Scrum.org PAL I: Professional Agile Leadership (PAL I)

Last checked November 10, 2026 against the official Scrum.org exam page.

1. Question 1Understanding and Applying the Scrum Framework

   A Scrum Team's Developers track their daily progress in a private spreadsheet that only the Scrum Master can open, so the Product Owner learns about slipping work only at the Sprint Review. Which empirical pillar is most directly violated?

   1. AAdaptation
   2. BInspection
   3. CPredictability of the forecast
   4. DTransparency
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   Correct answer: D

   Transparency means the work and its progress must be visible to those responsible for the outcome, and here the Product Owner cannot see it. Inspection and adaptation depend on transparency, but the direct violation is of transparency. Predictability is not one of Scrum's three empirical pillars.

2. Question 2Developing People and Teams

   A team manager begins assigning each Developer a specific task every morning and approving every technical decision before work starts. The team's delivery slows. What should the manager do to restore self-managing behaviour?

   1. AAssign tasks each morning, so that every Developer stays focused on the Sprint Goal and avoids overlap
   2. BLet the Developers decide how to deliver the Sprint Backlog and coach them when they ask for help
   3. CApprove each technical decision, so the Increment meets the expectations of the wider organization
   4. DGive the Product Owner final say over each Developer's daily task allocation
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   Correct answer: B

   A self-managing team decides internally how to deliver its work, so the manager should step back and coach rather than direct. The other options keep the manager or Product Owner in control of daily task and technical decisions, which is the very pattern that slowed the team.

3. Question 3Managing Products with Agility

   A team usually has about 12 items in progress at any time and finishes about 4 items per week. Assuming a stable flow, which average cycle time does Little's Law predict?

   1. AAbout 8 weeks, found by subtracting throughput from work in progress
   2. BAbout 3 weeks, found by dividing work in progress by throughput
   3. CAbout 16 weeks, found by adding work in progress to throughput
   4. DAbout one-third of a week, found by dividing throughput by work in progress
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   Correct answer: B

   Little's Law states that average cycle time equals work in progress divided by throughput, so 12 divided by 4 gives about 3 weeks in a stable flow. The other answers use subtraction, addition or an inverted division, none of which matches the law.

4. Question 4Developing and Delivering Products Professionally

   In an agile team, what does emergent architecture mean?

   1. AThe architecture is fixed by a single architect before any code is written and never revisited
   2. BThe system's design evolves through small, tested increments instead of being fully specified up front
   3. CThe vendor's platform sets the architecture, and the team adapts its work to fit that platform
   4. DThe architecture is documented automatically from the source code, so no design decisions need to be made or recorded at all
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   Correct answer: B

   Emergent architecture arises as the team builds and refactors small, tested increments, so design decisions are made and revised as evidence arrives. The other options describe up-front design, vendor-defined structure or the claim that no design decisions are needed.

5. Question 5Evolving the Agile Organization

   What does Conway's Law say about the systems that organizations build?

   1. AThe most senior engineer's preferred architecture will always be the one adopted
   2. BSystems always outlast the teams that built them, so they never need to change and rarely need redesign
   3. CTeams should never exceed nine people, or the system design will fail
   4. DSystems tend to mirror the communication structures of the organizations that build them
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   Correct answer: D

   Conway's Law observes that the design of a system tends to reflect the communication structure of the organization that produces it. The other statements make claims about system lifetime, team size or seniority that the law does not state.