PGM Program Execution and Oversight 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A program manager discovers that two component projects share a critical resource, creating a scheduling conflict. What is the BEST first action?
- Escalate to the sponsor immediately
- Analyze the dependency and negotiate a resource-sharing agreement between project managers (Correct answer)
- Cancel the lower-priority project
- Request additional budget to hire duplicate resources
Correct answer: Analyze the dependency and negotiate a resource-sharing agreement between project managers
Resource conflicts between component projects should first be resolved through dependency analysis and negotiation at the program level before escalation.
Question 2: Which metric BEST indicates whether a program is delivering expected business value during execution?
- Schedule Performance Index (SPI)
- Benefits realization rate against the benefits register (Correct answer)
- Number of change requests approved
- Team velocity across component projects
Correct answer: Benefits realization rate against the benefits register
The benefits realization rate tracks how much planned benefit the program has actually delivered, which is the core measure of value creation.
Question 3: A program manager receives a change request that exceeds the program-level threshold. What is the correct action?
- Approve it if the budget allows
- Reject it to protect scope
- Submit it to the Program Governance Board for decision (Correct answer)
- Defer it until the next phase
Correct answer: Submit it to the Program Governance Board for decision
Changes exceeding program-level authority thresholds must be escalated to the Program Governance Board for evaluation and decision.
Question 4: During program execution, a component project manager reports that a risk has materialized into an issue. What should the program manager do FIRST?
- Update the program risk register and assess cross-project impact (Correct answer)
- Close the risk and open a new issue log entry only in that project
- Immediately notify all stakeholders of the problem
- Reallocate program reserves to the affected project
Correct answer: Update the program risk register and assess cross-project impact
The program manager must first assess whether the issue affects other component projects and update the program-level risk register accordingly.
Question 5: A program has six component projects. Three are on schedule, two are behind, and one is ahead. How should the program manager present status to the sponsor?
- Report only the two behind-schedule projects as exceptions
- Provide an integrated program-level status showing overall health and individual project variances (Correct answer)
- Average the performance across all projects into one metric
- Report that the program is on track since the majority of projects are meeting targets
Correct answer: Provide an integrated program-level status showing overall health and individual project variances
Program status reporting requires an integrated view showing both overall program health and individual project variances to give the sponsor accurate information.
Question 6: What distinguishes program-level change control from project-level change control?
- Programs do not require formal change control processes
- Program change control focuses on impacts to strategic benefits and cross-project dependencies (Correct answer)
- Project change control considers a broader set of stakeholders than program change control
- Program change control only applies to budget changes
Correct answer: Program change control focuses on impacts to strategic benefits and cross-project dependencies
Program change control evaluates how changes affect strategic benefits realization and interdependencies across component projects, which is broader than individual project scope management.
Question 7: A program manager notices that component project teams are duplicating work on similar technical problems. What governance mechanism addresses this BEST?
- Mandating weekly cross-project status meetings
- Establishing a program-level knowledge management and lessons learned repository (Correct answer)
- Requiring all technical decisions to go through the PMO
- Assigning one project manager to oversee all technical work
Correct answer: Establishing a program-level knowledge management and lessons learned repository
A program-level knowledge management repository allows teams to share solutions, reducing duplication and accelerating problem resolution across component projects.
PGM Program Execution and Oversight 2
A program manager discovers that two component projects share a critical resource, creating a scheduling conflict.
What is the BEST first action?