Updated PMP Exam Questions & Answers –What is Schedule Performance Index PMP?

PMP Certification is the most reputable certification in the field of project management around the world. It is known that the PMP exam is difficult indeed. However, with the guidance of a reliable training institute like SPOTO, we will help you clear the exam smoothly. In this blog, we will provide 15 PMP practice tests with detailed explanations for each question. Besides, we carefully point out the related knowledge area in the PMBOK. Get started now! 

1. A manager and the head of engineering discuss a change to a major work package. After the meeting, the manager contacts you and tells you to complete the paperwork to make the change. This is an example of: 

A-) Management attention to scope management. 

B-) Management planning. 

C-) A project expediter position. 

D-) A change control system. 

Answer is C. In this situation, project manager acts as the secretary of the project and does the paper work. So this is an example of project expediter position where project manager does not have any authority and power. Project manager does only paper work. Knowledge Area: Organizational Influences and Project Lifecycle 

2. During a team meeting, a team member asks about the measurements that will be used on the project to judge performance. The team member feels that some of the measures related to activities assigned him are not valid measurements. The project is BEST considered in what part of the project management process? 

A-) Initiating 

B-) Executing 

C-) Monitoring & Controlling 

D-) Closing 

Answer is B. Executing. Questions states that team member feels some of the measures on his activities are not valid. Therefore, he must be working during the executing phase of the project where project deliverables are produced and project members perform most of the work they should do. Knowledge Area: Project Management Processes 

3. Your company just won a major new project. It will begin in three months and is valued at 2m USD. You are the project manager for an existing project. What is the FIRST thing you should do once you hear of the new project? 

A-) Ask management how the new project will use resources 

B-) Resource level your project 

C-) Crash your project 

D-) Ask management how the new project will affect your project 

Answer is D. Ask management how the new project will affect your project. Since this is another project that your company is going to execute, you need to be sure whether it will impact your project. Knowledge Area: Integration Management Knowledge Area 

4.You are a new project manager who has never managed a project before. It would be BEST in this situation to rely on _____ during planning in order to improve your chance of success. 

A-) Your intuition and training 

B-) Stakeholder analysis 

C-) Historical information 

D-) Configuration management 

Answer is C. Historical information. First thing to explore before starting a new project is the historical information about similar projects in the organizational process assets library of the organization. Knowledge Area: Integration Management Knowledge Area 

5.During project executing, a team member comes to the project manager because he is not sure of what work he needs to accomplish on the project. Which of the following documents contain detailed descriptions of work packages? 

A-) WBS Dictionary 

B-) Activity List 

C-) Project scope statement 

D-) Scope management plan 

Answer is A. WBS Dictionary. Work packages in a Work Breakdown Structure contain only nouns or a couple of words regarding a work or deliverable. Detailed information on what needs to be done, responsible, prerequisites, successors, due date etc. are included in the Work Breakdown Structure Dictionary. Knowledge Area: Scope Management Knowledge Area 

6.During a meeting with some of the project stakeholders, the project manager is asked to add work to the project scope. The project manager had access to correspondence about the project before the project charter was signed and remembers that the project sponsor specifically denied funding for the scope mentioned by these stakeholders. The BEST thing for the project manager to do is to: 

A-) Let the sponsor know of the stakeholders’ request. 

B-) Evaluate the impact of adding the scope. 

C-) Tell the stakeholders the scope cannot be added. 

D-) Add the work if there is time available in the project schedule 

Answer is C. Tell the stakeholders the scope cannot be added. After the scope of a project is finalized and scope baseline is determined, it can be changed only with the approved changed requests. If there is not an approved change request, existing scope baseline must be valid and project team must work on to deliver that scope only. In the scenario, scope is defined already but some stakeholders ask to add new work to the scope. This cannot be done unless there is an approved change request. Therefore, stakeholders must be informed that this new work cannot be added. Knowledge Area: Scope Management Knowledge Area 

7.Your project management plan results in a project schedule that is too long If the project network diagram cannot change but you have extra personnel resources, what is the BEST thing to do? 

A-) Fast track the project. 

B-) Level the resources. 

C-) Crash the project. 

D-) Monte Carlo analysis. 

The answer is C, crash the project. Because, in first sentence, it is mentioned that schedule is too long, therefore the aim is making a shorter schedule. And in the second sentence it is mentioned that you have extra personnel resources. If you have resources, you can put more resources in an activity to complete it in a shorter time. And this is actually a description of crashing an activity or crashing the project. If you look to the other options, fast tracking was performing activities in parallel instead of series, therefore it is irrelevant. Leveling the resources was for fixing the over-allocation of resources and distributing the tasks to all your resources uniformly. And Monte Carlo analysis was another estimating tool which is irrelevant choice as well. Therefore, here the best answer is C. Knowledge Area: Schedule Management Knowledge Area 

8.An activity has an early start (ES) of day 3, a late start (LS) of day 13, an early finish (EF) of day 9, and a late finish (LF) of day 19. The activity: 

A-) Is on the critical path. 

B-) Has a lag. 

C-) Is progressing well. 

D-) Is not on the critical path. 

Answer is D. is not on the critical path. Because if you look to the early start and late start values of the activity, you can find the float or the slack of activity’s time by subtracting early start, 3 days, from the late start, 13 days. And it gives 10 days of float for this activity. You will find the same result if you go through subtracting the early finish, 9 days, from the late finish, 19 days. Since the float of activity or the slack of the activity is greater than zero, it’s not on the critical path. Remember the critical path activities was having zero float, therefore the answer is D. Knowledge Area: Schedule Management Knowledge Area 

9.Early in the life of your project, you are having a discussion with the sponsor about what estimating techniques should be used. You want a form of expert judgment, but the sponsor argues for analogous estimating. It would be BEST to: 

A-) Agree to analogous estimating, as it is a form of expert judgment 

B-) Suggest life cycle costing 

C-) Determine why the sponsor wants such an accurate estimate 

D-) Try to convince the sponsor to allow expert judgment because it is typically more accurate. 

Answer is A. Agree to analogous estimating, as it is a form of expert judgment. Since analogous estimating is a type of expert judgment you can accept it. This is a tricky question. Knowledge Area: Cost Management Knowledge Area 

10. A schedule performance index, SPI, of 0.75 means: A-) Project is over budget. B-) Project is ahead of schedule. C-) Project is progressing at 75% of the rate originally planned D-) Project is progressing at 25% of the rate originally planned Answer is C, project is progressing at 75% of the rate originally planned. A, is irrelevant because SPI is a schedule performance index. We cannot derive any conclusion about budget performance of the project with this index. B, is not correct because SPI is less than one, therefore, the project is behind schedule. And D, says that you have completed 25% of the work that you have originally planned, so it’s not correct. The correct answer here is C, because SPI 0.75 means, you have completed 75% of your work that you have originally planned. Knowledge Area: Cost Management Knowledge Area 

11. You are the program level manager with several project activities underway. In the executing process group, you begin to become concerned about the accuracy of progress reports from the projects. What would BEST support your opinion that there is a problem? 

A-) Quality Audits 

B-) Risk Quantification Reports 

C-) Regression Analysis 

D-) Monte Carlo Analysis 

Answer is A. quality audits. If you read the second sentence again, it says that you are concerned about the accuracy of progress reports from the project. In order to check whether the standards of your organization have been applied in the projects that you are responsible of, you can conduct a quality audit and find out whether there is really a problem. Therefore, here the best answer is A, Quality Audits. Knowledge Area: Quality Management Knowledge Area 

12. You are a project manager for a major information systems project. Someone from the quality department comes to see you about beginning a quality audit of your project. The team, already under pressure to complete the project as soon as possible, objects to the audit. You should explain to the team that the purpose of a quality audit is: 

A-) Part of an ISO 9000 investigation 

B-) To check if the customer is following its quality process 

C-) To identify inefficient and ineffective policies 

D-) To check the accuracy of costs submitted by the team How would you explain it to your team if you were in this case? 

The best answer is C, to identify inefficient and ineffective policies. B and D are irrelevant options because quality audit is done in order to check whether you are meeting the quality standards, whether you are following the quality procedures of your company. Therefore, it’s not related whether the customer is following its quality processes. Or it is not related about accuracy of costs submitted by the team. Knowledge Area: Quality Management Knowledge Area 

13. During every project team meeting, the project manager asks each team member to describe the work he or she is doing, and the project manager assigns new activities to team members. The length of these meetings has increased because there are many different activities to assign. This could be happening for all the following reasons EXCEPT: 

A-) Lack of a WBS 

B-) Lack of a responsibility assignment matrix 

C-) Lack of resource leveling 

D-) Lack of team involvement in project planning 

Answer is C, lack of resource leveling. If you read the clauses again, here the problem is the activities or the tasks that need to be performed in the project are not clear. So, the reasons of these ambiguities, or these unclear points about the tasks that will be performed can be lack of a WBS. If you could not decompose your project activities and creation of WBS, then this might be causing the ambiguities in your project tasks. Also, if you do not have a clear and concise responsibility assignment matrix, then the resources of your project will have unclarity about who will do what in the project. Also, if the team was not involved in project planning, maybe you could not have identified the required steps, required tasks, activities that need to be performed in the project. So, options A, B, and D are the possible reasons for this case mentioned in the question. However, lack of resource leveling might be causing a scheduling problem. Resource leveling is a technique used in schedule management knowledge area, which was enabling the uniform distribution of tasks and activities in a project. Knowledge Area: Resources Management Knowledge Area 

14. Conflict resolution techniques that may be used on a project include confronting, smoothing, forcing, and: 

A-) Withdrawing 

B-) Directing 

C-) Organizing 

D-) Controlling Which of the options is a conflict resolution technique? 

Answer is A, Withdrawing, or in other words, avoiding. The other three are directing, organizing, and controlling, are not types of conflict resolution techniques. Therefore, the answer is A. Knowledge Area: Resources Management Knowledge Area 

15. All of the following about communication models is true EXCEPT: 

A-) Sender encodes his thoughts and sends to receiver. 

B-) Information is sent by the sender to receiver with the assistance of medium. 

C-) Receiver acknowledges if he agrees with the information he received. 

D-) Message is decoded by the receiver into thoughts. Which one is not correct about communication models? 

The answer is C, Receiver acknowledges if he agrees with the information he received. If you remember, the acknowledgement was saying that the receiver got the message, but it does not mean that he or she agrees with the received message. Acknowledgment means only that the message sent by the other party has been received. Therefore, it does not mean an agreement, and here the best answer is C. Knowledge Area: Communications Management Knowledge Area Explore More  PMP Demos? Click here!

What is Schedule Performance Index PMP?

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