CAE User Story Development & Refinement 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which story-splitting technique divides a story based on the type of data being processed?
- Split by workflow steps
- Split by data variations (Correct answer)
- Split by interface type
- Split by business rules
Correct answer: Split by data variations
Splitting by data variations creates separate stories for different data types or inputs, such as handling domestic vs. international addresses.
Question 2: A product owner wants to write acceptance criteria using Given-When-Then format. What is the 'When' clause used for?
- Describing the system's initial state before the action
- Specifying the action or event that triggers the behavior (Correct answer)
- Defining the expected outcome of the behavior
- Listing the stakeholders who approved the criteria
Correct answer: Specifying the action or event that triggers the behavior
In Given-When-Then, the 'When' clause captures the specific action, event, or trigger that the acceptance criterion is testing.
Question 3: A scrum team repeatedly discovers new acceptance criteria for stories during the sprint. What refinement practice would reduce this?
- Limit the sprint to only one story at a time
- Invest more time in pre-sprint backlog refinement sessions (Correct answer)
- Remove acceptance criteria from stories entirely
- Only allow the product owner to discover new criteria
Correct answer: Invest more time in pre-sprint backlog refinement sessions
Thorough pre-sprint refinement reduces mid-sprint surprises by flushing out hidden requirements before the team commits to a story.
Question 4: Which of the following is an example of a non-functional requirement that should be captured in a user story's acceptance criteria?
- The user can reset their password
- The page must load within two seconds on a 4G connection (Correct answer)
- The admin can add new product categories
- The checkout flow requires a credit card
Correct answer: The page must load within two seconds on a 4G connection
Performance constraints like load time are non-functional requirements (quality attributes) that must appear in acceptance criteria to be testable.
Question 5: What is the recommended frequency for backlog refinement in Scrum?
- Once per release cycle
- Continuously throughout the sprint, totaling no more than 10% of the team's capacity (Correct answer)
- Only during sprint retrospectives
- At the start of each sprint planning session
Correct answer: Continuously throughout the sprint, totaling no more than 10% of the team's capacity
Scrum recommends ongoing refinement throughout the sprint with a guideline of spending no more than 10% of team capacity on it.
Question 6: A story passes all acceptance criteria in a demo but the product owner is dissatisfied. What most likely went wrong?
- The developers used the wrong technology stack
- The acceptance criteria did not fully capture the product owner's intent (Correct answer)
- The team did not hold a sprint review
- The story was estimated incorrectly
Correct answer: The acceptance criteria did not fully capture the product owner's intent
Acceptance criteria that pass mechanically yet fail to satisfy intent indicate a gap between what was written and the product owner's underlying expectation.
Question 7: When using the '5 Whys' technique during story refinement, what is the team trying to uncover?
- The number of acceptance criteria needed
- The root cause or true business need behind a requested feature (Correct answer)
- Which team member should own the story
- The correct story point estimate
Correct answer: The root cause or true business need behind a requested feature
The 5 Whys helps teams dig past surface-level feature requests to discover the genuine business problem or goal the story should solve.
CAE User Story Development & Refinement 3
Which story-splitting technique divides a story based on the type of data being processed?