechanical engineer's sign-off from another department before it can call a housing-design change Done. Which response best supports the team becoming more cross-functional over time?
The firmware Developers decide, on their own authority, that they will skip the required UL safety certification checklist for this Sprint's battery-charging feature because they're confident it's safe. Is this a valid exercise of self-management?
At Sprint Planning, the Developers are unsure how much work they can realistically take on this Sprint given an upcoming firmware certification deadline. The Scrum Master keeps the discussion focused on forecasting capacity but does not tell them a specific number of items to commit to. What is this an example of?
A newly promoted Product Owner at the robot company asks the Scrum Master to explain what "Commitment" and "Courage" actually mean as Scrum values, since they've only heard the terms in passing. The Scrum Master walks through each value and how it shows up in daily work. Which stance is this?
None of the Developers on a newly formed hardware Scrum Team have ever taken a product through a UL safety certification cycle before. The Scrum Master, who has personally guided two prior product certifications at a former employer, offers to walk the team through what that process typically looks like and the pitfalls to expect. Which stance is this?
An engineering director asks the Scrum Master to make sure a particular senior Developer is the one who fixes every critical firmware bug this Sprint, bypassing the team's own workflow. What is the Scrum Master's best response?
On a home-robot company's app team, only one Developer can debug the Bluetooth pairing code, creating a bottleneck every Sprint. The Developers decide among themselves to pair that Developer with two others so the skill spreads across the team. What best describes the Scrum Master's role in this situation?
Two firmware Developers disagree about whether to use interrupt-driven or polling-based sensor reads for the new vacuuming robot's obstacle detection. Both approaches are technically workable. What should the Scrum Master do?
Facing a tight retail launch date, the Developers on a home-robot company's Scrum Team agree among themselves to stop writing automated tests for new app features for the rest of the release, planning to "catch up on testing later." Does self-management give them the authority to make this change on their own?
A Scrum Team keeps citing the same recurring impediment — nobody feels confident writing firmware unit tests — Sprint after Sprint, without making progress on it. Rather than arranging training for them or solving it personally, the Scrum Master asks the team, "What's one small step your team could try this Sprint to start closing that gap?" Which stance is the Scrum Master primarily using?
During the Daily Scrum, two Developers on the home-robot firmware team start raising their voices at each other over how to implement a battery-charging retry routine, and the disagreement is clearly derailing the meeting. What should the Scrum Master do?
A firmware Developer privately tells the Scrum Master that a safety-certification test has been failing for two Sprints, but the Developer has been afraid to raise it in the Daily Scrum because a previous Scrum Master publicly criticized bad news. What is the most effective step for the Scrum Master to take first?
During a Sprint Review, the Product Owner sharply criticizes a Developer's companion-app work in front of retail stakeholders, embarrassing the Developer. What should the Scrum Master do after the event?
The companion-app team and the firmware team, both working on the same home-robot product, spend a Sprint Review blaming each other for a Bluetooth pairing feature that never integrated successfully. What is the most effective facilitation move for the Scrum Master?
A firmware Developer is split 50/50 between the home-robot Scrum Team and an unrelated legacy-product team, and the robot team's Sprint Backlog repeatedly stalls waiting for that Developer's availability. What should the Scrum Master do?
One Developer on the home-robot cloud-services team works remotely from a timezone six hours off from the rest of the team, making the usual Daily Scrum time land at midnight for that Developer. Who should decide how to adjust the Daily Scrum, and how?
With three weeks left before a big-box retailer's launch deadline, a director asks the Scrum Master to add two new Developers to the firmware team in the middle of the current Sprint to speed up certification work. What should the Scrum Master do?
As the home-robot product grows, the company splits into an app Scrum Team and a firmware Scrum Team, and the two teams start keeping separate backlogs of work they each think is most important, causing conflicting priorities. What does the 2020 Scrum Guide say should happen instead?
During Sprint Planning, two Developers on the app team disagree strongly about which companion-app bug to tackle first, and the Product Owner has already left the meeting. What should the Scrum Master do?
In a Sprint Retrospective, a junior firmware Developer admits they knew the Sprint Goal was at risk a week earlier but stayed quiet because they were afraid of being blamed. What should the Scrum Master focus on in response?
During a Sprint Retrospective, feedback about a missed certification deadline turns personal, with one Developer telling another they are simply "not careful enough" for firmware work. How should the Scrum Master redirect the conversation?
At a Sprint Review, the hardware team and firmware team disagree in front of stakeholders about which team's defect caused a robot's arm motor to stall during demonstration. What should the Scrum Master do in the moment?
The home-robot product's app Developers work from one office and the firmware Developers work from another office in a different country, and the two groups rarely interact outside formal meetings, leading to slow, indirect communication. What is the most appropriate Scrum Master action?
A regulatory-compliance specialist who is not a Developer on the Scrum Team joins the Daily Scrum most days to ask detailed certification questions, regularly extending the event well past 15 minutes. What should the Scrum Master do?
A new Developer joins the firmware Scrum Team at the start of a Sprint, and within days the team's usual pace visibly slows as existing Developers spend time explaining context and reviewing the newcomer's early work. A stakeholder asks the Scrum Master why the team suddenly seems less productive. What is the most accurate response?
As the home-robot product scales to an app Scrum Team and a firmware Scrum Team, each team defines its own separate Definition of Done for its component, and integrated releases keep failing because "done" firmware sometimes breaks against "done" app builds. What does the 2020 Scrum Guide indicate should happen?
A Developer who lost a disagreement with a teammate over a firmware coding standard skips the Scrum Master entirely and emails a senior director asking to have the decision overturned. What should the Scrum Master do?
The Scrum Master notices that one Developer has repeatedly failed to deliver on what they said they'd finish by the Daily Scrum, several Sprints in a row, without ever raising a blocker. What is the most appropriate way for the Scrum Master to address this?
A retail stakeholder is angry with the Product Owner in a hallway conversation about a slipped launch date for the home-robot, and the conversation is becoming tense. The Scrum Master happens to walk by. What is the appropriate role for the Scrum Master to play?
With three Scrum Teams now building different parts of the home-robot product, each team wants to hold a separate Sprint Review with its own stakeholders, resulting in a fragmented picture of the actual integrated product. What should the Scrum Master(s) work toward instead?