APM Product Backlog Management 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A Product Owner wants to prioritize backlog items using the WSJF (Weighted Shortest Job First) model. Which factor is NOT part of the WSJF calculation?
- Cost of delay
- Job duration (job size)
- Developer skill level (Correct answer)
- User/business value
Correct answer: Developer skill level
WSJF calculates priority using cost of delay (which includes business value, time criticality, and risk reduction) divided by job size; developer skill is not a factor.
Question 2: Which of the following is a sign that a product backlog is NOT well-maintained?
- Items at the top are more detailed than items at the bottom
- The backlog has hundreds of items with no priority or estimates (Correct answer)
- The team reviews the backlog every sprint
- Epics are broken into smaller stories over time
Correct answer: The backlog has hundreds of items with no priority or estimates
A backlog with hundreds of unordered, unestimated items indicates neglect and makes effective sprint planning impossible.
Question 3: When using the MoSCoW prioritization method, items labeled 'Should Have' are best described as:
- Critical items without which the product cannot launch
- Important but not critical items that should be included if possible (Correct answer)
- Items that would be nice to have but are not planned
- Items explicitly excluded from the current scope
Correct answer: Important but not critical items that should be included if possible
'Should Have' items are high-priority but not critical to launch; they are included if time and budget allow without jeopardizing 'Must Have' items.
Question 4: How does the Product Owner balance technical debt items with new feature requests in the backlog?
- Technical debt is always deprioritized in favor of features
- Technical debt should be tracked separately and never mixed with feature work
- Technical debt items should be prioritized based on their impact on future velocity and product quality (Correct answer)
- Only the development team decides when to address technical debt
Correct answer: Technical debt items should be prioritized based on their impact on future velocity and product quality
Technical debt must be weighed against feature value because unresolved debt slows future development and reduces product quality over time.
Question 5: A product backlog item states: 'As a user, I want a faster system.' Why is this story problematic?
- It is written in the wrong format
- It lacks a measurable acceptance criterion making it impossible to verify completion (Correct answer)
- It does not have a story point estimate
- It should be an epic instead of a story
Correct answer: It lacks a measurable acceptance criterion making it impossible to verify completion
Without measurable acceptance criteria defining what 'faster' means (e.g., page loads in under 2 seconds), the team cannot objectively verify when the story is done.
Question 6: In Agile, the concept of 'ready' for a Product Backlog Item typically means:
- The item has been assigned to a developer
- The item is small enough, understood, and estimated so it can be pulled into a sprint (Correct answer)
- The item has been approved by the QA team
- The item has been presented to end users for feedback
Correct answer: The item is small enough, understood, and estimated so it can be pulled into a sprint
A 'ready' PBI meets the team's Definition of Ready—it is independent, negotiable, valuable, estimable, small, and testable (INVEST criteria).
Question 7: Which artifact in Scrum most directly reflects the current priorities of the Product Owner?
- The sprint burndown chart
- The ordered product backlog (Correct answer)
- The release plan
- The impediment log
Correct answer: The ordered product backlog
The ordered (prioritized) product backlog directly reflects the Product Owner's current assessment of what delivers the most value next.
APM Product Backlog Management 3
A Product Owner wants to prioritize backlog items using the WSJF (Weighted Shortest Job First) model.
Which factor is NOT part of the WSJF calculation?