PMI-ACP Project Management Institute Agile Certified Practitioner Exam Study Guide

J. Ashley Hunt

• Publisher: Sybex
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781119434450
• eBook ISBN: 9781119434467
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Certification Guides in Computer Science
• Index: Computer Science

The ultimate study package for the new PMI-ACP exam

The PMI-ACP Project Management Institute Agile Certified Practitioner Exam Study Guide is an all-in-one package for comprehensive exam preparation. This up-to-date guide is fully aligned with the latest version of the exam, featuring coverage of 100 percent of the exam domains. Expanded coverage of AGILE includes the basic principles, value-driven delivery, stakeholder engagement, team performance, adaptive planning, problem detection and resolution, and continuous improvement to align with the A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® 6th Edition) and its increased emphasis on agile, adaptive and iterative practices.

In-depth discussion merges with hands-on exercises and real-world scenarios to provide a well-rounded review of essential exam concepts, while the online learning center provides an assessment test, chapter tests, a practice exam, and study aids to help you ensure complete preparation for the big day.

• Master 100 percent of the exam objectives, including expanded AGILE coverage
• Reinforce critical concepts with hands-on practice and real-world scenarios
• Test your knowledge with challenging chapter review questions
• One year of FREE access to the Sybex online test bank featuring practice tests, flashcards, a glossary, and more

Project management is one of the most in-demand skills in today's job market, making more and more employers turn to AGILE methodologies to enhance delivery and results. The PMI-ACP certification shows employers that you have demonstrated mastery of essential project management skills and a practical understanding of adaptive, iterative processes; this validation puts you among the ranks of qualified project management professionals employers are desperately seeking, and the PMI-ACP Project Management Institute Agile Certified Practitioner Exam Study Guide is your one-stop resource for exam success.

Chapter 1
Agile Foundations

THE FOLLOWING PMI-ACP^® EXAM TOPICS ARE COVERED IN THIS CHAPTER:

Agile Principles and Mindset

• Task 1: Advocate for agile principles by modeling those principles and discussing agile values in order to develop a shared mindset across the team as well as between the customer and the team.
• Task 2: Help ensure that everyone has a common understanding of the values and principles of agile and a common knowledge around the agile practices and terminology being used in order to work effectively.
• Task 3: Support change at the system or organization level by educating the organization and influencing processes, behaviors, and people in order to make the organization more effective and efficient.
• Task 4: Practice visualization by maintaining highly visible information radiators showing real progress and real team performance in order to enhance transparency and trust.
• Task 5: Contribute to a safe and trustful team environment by allowing everyone to experiment and make mistakes so that each can learn and continuously improve the way he or she works.
• Task 6: Enhance creativity by experimenting with new techniques and process ideas in order to discover more efficient and effective ways of working.
• Task 7: Encourage team members to share knowledge by collaborating and working together in order to lower risks around knowledge silos and reduce bottlenecks.
• Task 8: Encourage emergent leadership within the team by establishing a safe and respectful environment in which new approaches can be tried in order to make improvements and foster self-organization and empowerment.
• Task 9: Practice servant leadership by supporting and encouraging others in their endeavors so that they can perform at their highest level and continue to improve.

In this chapter, we will go through some of the information found in Agile Principles and Mindset of the PMI-ACP exam as an overview of how Agile began. We will continue in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 as we get into greater depth on frameworks and the tasks of Agile.

History and the Agile Manifesto

When most people think of Agile, they see it as a recent development of a new kind of methodology. In fact, in the age of technology and software development, there are a lot of buzzwords out there revolving around continuous delivery and software production. The history of Agile spans a decade or more. As early as the 1990s, it became necessary for organizations to keep up with the rapid pace of enterprise software development. Technology went from answering machines to dial-up modems and “You’ve got mail” to the types of technology that we’re using today. Due to the proliferation of software programs, apps, and other cutting-edge technologies, it became necessary for organizations to find a better way to manage and adapt.

Most organizations had trouble keeping up with changes in requirements, computer systems, and software, and many were using outdated modalities and best practices. In some industries, it took much longer than expected to create the technology necessary to run the organization or to get certain projects off the ground. The industries that were affected were not necessarily companies that produce software or computer technologies; rather, it was the companies that were using those technologies to get their projects off the ground that felt the greatest impact. Industries like government, telecommunications, automotive, and others that were dependent on software and processing technologies being totally up-to-date were finding that the technologies that they were using were outdated and not effective for the projects they were working on currently.

Organizations were also figuring out that heavier project management methodologies, which focused more on long-term planning, were not as effective for the types of projects they were working on now. Due to a highly changing environment and constant demands to stay current on innovative technologies, it was imperative to find newer and better ways of doing things.

The Agile Alliance

The frustration of heavy methodologies that didn’t work for the industry and attempting to find a more “lightweight” model of project management led 17 software developers to meet and discuss new methods or ways to embrace changes and to provide enhanced on-time feedback.

When most people hear about these software developers getting together, they think about the well-known Agile Alliance, which created the Agile Manifesto. While it wasn’t the first time this group got together to discuss a variety of methodologies and best practices, the most famous meeting was in Snowbird, Utah, in February 2001.

The goal of this meeting was to discuss ways to simplify or create a lightweight type of practice or practices that could fluctuate depending upon the project’s needs. The ability to build working software quickly by understanding what the customer needs with very little front-end planning and documentation formed a large part of the discussions. Some of the more recognizable names that make up the Agile Alliance are Kent Beck and Ward Cunningham, who created the eXtreme Programming methodology, or XP, as well as Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber, who created the Scrum process in the early 1990s.

The Agile Alliance determined that new methods should be based on iterative and incremental development rather than a preplanned and well-defined scope of work right at the very beginning of the project. This would allow the result to surface organically as new features or requirements were discovered.

The second driving factor was creating higher quality software in shorter time frames, running short sprints or iterations and work to produce something usable at the end of each. This would allow the user to test the increment and make determinations for new requirements for the next iteration. To run quick iterations and create usable increments, it was difficult to preplan everything. Thus, the Agile Alliance determined that it was necessary to have requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration and self-organizing, cross-functional teams. This would allow for business value to evolve and develop a cross-pollinated understanding of what the results should be at the team level. Everyone knows the vision, even when the vision changes.

The Agile Manifesto

For those variables to work effectively, it was necessary to adapt current methods, including a Waterfall type framework to suit the needs of more technical types of projects. Based on the discussions and the need to adapt the common Waterfall types of methodologies to suit a rapid, frantic pace in technology, the Agile Manifesto was born.

The Agile Manifesto was designed to be a set of lightweight and guiding principles rather than set rules and formal processes. The goal of a written manifesto is for a person or persons to publicly announce something they feel strongly about or to make their views known. That doesn’t mean a long statement spanning pages and pages. In fact, much like Agile methodologies in general, the manifesto is short and easy to understand and gets straight to the point without any additional noise.

The Agile Manifesto forms the basis for most methods currently in use today, including Scrum, eXtreme Programming, Lean, Crystal Methods, and others.

The Agile Manifesto has very specific values that are stated very simply without any additional explanation. The reason for this i...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Preface
• Introduction
• Assessment Test
• Answers to Assessment Test
• Chapter 1 Agile Foundations
• Chapter 2 Scrum and eXtreme Programming (XP)
• Chapter 3 Key Aspects of Additional Agile Methodologies
• Chapter 4 Agile Initiation and Stakeholder Engagement
• Chapter 5 The Human Side of Agile Project Management
• Chapter 6 Agile Estimation and Planning
• Chapter 7 Effective Team Performance on Agile Projects
• Chapter 8 Agile Execution and Tracking of Iterations
• Chapter 9 Detecting Problems and Working Through Changes
• Chapter 10 Tailoring, Quality Management, and Improving Project Processes
• Appendix A Next Steps
• Appendix B Answers to Review Questions
• Advert
• EULA