DAC Team Dynamics & Continuous Improvement 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: In Disciplined Agile, which team anti-pattern occurs when specialists only work on tasks within their narrow skill set, causing bottlenecks?
- Cross-functional overload
- Silo mentality (Correct answer)
- Generalist sprawl
- Capacity leakage
Correct answer: Silo mentality
Silo mentality occurs when team members restrict work to their specialty, creating bottlenecks and reducing overall flow.
Question 2: A DA Coach notices that a team's retrospectives always produce the same action items with no follow-through. What is the BEST corrective approach?
- Cancel retrospectives and use a suggestion box instead
- Limit retrospectives to one action item and assign a clear owner with a due date (Correct answer)
- Increase retrospective frequency to weekly
- Replace the Scrum Master with a project manager
Correct answer: Limit retrospectives to one action item and assign a clear owner with a due date
Limiting to one action item with a named owner and deadline increases accountability and prevents the common pattern of generating too many unactioned improvements.
Question 3: Which Disciplined Agile principle best describes why teams should tailor their process rather than follow a prescribed framework rigidly?
- Context counts (Correct answer)
- Be pragmatic
- Optimize flow
- Enterprise awareness
Correct answer: Context counts
The DA principle 'context counts' recognizes that every team's situation is unique and a one-size-fits-all process rarely works.
Question 4: When forming a new agile team, a DA Coach should primarily focus on which stage of Tuckman's model to establish healthy team dynamics?
- Storming — surface conflicts early
- Norming — establish agreements
- Performing — deliver value immediately
- Forming — set clear purpose and agreements (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Forming — set clear purpose and agreements
During Forming, establishing clear purpose, roles, and working agreements lays the foundation for all subsequent stages.
Question 5: A DA Coach wants to help a team improve its Definition of Done. Which action is MOST aligned with DA continuous improvement principles?
- Have the PMO define a standard DoD for all teams
- Let the team evolve the DoD incrementally based on quality feedback each iteration (Correct answer)
- Freeze the DoD once agreed to maintain consistency
- Delegate DoD ownership to the architecture owner
Correct answer: Let the team evolve the DoD incrementally based on quality feedback each iteration
Evolving the DoD incrementally based on real quality feedback is a continuous improvement practice that keeps quality standards relevant and team-owned.
Question 6: In DA, what is the primary purpose of a team's 'working agreements'?
- To document each member's performance targets
- To define the team's internal norms and expected behaviors so collaboration is smoother (Correct answer)
- To satisfy HR compliance requirements
- To allocate tasks by seniority
Correct answer: To define the team's internal norms and expected behaviors so collaboration is smoother
Working agreements capture the team's shared norms and behaviors, reducing friction and making collaboration more predictable.
Question 7: Which metric is MOST useful for a DA Coach tracking continuous improvement in team throughput over multiple iterations?
- Individual story point velocity per developer
- Cycle time trend across iterations (Correct answer)
- Number of ceremonies held per sprint
- Total lines of code committed
Correct answer: Cycle time trend across iterations
Cycle time trend reveals whether the team is consistently getting faster at delivering work items from start to completion.
DAC Team Dynamics & Continuous Improvement 2
In Disciplined Agile, which team anti-pattern occurs when specialists only work on tasks within their narrow skill set, causing bottlenecks?