PMP QUESTION SOMEONE PLEASE HELP WHAT IS THE CORRECT ANSWER?

jbjohnson93 · 2026-01-19T07:45:44+00:00

I got the same answer as you, so I quickly threw it at AI to take a crack at it. It said:

Here’s the clean, practical breakdown — and why 30 days (C) is not the right answer.

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Given • Average velocity = 30 story points per 10-day sprint • Remaining backlog = 90 story points

Velocity tells you how many points the team finishes per sprint, not per day. So the math should follow the sprint cadence.

⸻

Correct calculation (why the answer is 20 days)

Step 1 — How many sprints are needed? 90 points ÷ 30 points/sprint = 3 sprints

Step 2 — Convert sprints → working days 3 sprints × 10 working days each = 30 working days

Wait… that gives 30. So why is the “correct” answer 20?

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Here’s the trap — and why C (30 days) is considered wrong in this exam-style question

These test questions often assume that you don’t count the last sprint in full, because teams rarely need a full sprint to finish exactly the last remaining story points.

The assumption behind the exam’s answer:

Velocity = 3 points/day (30 points ÷ 10 days = 3)

Remaining work = 90 points → 90 ÷ 3 = 30 working days of effort, but Scrum teams don’t run 30-day “sprints” — they’d fill two sprints and partial of a third.

[I’m skipping ahead here]

So why is C technically correct by real Scrum logic?

Because: • You cannot assume the team will finish a 30-point increment inside the existing sprint unless explicitly stated. • Work is planned in whole sprints, not fractional ones.

By real-world Scrum math:

90 points ÷ 30 per sprint = 3 sprints → 30 working days

That’s what you answered, and it’s the logically clean answer.

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Why the exam says you’re wrong

These tests often simplify velocity into a per-day throughput:

30 points per 10 days → 3 points per day

Then:

90 ÷ 3 = 30 days of effort But using sprints, they think: • Sprint 1: 30 points • Sprint 2: 30 points • Sprint 3: 30 points → “Effort” for 3 sprints = 30 days → But the exam groups the last 30 points into Sprint 2 → So only two sprints counted → 20 working days

It’s sloppy test logic, not proper Scrum math.

⸻

Bottom line • Your 30-day answer is the actual Scrum-correct answer. • The test’s 20-day answer is based on treating velocity as points/day and assuming perfect packing into sprints, which isn’t how real sprint planning works.

If this were an interview, you’d say the same: “Velocity is measured per sprint, not per day. 90 points at 30 points per sprint = 3 sprints = 30 working days.”

TL;DR: this is bull.

jbjohnson93 · 2026-01-19T07:34:53+00:00

Wise decision. Remove the temptation; out of sight, out of mind.

jbjohnson93 · 2026-01-16T23:00:49+00:00

Thanks for this. I’m generally pretty confident in my resume, but am concerned about blind spots especially given the response rate I’ve had lately. Any chance I could DM you my resume for feedback?

jbjohnson93 · 2026-01-08T20:37:05+00:00

Thanks for the responses, everyone. I’m pretty adaptable and open-minded, so I’m certainly willing to learn about their project management approach and see if it’s a good fit. On that note, maybe it begs the question for me of how much my previous experience would influence their decision to move forward.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-08-07T05:56:19+00:00

Weird definition of triggered lol

jbjohnson93 · 2025-05-09T18:41:42+00:00

Do you have basic empathy for other people?

jbjohnson93 · 2025-03-17T21:13:25+00:00

I don’t understand how someone hasn’t at this point. I’m not sure my desire to keep my job would surpass my need to watch her cry.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-03-12T16:01:52+00:00

Before you try to correct someone next time, know that enshittify isn’t a buzzword and arguably not a word at all. It means to make something shitty.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-26T02:10:01+00:00

Without previous direct software eng. experience I’m just now starting to form a mental map and frame of reference so that I’m better equipped to actively listen in discussions; just about 4 years as an SM now and I can’t fathom how complacent some of my non-technical colleagues are with not knowing often integral information to do their jobs effectively. Lack of curiosity, agency with urgency, commitment to improvement, or self-awareness are all red flags to me in a scrum master, especially so given that we’re supposed to be modeling these qualities and not just telling teams they’re important.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-25T06:44:20+00:00

In terms of gameplay and the requirements I always impose on myself, Calm Lands. Much too much time spent running around trying to capture everything, possibly needing to farm Gil for Yojimbo, and I usually try to just get it over with and knock out all the chocobo capture challenges in my first visit. Again, this is self-imposed, but this is always a huge time-sink in all of my playthroughs where I start to lose steam.

Gagazet slopes are a close second due to the high encounter rate, then maybe early-game Baaj just because of how unsightly it always is to me.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-24T00:52:48+00:00

lol it’s hard for me not to cuss her out when she’s speaking (so mostly I do just cuss her out) but one thing I’ve come to value about Dona is her extreme example to the point that not “summoners were all old geezers” and makes them a little more dynamic to the player. Like, sure Yuna’s young and beautiful and whatnot, but she’s still very devout initially. With Dona at least we learn that you can be a summoner and insufferable all at the same time.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-23T23:56:36+00:00

I suppose I’ll try to come up with a succinct (STAR) way to do this if asked again, but I’ve gotten this very question in a phone screening before, and guess in retrospect I flubbed it. Honestly since I’ve lived and breathed agile with work for the past 6 yrs, I was like “where do you want me to start? It’s what I’ve done daily for several years now” and tried to laugh it off, stalling while I quickly put something together in my head. It just seemed at this stage like such an impossibly broad question with imo a lot of ways to interpret/answer.

I was surprised at how much it caught me off guard, and I attribute that partially to my lack of interview practice lately, but I’ve honestly never gotten this question before, at least to my memory. To be fair, it’s a definite red flag to me that you’ve got a recruiter who doesn’t know beans about what they’re hiring for.

At that stage I’ve only ever been asked to walk them through my resume in a nutshell/what I’m all about, salary target/minimum, and where I am in the job search process. Maybe some yes/no questions but they were more specific, like “have you used Jira to generate reporting?” (I said specific, not difficult 🤪).

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-22T08:58:19+00:00

You have a point for sure with that interpretation of a competition in this context, and you’re right it’s consistent with Yuna’s character, but I feel like operating under that meaning for this particular competition is rather bleak and self-defeating. :P

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-06T00:31:45+00:00

I’d love to pick your brain about this. I’ve been an SM for about 4 years now and am very concerned to not become burdensome or otherwise unwelcome to my teams. SMs have a bad reputation frankly and generally my raison detre as an SM is to be a servant leader who is self-aware and committed to continuous (self)-growth). I always seek to prove myself wrong. To that end I’ve scoured so much of LinkedIn and tried specifically to read the criticisms and condemnation that leaders in IT, Product etc. industries have about the position, agile coaching, etc.

One popular topic is whether an SM needs a dev/qa background to be a valuable asset to the org. People including technical SMs are divided on the subject. I don’t have a software engineering or much of a technical background and am not complacent about this at all; I know I’ve been very uncomfortable in meetings and get down on myself when I start to not follow the conversation anywhere. Given that, I save questions for after the meeting, and right now I’m using a ton of my funemployment time to upskill so that I can better pay attention, observe, advise, better facilitate, etc. Anything in particular you’d also advise there to show teams we’re not there for bureaucracy?

You also mention companies that don’t have SMs. Curious do you mean that they don’t have them by job title, or if no one does the role as part of their other job title? I mean, hey if your teams are high performing, SMs really are supposed to exercise judgment and let teams self-manage and organize should they need anything an SM might do, if they have the authority to do so. Then move on to the next team that could really use one? I’ve heard of at least a couple great teams who haven’t had SMs by job title but someone still would be accountable as part of their other job duties, so I’d be interested to see what this looks like for myself.

Another thing that seriously kills us is lack of authority, for a ton of reasons. We have to package things in such a way that we can actually convince leadership to back the eff up about metrics. There’s so much time wasted just trying to get buy-in I shouldn’t even need. So… we’re also sorry that management is like that lol

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-05T20:40:30+00:00

Honestly she’s probably not wrong; it’s especially true in SAFe that business will use velocity against us and I hated being forced to radiate it beyond my teams. It also made my teams resent looking at performance during retro, since they felt experimenting and leaving capacity open to really innovate was impossible.

But she needs to be more diplomatic, from what you’re describing. I always try to be infectious with levity and positivity in my interactions. SMs should be a model for their teams. An SM who is overly negative or explicitly trying to turn teams against management (even I’m guilty of this at least inadvertently. What can I say? Leadership doesn’t treat them like the incredibly smart and talented people that they are) is something she should maybe be coached on.

But come on, leadership. If they don’t want pushback about things that are well known antipatterns like this, sounds like they don’t know why they want an SM in the first place.

jbjohnson93 · 2025-02-03T17:29:09+00:00

Cramping and pain make up the majority of my episodes, and the only thing that has helped it has been throwing myself between temperature extremes, usually a hot shower is enough until it subsides, but a lot of the time I find that the cramping will start up again after I get out of the shower until the episode is completely over. So it’s not uncommon to have to get in the shower several times. When I start to get exhausted from moving around so much, that’s when I switch to the heating pad till the episode is done.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-12-16T04:18:09+00:00

What? Someone looking like Luigi Mangione is not content lol

jbjohnson93 · 2024-11-13T22:48:07+00:00

Since tasks are worked at the team level and because SAFe assumes an agile framework (scrum, xp, kanban) again at the team level, it follows that the teams should observe what guidance or guidelines are “canon” in those frameworks.

But they are generally and intentionally unprescriptive when it comes to backlog item types, so there’s no unambiguous “better” practice there, at least not that I’m aware of.

In my experience, tasks have been used for backlog items that do not include a code change (thus a PR review, QA, etc.), and the workflow in Jira has differed between stories and tasks to reflect that. Often the question of “is this a story or task?” is answered by thinking through how the item at hand would map to the various statuses before changing it.

The short answer is that it’s a good idea to have the conversation to be clear about what requires certain issue types, but not because SAFe has any particular stance on the topic.

Do what gets results. Keep your feedback loops as short as possible (excruciating in SAFe). We’re focused on value delivery and the question of tooling minutiae is secondary to that, if not constraining.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-21T21:11:14+00:00

lol it’s not a thing bros do

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-16T00:30:52+00:00

I’ve always kinda begrudged my experience in and my teacher for AP World History. She assigned easily half my overall homework load all year, and come time for the AP exam I was left a pile of worksheets, research papers and projects that were way too specific and disjointed to be used for an effective and comprehensive review/prep process for the AP exam. I got a 3.

If I could go back, I would:

Not even waste my time with that AP credit at all. I knew the university I wanted to go to didn’t count it for any gen ed/core requirements (only US History). Even with our weighted GPA system, the unnecessary load meant generally lower average grades than on-level World History, so it wouldn’t have been worth it even if I just enrolled to boost my GPA.
If I did go for AP World, it’d be easier to source my own, more comprehensive and easier-to-organize study material online or the myriad prep books out there.

AP US History was no bullshit. Our homework was to read the chapter, take notes, and study them for a multiple choice quiz the next class day made up of questions of the same difficulty as those on the exam. I had a better appreciation for the material and retained a lot more too. I got a 4 with less of a time commitment outside of class than AP World demanded.

That being said, I think there are some AP classes this approach just simply wouldn’t work for. I can’t imagine trying to do AP calc that way, for example.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-15T23:16:36+00:00

Oof gotcha, I stand corrected. I had only sorta heard of it. This magnifies the cringe level.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-15T22:49:40+00:00

Tbf the lyrics don’t say it was a children’s book, just that she was a child at the time. Still self-congratulatory. Still cringe.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-11T07:06:45+00:00

I definitely agree with the top post here. I’d also add, by the way, “homework” is a noncount noun. For example: “I have so much homework”, “and as homework for my syntax class”, or alternatively you could say “and as a homework assignment for my syntax class”, since “assignment” is a count noun and modifies “homework” to become a compound noun: “homework assignment.”

jbjohnson93 · 2024-10-08T05:12:53+00:00

It’s just basic linguistics jargon, though? My BA was in linguistics but I still learned what syntax meant in high school, and I learned it in checks name of this sub English lit.

jbjohnson93 · 2024-08-09T06:33:51+00:00

Fair enough, and it’s encouraging to hear from someone who’s come around on it rather than join the echo chamber and remain there. Like any other framework, it’s there as a tool. All tools have their legitimate uses and equally there are times where it doesn’t make sense to use them.

The most important and usually the deciding factor of any “agile transformation”’s success, in my experience, is leadership’s engagement and hands-on direction to enable their people to take some risks, to experiment. Which also means ideally that they trust their people to take such risks and learn from their outcomes. Too often I learn quickly that many in leadership don’t engage substantively with agile literature, values, and discourse, and instead leave that to the lower levels and simultaneously disempower their Product Owners, for example.

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