PMI PMI-PgMP Free Practice Questions — Page 2

Q: Your company and a competing company have created a teaming agreement for an opportunity. Through this team agreement you and your competitor can complete a major program for a client. This is, technically, a risk response for both organizations. What type of risk response are you dealing with in this instance?

D. Sharing. Sharing is a positive risk (opportunity) response where two or more parties jointly own an opportunity to increase the probability of success — a teaming agreement between competitors to pursue a major program is a textbook example of sharing. Option A (teaming) describes the mechanism (the agreement itself), not the risk response strategy — teaming is how sharing is implemented, not the PMI risk response term. Option B (exploiting) is an opportunity response used to ensure the opportunity definitely occurs, typically by eliminating uncertainty, which is not what a teaming agreement does. Option C (accepting) means taking no action and dealing with consequences if the risk occurs, which contradicts the proactive nature of forming a teaming agreement.

Q: A project manager in your program has estimated the cost of a program to be $145,000. As the project manager's project comes close to completion, the project manager realizes that he has still $27,876 left in his project budget. He decides to add some additional features to the project's deliverables in an effort to use the remaining budget. These additions will add value to the project and the project customer is likely to enjoy these new features. This is an example of what term?

A. Gold plating. Gold plating is when a project manager adds unrequested features or extras beyond the agreed scope — even with good intentions — to use remaining budget or impress the customer. This is discouraged in PMI standards because it bypasses change control and introduces unplanned risk. Option B (errors and omissions) refers to mistakes or missing information in contracts or deliverables, which is unrelated to adding extra features. Option C (expert judgment) is a tool and technique used for decision-making and estimation, not a term describing unauthorized scope additions. Option D (value added change) sounds positive but is not a recognized PMI term — all scope changes, even beneficial ones, must go through formal change control, making this still gold plating.

Q: Andy is the program manager of the HQN Program. This program is nearing its completion and there is still $25,000 left in the program budget. Andy has asked the program team to identify some extra deliverables that can be included in the program scope to improve the program deliverable but also to use all of the funds in the budget. What term is assigned to the actions that Andy is trying to do in this instance?

D. Gold plating. This is another clear example of gold plating — Andy is deliberately adding unrequested scope to consume remaining budget, which bypasses formal change control and introduces unplanned risk to the program. Option A (value-added change requests) is not a recognized PMI term, and any scope addition — regardless of perceived value — must go through proper change control, not be self-initiated to spend leftover funds. Option B (zero-based budgeting) is a budgeting technique where every expense must be justified from scratch each period, completely unrelated to adding scope at program end. Option C (integrated change control) is the process that should be followed when changes are needed — Andy is actually bypassing this process, making this option the opposite of what is happening.Sonnet 4.6

Q: What analysis type could you use in a program to compare the positive stakeholders and their position, power, and influence over your program to the same variable components of the negative stakeholders in your program?

D. Force field analysis. Force field analysis is specifically designed to compare driving forces against restraining forces — in this context, mapping positive stakeholders (supporters) versus negative stakeholders (resistors) across position, power, and influence to understand the balance of forces affecting the program. Option A (sensitivity analysis) is a quantitative risk technique that determines which variables have the most impact on outcomes, not a stakeholder comparison tool. Option B (stakeholder analysis) identifies and assesses individual stakeholders but does not inherently compare positive versus negative stakeholders against each other in a structured opposing-forces format. Option C (Monte Carlo simulation) is a quantitative risk analysis technique using probability distributions and iterations to forecast outcomes, completely unrelated to stakeholder comparison.

Q: You are the program manager of the BHG Program. One of the projects in your program will be using new materials that are somewhat untested. You are worried that there may be delays and waste because the project team is unaware of how to accurately use these materials. You elect to send the people that will be using the new materials through training on how to complete their project work. You also allow them to purchase some of the materials to experiment on their use before the actual project work is to be done. You want to ensure that mistakes do not enter into the project. What type of action have you provided in this scenario?

A. This is an example of a preventive action.. A preventive action is a proactive step taken to eliminate the cause of a potential future problem before it occurs — training the team and allowing practice with new materials before actual project work begins is a textbook preventive action. Option B (team development) describes building team skills and cohesion broadly, but the specific intent here is preventing defects and delays, not general development. Option C (quality assurance) focuses on auditing processes to ensure standards are followed, not on proactively preventing a specific anticipated problem before work begins. Option D (corrective action) is taken after a problem has already occurred to bring performance back on track — since no mistakes have happened yet, this is preventive, not corrective.

Question 1

Your company and a competing company have created a teaming agreement for an opportunity. Through this team agreement you and your competitor can complete a major program for a client. This is, technically, a risk response for both organizations. What type of risk response are you dealing with in this instance?

Answer

Show Answer & Explanation

Correct Answer: D. Sharing

Sharing is a positive risk (opportunity) response where two or more parties jointly own an opportunity to increase the probability of success — a teaming agreement between competitors to pursue a major program is a textbook example of sharing. Option A (teaming) describes the mechanism (the agreement itself), not the risk response strategy — teaming is how sharing is implemented, not the PMI risk response term. Option B (exploiting) is an opportunity response used to ensure the opportunity definitely occurs, typically by eliminating uncertainty, which is not what a teaming agreement does. Option C (accepting) means taking no action and dealing with consequences if the risk occurs, which contradicts the proactive nature of forming a teaming agreement.

Question 2

A project manager in your program has estimated the cost of a program to be $145,000. As the project manager's project comes close to completion, the project manager realizes that he has still $27,876 left in his project budget. He decides to add some additional features to the project's deliverables in an effort to use the remaining budget. These additions will add value to the project and the project customer is likely to enjoy these new features. This is an example of what term?

Answer

Show Answer & Explanation

Correct Answer: A. Gold plating

Gold plating is when a project manager adds unrequested features or extras beyond the agreed scope — even with good intentions — to use remaining budget or impress the customer. This is discouraged in PMI standards because it bypasses change control and introduces unplanned risk. Option B (errors and omissions) refers to mistakes or missing information in contracts or deliverables, which is unrelated to adding extra features. Option C (expert judgment) is a tool and technique used for decision-making and estimation, not a term describing unauthorized scope additions. Option D (value added change) sounds positive but is not a recognized PMI term — all scope changes, even beneficial ones, must go through formal change control, making this still gold plating.

Question 3

Andy is the program manager of the HQN Program. This program is nearing its completion and there is still $25,000 left in the program budget. Andy has asked the program team to identify some extra deliverables that can be included in the program scope to improve the program deliverable but also to use all of the funds in the budget. What term is assigned to the actions that Andy is trying to do in this instance?

Answer

Show Answer & Explanation

Correct Answer: D. Gold plating

This is another clear example of gold plating — Andy is deliberately adding unrequested scope to consume remaining budget, which bypasses formal change control and introduces unplanned risk to the program. Option A (value-added change requests) is not a recognized PMI term, and any scope addition — regardless of perceived value — must go through proper change control, not be self-initiated to spend leftover funds. Option B (zero-based budgeting) is a budgeting technique where every expense must be justified from scratch each period, completely unrelated to adding scope at program end. Option C (integrated change control) is the process that should be followed when changes are needed — Andy is actually bypassing this process, making this option the opposite of what is happening.Sonnet 4.6

Question 4

What analysis type could you use in a program to compare the positive stakeholders and their position, power, and influence over your program to the same variable components of the negative stakeholders in your program?

Answer

Show Answer & Explanation

Correct Answer: D. Force field analysis

Force field analysis is specifically designed to compare driving forces against restraining forces — in this context, mapping positive stakeholders (supporters) versus negative stakeholders (resistors) across position, power, and influence to understand the balance of forces affecting the program. Option A (sensitivity analysis) is a quantitative risk technique that determines which variables have the most impact on outcomes, not a stakeholder comparison tool. Option B (stakeholder analysis) identifies and assesses individual stakeholders but does not inherently compare positive versus negative stakeholders against each other in a structured opposing-forces format. Option C (Monte Carlo simulation) is a quantitative risk analysis technique using probability distributions and iterations to forecast outcomes, completely unrelated to stakeholder comparison.

Question 5

You are the program manager of the BHG Program. One of the projects in your program will be using new materials that are somewhat untested. You are worried that there may be delays and waste because the project team is unaware of how to accurately use these materials. You elect to send the people that will be using the new materials through training on how to complete their project work. You also allow them to purchase some of the materials to experiment on their use before the actual project work is to be done. You want to ensure that mistakes do not enter into the project. What type of action have you provided in this scenario?

Answer

Show Answer & Explanation

Correct Answer: A. This is an example of a preventive action.

A preventive action is a proactive step taken to eliminate the cause of a potential future problem before it occurs — training the team and allowing practice with new materials before actual project work begins is a textbook preventive action. Option B (team development) describes building team skills and cohesion broadly, but the specific intent here is preventing defects and delays, not general development. Option C (quality assurance) focuses on auditing processes to ensure standards are followed, not on proactively preventing a specific anticipated problem before work begins. Option D (corrective action) is taken after a problem has already occurred to bring performance back on track — since no mistakes have happened yet, this is preventive, not corrective.

PMI PMI-PgMP Free Practice Questions — Page 2

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