Governance ◾ 33
6. Assume the Portfolio Board met and made a decision to add two programs
and three projects to the portfolio and to terminate three other projects
as they no longer support the strategic goals. With these newly authorized
components, it is time to update the:
a. Resource availability
b. Portfolio
c. Portfolio roadmap
d. Portfolio strategic plan
7. Your organization has a portfolio performance management plan, and within
it benets realization is described. One of the reasons for doing so is to:
a. Ensure there is overall portfolio value
b. Describe key metrics to collect for all aspects of the portfolio
c. Clearly identify benets for stakeholders
d. Have templates in place for benets realization plans for program and
project managers
8. As the portfolio manager it is your responsibility to maintain and update
various portfolio process assets. You also are using them as you prepare the
portfolio management plan. One that may be overlooked but is helpful in
determining portfolio processes is:
a. Overall governance approach
b. Portfolio management information system
c. Existing human resources
d. Open issues
9. As the portfolio manager you are accustomed to changes and the need to
periodically re- prioritize the components as new components are added to
the portfolio, others are terminated, and others complete on schedule. As
you set up your portfolio performance plan, change management and con-
trol is a separate section in it. Within this section you have a:
a. Process to optimize the component risk
b. Method to ensure regulatory compliance
c. Method to schedule change activities
d. Approach to respond quickly to strategic changes and manage them
accordingly
34 ◾ PfMP® Exam Practice Tests and Study Guide
10. As the portfolio manager, you know it is important to communicate to key
stakeholders. You need to provide timely messages to those stakeholders who
have a component that is approved for authorization into the portfolio and
also to the key stakeholders who are involved if a component is removed.
You do not want them to learn about these decisions from others, and your
focus is on consistent messages. Your approach is documented in the:
a. Communications strategy
b. Governance strategy
c. Portfolio management plan
d. Portfolio strategic plan
11. An active Portfolio Review Board that meets on a regularly scheduled basis
and makes decisions following an agreed upon and dened process so ‘pet
projects’ are not pursued is considered a best practice. After a recent matu-
rity assessment conducted by an outside consultant following OPM3, the
consultant noted in the Improvement Report that the Portfolio Review Board
needed a roadmap for its oversight functions. Having an up- to- date roadmap
is helpful as it:
a. Establishes how the portfolio is dened
b. Provides information on components for needed changes
c. Enables actions to be taken to minimize risk
d. Shows dependencies within the portfolio
12. Assume you are the portfolio manager at the enterprise level in your medi-
cal device company. The company’s long- standing mission is for its products
to be ones of the highest possible quality for its end users. As the enterprise
portfolio manager, you set up at the beginning a Portfolio Review Board,
and its members are the senior executives of the company. They conduct
phase- gate reviews and have a special interest in:
a. Products and services ranked in the top 10 of all the work under way
b. Products and services that are ready for commercialization
c. Research and development initiatives
d. Quality assurance and quality control
Governance ◾ 35
13. In order to keep operating costs low, your executive team is relying on con-
tractors to actually manage about 85% of the work in your organization. You
serve as the portfolio manager and often make recommendations, or sup-
port those of others, as to whether or not outsourcing is the best approach
to follow. The procurement decisions are included in:
a. The portfolio management plan
b. The portfolio procurement plan
c. The portfolio roadmap
d. The portfolio strategic plan
14. Your government agency, responsible for international espionage, recently
had its mandate reduced by the government based on outrage from people
throughout the world. As a result, its functions have been reduced, and the
agency has greater government oversight. It represents a signicant change
to the agency, which then impacts the resources and components in the
portfolio. The response to such a signicant change should be:
a. In the governance processes
b. Dened by the portfolio management ofce
c. The responsibility of the portfolio manager
d. In the portfolio strategic plan
15. After a dismal track record of consistently late and over- budget IT programs
and projects in your consulting company, the CEO found it was losing pro-
posals given these failures. The CEO realized changes in IT management
were required and hired a Chief Information Ofcer (CIO) with a proven
track record of taking companies that were at Level 1 in the Capability
Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) to Level 3 in one year. This CIO also
recommended that the company implement a portfolio management pro-
cess to ensure there no unapproved work was under way. The result is that
programs and projects now are considered successful, and the company
now is winning proposals. However before deciding to bid on a proposal,
the company no longer waits for the Request for Proposal (RFP), and now
has capture managers present proposals to the Portfolio Review Board when
new opportunities are located for approval. These proposals:
a. Often result in the need for an unscheduled meeting of the Board to be
held
b. Require the same degree of information as that for a program or project
c. Do not substitute for the need for another proposal if the company wins
the contract
d. Should have the capture manager remain as the sponsor if the contract is
awarded
36 ◾ PfMP® Exam Practice Tests and Study Guide
16. Your automotive company is working on its strategic plan for its 2016 model
line of vehicles. In the past, when the country’s economy was signicantly
lagging, it had to obtain funds from the government to avoid bankruptcy.
Now, the economy has recovered, and the company repaid monies loaned
by the government. To ensure it is focusing on the right products and ser-
vices, the EPMO hired a PfMP to review its portfolio processes and bench-
mark them against best practices elsewhere. The PfMP consultant noted that
the existing portfolio had components that had not been planned effectively.
As a result, now the EPMO Director realizes that:
a. The portfolio prioritization model requires updates
b. A separate portfolio manager should be hired to oversee the process
c. Benets from the existing components are unlikely to be realized
d. The portfolio governance board needs to be re- constituted into a
decision- making forum that meets regularly
17. At your University, as the portfolio manager, you have an inventory, which
you strive to maintain, of all the components and have set up key descrip-
tors. Your goal, as you review proposals for new components from sponsors
before the nal review by the University’s Portfolio Committee, is to ensure
the proposed component meets requirements for consideration, and this is
a rst screening. This means, for example, that a component should be one
that is:
a. Able to use existing University resources
b. Greater than a predetermined minimum size
c. Focused on quantitative benets
d. Independent of current portfolio components
18. After a year of regular Portfolio Review Board meetings at the business
unit level, the CEO hired a consultant to determine if the portfolio process
was effective or needed some revisions. The consultant recommended that
resource capability and capacity information was not up to date as compe-
tency proles were not in place. As a result:
a. The HR Department now is gathering data on the competencies pos-
sessed by staff members
b. The portfolio management information system needs revision
c. Portfolio reports require updates
d. The number of resources and skill set data are to be collected by each
business unit
Governance ◾ 37
19. Assume you recently were hired at a health insurance company to be its
portfolio manager. During the job interview, you learned the company had a
portfolio management process in place and a software tool, but the portfolio
manager had left the company. You realize your predecessor had not pre-
pared a portfolio management plan, which you believe is critical to success.
In preparing it, you want to understand the structure, scope, resources, time-
line, stakeholder communication requirements, performance expectations,
key risks, dependencies, and constraints so you should:
a. Conduct interviews with members of the Portfolio Review Board and
those responsible for the software tool
b. Review the portfolio charter
c. Follow the completed portfolio strategic plan, which was updated two
months ago
d. Review existing portfolio process assets
20. Although portfolio management is a new function in your University, people
are embracing it and excited now that a portfolio structure has been set
up. The portfolio manager is respected and attained her doctoral degree in
project management from the University, and the Chancellor is chairing the
Portfolio Review Board, which held its rst meeting a week ago and shared
the results throughout the University. It now is necessary to:
a. Update the strategic management plan
b. Prepare a charter for the Portfolio Review Board
c. Set up a dashboard system for regular reports from the component man-
agers to the portfolio manager
d. Authorize the portfolio manager to assign resources to the components
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