PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP®)

Domain 1 Mindset – 28%

Agile practitioners should have a deep understanding of the agile mindset and principles and the ability to apply them in practice. They should be able to create an environment that fosters innovation, experimentation, and continuous learning.

Additionally, they should be able to promote collaboration and teamwork, establish a shared vision and working agreements, and develop high-performing
teams.

They should also be able to use retrospective findings to improve the team and breakdown silos. Finally, agile practitioners should be able to evaluate the team’s understanding of agile and tailor the approach accordingly, as well as identify the appropriate inter-team coordination approach.

Task 1: Experiment Early 

• Build an increment of the product to validate solution and/or market need
• Create an environment to innovate, learn, and grow

Task 2: Embrace Agile Mindset

• Use agile values and principles

• Integrate agile models based on needs (e.g., use case, team, project, organization)
• Apply the appropriate complexity method/domain to the complexity theory system (i.e. CAS, Stacey Matrix, Cynefin) to classify scenarios
• Identify the application and importance or risks of each complexity system theory given a specific scenario
• Interpret the output of agile suitability tools

Task 3: Promote Collaborative Team Environment

• Establish team vision and working agreements approach (e.g., scrum of scrums, team of teams)
• Form and develop a high performing team
• Use retrospective findings to improve the team
• Use collaboration practices to breakdown silos
• Commit to the team’s decisions even in disagreement
• Evaluate the team’s understanding of agile to tailor the agile approach
• Identify the key factors to consider when determining the appropriate inter-team coordination

Task 4: Build Transparency

• Make status, progress, process, risks, impediments, and learning accessible to all (e.g., using information radiators)
• Define communication strategies for co-located and distributed teams
• Establish a feedback loop for team

Task 5:Foster Psychological Safety

• Promote a no blame culture by encouraging objectivity
• Encourage challenging the status quo
• Encourage dialogue over debate

Task 6: Shorten Feedback Loops 

• Include the stakeholders from day one
• Maximize value given a specific timeframe
• Use tools and techniques to shorten feedback (e.g., design thinking and lean startup)

Task 7: Embrace Change 

• Promote a growth mindset to respond to change
• Adapt to product needs based on the learning and feedback
• Embrace process adaptation by responding to changing requirements and priorities
• Encourage and model cross skills (e.g., generalizing specialists)

Domain 2 Leadership – 25%

Agile practitioners should possess the necessary skills and knowledge to effectively lead within an agile team. This includes a deep understanding of agile principles and methodologies and the ability to create a collaborative team environment that fosters innovation, learning, and growth.

They should also be able to apply principles of systems thinking to classify scenarios and identify the importance or risks of each classification. Additionally, they should be able to interpret the output of agile suitability tools and integrate agile models based on needs.

Other key skills include the ability to establish team vision and working agreements, form and develop high-performing teams, use retrospective findings to improve the team, and use collaboration practices to break down silos.
They should also be committed to the team’s decisions even in disagreement and be able to evaluate the team’s understanding of
agile to tailor the approach.

Task 1: Empower Teams  

• Establish an environment of trust (e.g., enable transparent communication)
• Interpret the output of self-assessment tools and techniques to help teams develop their capabilities
• Motivate team members (e.g., to experiment and/or take risks)
• Coach and mentor team members
• Promote collective ownership of goals
• Recognize the differences between training, coaching, and mentoring and when to apply each approach
• Apply emotional intelligence techniques to support the team, increase empathy, resolve conflict and support positive influence
• Interpret non-verbal cues during team interaction

Task 2: Facilitate Problem Resolution  

• Investigate the root cause of problems (e.g., root cause analysis, Ishikawa)
• Ensure the problems are resolved in a timely manner
• Determine the resolution strategies with the team that will add the most value

Task 3: Promote Knowledge Sharing

• Create environment to capture and share knowledge (e.g., Lessons Learned for continuous improvement, retrospectives, communities of practice)
• Allocate time for knowledge sharing and making required updates
• Leverage organizational knowledge assets (e.g., from other similar initiatives, people and processes)

Task 4: Promote agile mindset principles and practices  

• Create awareness around the agile values and principles
• Recognize, reward, and encourage agile behavior
• Foster an environment for continuous improvement

Task 5: Promote shared vision and purpose

• Define and ensure there is a common understanding of the purpose and vision with all stakeholders
• Continuously communicate the vision and purpose
• Ensure product is always aligned to the vision and organizational goals

Task 6: Facilitate conflict management 

• Identify the root cause and the level of the conflict
• Promote collaborative approach to solve the conflict

Domain 3 Product – 19%

Agile practitioners should have a deep understanding of agile methodologies, including (but not limited to): Scrum, Kanban, and Lean, and be able to apply them to project management and product development. They should have experience in product development, building product roadmaps, creating user stories, and managing product backlogs.

They should have foundational technical knowledge and be able to work closely with development teams to understand technical requirements and constraints. Practitioners should have excellent communication skills and be able to effectively communicate with stakeholders, including customers, development teams, and executives.

The candidate should have strong leadership skills and be able to lead cross-functional teams to deliver high-quality products. Additionally, they should be committed to continuous learning and be willing to stay up to date with the latest trends and best practices in agile project and product management and development.

Task 1: Refine product backlog  

• Clarify the backlog items
• Use tools and techniques to collectively size work
• Prioritize the backlog items with the customer/stakeholder
• Decompose the backlog items as needed

Task 2: Manage increments  

• Ensure increment is aligned with business priorities
• Measure the delivery of value
• Define the increment goals
• Demonstrate increments of value for early feedback

Task 3: Visualize work 

• Educate work visualization techniques
• Continuously share information
• Establish a process to update the data/stats

Task 4: Manage value delivery

• Define what value will look like (e.g., success criteria, sustainability, security, privacy, regulatory, compliance)
• Ensure that the targeted results are achieved (e.g., Customer satisfaction, increase in sales)
• Ensure the value increments are optimized

Domain 4 Delivery – 28%

Agile practitioners should have the necessary skills and knowledge to effectively manage and deliver projects and products using agile approaches. The candidate should have strong communication and collaboration skills to work effectively with cross-functional teams. Experience in agile project management tools and techniques such as user stories, sprint planning, and retrospectives.

Knowledge of agile development practices such as continuous integration, continuous delivery, and test-driven development. Familiarity with agile frameworks and methodologies, but not limited to, such as Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, and Lean. Ability to adapt to changing requirements and priorities in a fast-paced environment. Experience in using agile metrics to measure project progress and
success. Seeking early feedback from internal and external customers to ensure alignment with their needs. Managing risks proactively to minimize impact on project and/or product delivery. Eliminating waste by focusing on delivering value to the customer.

Performing continuous improvement to enhance project delivery and team performance. Engaging customers throughout the project to ensure their needs are met. Optimizing flow by focusing on delivering value quickly and efficiently. In addition, agile practitioners should also have a strong commitment to continuous learning and improvement and a passion for delivering high-quality products
and services to customers

Task 1: Seek early feedback  

• Evaluate customer satisfaction
• Collect and incorporate stakeholders’ feedback on a regular basis
• Deliver work in small increments

Task 2: Manage agile metrics  

• Determine which metrics are appropriate for a given audience
• Use metrics insights for decision making
• Radiate metrics across the relevant audience
• Review and analyze metrics

Task 3: Manage impediments and risk  

• Proactively identify risks and impediments
• Use lessons learned to avoid risks/impediments recurrence
• Engage the team to find the most appropriate course of action
• Prioritize impediment removal and risk mitigation activities

Task 4: Recognize and eliminate waste 

• Visualize the end-to-end flow of value in the system (e.g., value added, non-value added)
• Iterate on identification and reduction of waste
• Use metrics, tools and feedback loops to identify waste
• Prioritize waste reduction activities

Task 5: Perform continuous improvements  

• Obtain metrics and feedback to drive continuous improvements
• Evaluate the effectiveness of process improvement
• Implement improvement actions

Task 6: Actively engage customers 

• Identify and analyze customer and their needs
• Encourage collaboration between customer and team
• Validate that iteration deliverables meet acceptance criteria

Task 7: Optimize flow 

• Limit work-in-progress at all levels
• Shield team from interruptions (e.g., create team interfaces)
• Use metrics to analyze and improve flow

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