Retrospectives are held toinspect what went well and what could be improved. According to thePMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.6), teams should use retrospectives to identifyissues, root causes, and impediments, not just successes. Identifying and discussing theproblems that arosehelps the team avoid similar issues in future sprints.
Mike Griffiths in hisPMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 7: Continuous Improvement)emphasizes the importance of open discussions around problems and the value of asafe environmentwhere teams can reflect and improve.
Option Bis correct: by highlighting the problems that emerged, the Scrum Master sets the stage for continuous improvement and alignment with organizational goals.

Velocity is a team-specific metric and cannot be reliably estimated until the team has worked together for several sprints. According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.4 Sprint Planning and Velocity Tracking), velocity should be measured empirically, not predicted based on assumptions or external input.
Mike Griffiths (PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning) emphasizes that new teams need to run a few sprints to establish a reliable velocity through real performance data, not estimation.
* Option D is correct: actual performance determines true velocity.
* Option A and B rely on speculation.
* Option C incorrectly uses sponsor input for team planning, which goes against agile principles.

The correct answer is C - Explain that the Kanban board enables the team to complete the work and increases transparency on work that is not done.
Agile values transparency, visibility, and collaboration. Kanban boards are a form of information radiator- tools that openly display the team's workflow, work-in-progress (WIP), and progress toward goals. Their visibility helps stakeholders and the team remain aligned and encourages accountability.
From the PMI Agile Practice Guide:
"Agile teams use information radiators such as Kanban boards to provide transparency and make status, bottlenecks, and priorities visible to all. This fosters trust, communication, and quick decision-making." (PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 3.5 - Information Radiators) Mike Griffiths adds:
"Visibility into progress and issues enhances communication and alignment across stakeholders. Information radiators like task boards or Kanban boards are vital tools for agile success." (Mike Griffiths, PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book, Chapter 5 - Agile Tools and Techniques) Other options are inappropriate:
* A and D compromise transparency and contradict agile values.
* B misstates the purpose of the Kanban board-it's not about assigning work post-completion.

According to the PMI Agile Practice Guide (Section 5.2 Requirements and User Stories) and Mike Griffiths' PMI-ACP Exam Prep Book (Chapter 6: Adaptive Planning), epics are large user stories that must be decomposed into smaller user stories for accurate planning and inclusion in sprints.
The two main drivers for breaking down epics are:
* Size - Epics are typically too large to be completed in a single iteration and must be divided to create manageable pieces of work.
* Priority - High-priority epics are decomposed early to allow the team to work on the most valuable items first.
This makes Option A the correct answer. The decision to decompose the epic is based on the need to fit it into sprint capacity and to align with backlog prioritization.

The correct answer is D - Get the product owner and team to meet to prioritize the work.
Agile teams prioritize collaboratively with the product owner, who represents the business value perspective.
Technical tasks (sometimes called "chores") may not deliver immediate business functionality but are important for sustaining delivery capacity. It's essential to balance technical work with feature delivery through backlog prioritization.
PMI Agile Practice Guide:
"Agile teams work with the product owner to prioritize backlog items, including technical debt or tasks that improve efficiency. Prioritization is a shared activity." (PMI Agile Practice Guide, Section 5.2 - Backlog Refinement) Mike Griffiths:
"Product owners collaborate with teams to ensure technical tasks that improve delivery capacity are balanced with business features." (PMI-ACP Exam Prep, Chapter 3 - Value-Driven Delivery) Incorrect options:
* A dismisses tasks that could improve long-term velocity.
* B ignores team ownership.
* C escalates prematurely rather than promoting collaboration.