Agile & Project Management Questions

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1. What do you mean by servant leadership?

The servant-leader shares power, puts the needs of others first and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible.

The servant leadership approach contains the following characteristics:

  • Promoting self-awareness
  • Listening
  • Serving those on the team
  • Helping people grow
  • Coaching versus controlling
  • Promoting safety, respect, and trust
  • Promoting the energy and intelligence of others2.

2. What do you mean by Authentic leadership?

Authentic leaders focus on the self-development of themselves and their followers.

3. What do you mean by Transactional leadership?

Transactional leaders focus on supervision, organization, or performance and use rewards and punishments to motivate followers.

4. What do you mean by Transformational leadership?

Transformational leaders focus on organizational goals.

5. What does deliverables refers to in project management?

The term deliverables is a project management term that’s traditionally used to describe the quantifiable goods or services that must be provided upon the completion of a project. Projects create deliverables, which are simply the results of the project or the processes in the project. That means a deliverable can be something as big as the objective of the project itself or the reporting that is part of the larger project.

6. Which is the main difference between scrum and agile?

Though Agile and Scrum look similar as they both rely on an iterative process, frequent client interaction, and collaborative decision making, but the key difference between Agile and Scrum is that while Agile is a project management philosophy that utilizes a core set of values or principles, Scrum is a specific Agile practice within Agile that is used to facilitate a project.
Although Scrum is an Agile approach, Agile does not always mean Scrum as there are many different approaches that are classified under Agile.

7. How would you best describe the Definition of Done?

Definition of Done is a checklist of elements that need to be completed for the task to be considered done. It is a shared understanding of expectations that the current sprint (or increment) must meet in order to be released to users.
So DoD can be a checklist of activities that add value to the product which must be fully completed before a member of the team can refer to a user story as “done.”
The best way to come up with a Definition of Done for your team is to sit together as a team and come up with a checklist that the whole team agrees upon.

8. What does it mean by ‘Delivering value’ in Agile?

Delivering value has always been the priority of agile teams as it is one of the principles that the agile manifesto emphasizes. Value from the customer’s point of view is the benefit they think they will get from using a product or a service.

9. What is Scope creep?

Scope creep (sometimes known as “requirement creep” or “feature creep”) refers to the uncontrolled changes in scope.
Scope creep is typically caused by key project stakeholders changing requirements, or sometimes from internal miscommunication and disagreements.

10. What is Kanban Agile method?

The Kanban method is a pull system which means that work is pulled into the system when the team has the capacity for it. The Kanban Method suggests an approach of managing the flow of work with an emphasis on continuous improvement without overburdening the development team that focuses on productivity and efficiency.

11. What is Product Roadmap in Agile?

A Product Roadmap is an Agile artifact that describes the incremental nature of how a product will be built and delivered over time, along with the important factors that drive each individual release.
In Agile-focused companies, the product roadmap provides guidance rather than a strict project plan.
Product Roadmap is different from Product backlog since the roadmap defines the big-picture that cannot be distilled in the product backlog, which potentially has a list of hundreds of items.

12. What is backlog refinement?

Preparing stories for the next iteration refers to backlog refinement. The project manager and some, or all, of the rest of the team review items on the backlog to ensure the backlog contains the appropriate items, that they are prioritized, and that the items at the top of the backlog are ready for delivery. This activity occurs on a regular basis and can be an officially scheduled meeting or an ongoing activity.

13. What is the role of a product owner within an Agile project?

The product owner represents the stakeholders and is considered to be the voice of the customer. The Product Owner has a significant role in maximizing the value produced by the team and ensuring stories meet the user’s needs and comply with the definition of “Done”.
This role has significant relationships and responsibilities outside the project team, including working with upper management, end-users, and other stakeholders.

14. What is the meaning of Zero Sprint?

The term “Zero sprint” is actually a step for preparing the initial sprint. Here, different activities are needed before initializing a specific project or task. All activities done before starting a project are considered as the Zero sprint such as doing some initial research, deciding about the technical choices, and getting ready regarding backlogs.

15. What is the purpose of a project kickoff meeting?

The purpose of a project kickoff meeting is to introduce the team, understand the project background, understand what success looks like, understand what needs to be done, and agree on how to work together effectively – it’s a chance to level set and get the team and client on the same page.

16. What is portfolio management?

A portfolio is a grouping of projects, and programs. It can also include other project-related activities and responsibilities.
The purpose of a portfolio is to establish centralized management and oversight for many projects and/or programs.
The purpose of creating and managing a portfolio is to ensure the business is taking on the right projects, and making sure they align with the company’s values, strategies, and goals.

17. What is escaped defect?

An escaped defect is a defect that was not found by the project team but rather found by the customer or end-users after the released version has been made available to them.

18. What is Lag time?

Lag Time is when a delay is purposely put between activities. According to the PMBOK Guide, 6th edition, “A lag time is the amount of time whereby a successor activity is required to be delayed with respect to a predecessor activity.”
It means, when the first activity completes and there is a delay before the second activity starts, this is called Lag. The delay is known as Lag Time.

19. What is Critical path in the network diagram?

Critical path is the longest sequence of tasks that must be done to successfully complete the project. Tasks that are in the critical path cannot start until the previous task has been completed. These are tasks that, if delayed for a certain amount of time, will throw the whole project off schedule. Identifying the critical path, then, is key to managing the project schedule.

20. What is WBS?

WBS is known as the Work Breakdown Structure. The purpose of the WBS is to subdivide the project deliverables and project work into smaller, more manageable tasks.

21. What is Pair Programming?

In an Agile practice where two team members share the same workstation, one team member does the coding while the other team member thinks and reviews the code to ensure it is in line with the requirements is referred to as Pair Programming.

22. In an Agile environment, a ‘Story Point’ is referred to as?

It’s an estimates of effort as influenced by amount of work, complexity, and risk

23. What is the Rolling wave technique?

It’s an iterative scheduling technique that uses progressive elaboration to plan the project as it unfolds. This is typically used when there is not enough information to create a complete project schedule upfront.

  • This is the strategy of planning at multiple points in time.
  • It’s the acknowledgement that we don’t know it all upfront, so we continuously plan.
  • You are going to re-visit and adapt your plans throughout the life of the project.
  • Use the iterations and products releases to easy hallmarks to understand when to re-plan.
  • Every time you complete an iteration or release an MVP, you know more about your product than you did before. Each and every time you go back and revisit your plans.
  • What you learned in that iteration or release trigger a change in your original estimated plan. This is what we called Rolling Wave planning.
  • You are simply aware that at times, you are going to review your original plans and make new ones based on what you know now.
  • You plan as a rolling wave between and within your execution cycles.

For example, A project is expected to complete in 10 months, but you only have the clarity for the first 3 months. In this case, the first 3 months are planned. As the project progresses and greater clarity is achieved, the following months can be planned.

  • Benefits of Role wave planning include the ability to keep diverse stakeholders in alignment on the plans. While you are continuously planning at many levels stakeholders require the most consistent visible communication.

23. What is Progressive Elaboration?

You are incorporating new information into your plans. You are taking feedback from demos and releases and re-prioritizing your backlog.

24. What is Capacity Planning?

Capacity planning is the process through which organizations see how much work they can complete, given their total number of employees and upcoming time constraints.
Capacity is the maximum amount of work that can be completed in a given time period. Capacity is often measured in hours available to be worked by employees. And “planning” is the act of scheduling employee hours against a fixed or expected amount of work.

For example, A company has 10 employees and each employee works for 40 hours a week. So the company has 400 hours of weekly capacity.

Benefits of Capacity Planning:

  • Create better long-term strategies and get a better sense of how your organization operates on a daily basis.
  • Make data-informed decisions about your staff and projects.
  • Create better budgets.
  • Eliminate burnout.
  • Understand your staff’s skill set.
  • Hire more intelligently.
  • Make time for training and upskilling.

25. Why project fails or the reasons for project failure?

Any project fails due to one of the following reasons, impacting quality, time, or budget.

  • Unclear goals – lack of detailed documentation and understanding can lead to inappropriate results.
  • Inadequate time frame – having trouble completing the project on time.
  • Poorly managed stakeholder expectations – project scope changes that are not agreed upon by stakeholders.
  • Resource deficiency – insufficient resources to complete the project.
  • Inadequate risk management – failing to establish the risk associated with each project can cause your project to fail.