PRINCE2-Agile-Foundation PRINCE2 Agile Foundation (Version 2) Exam Question and Answers

Agile Foundation guidance, aligned with PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile, explains that the managing product delivery process is where agreement on the requirements for the delivery of specialist products is necessary, making option D the correct answer. This process focuses on the interface between project management and the delivery teams, ensuring that work is clearly understood, authorized, executed, and accepted.

Managing product delivery is concerned with agreeing what specialist products are to be produced, the quality expectations they must meet, and how and when they will be delivered. This agreement typically takes the form of work packages or similar delivery agreements. These clarify requirements, acceptance criteria, constraints, and reporting expectations so that delivery teams can work with confidence and autonomy. Agile Foundation documents emphasize that clarity at this point is essential to avoid misunderstandings, rework, and delays.

Option A, initiating a project, establishes the overall project approach, governance, and high-level requirements, but it does not agree detailed requirements for specialist product delivery. Option B, starting up a project, is an early process focused on ensuring the project is viable and worth initiating; it does not involve detailed delivery agreements. Option C, controlling a stage, focuses on monitoring progress, handling issues, and ensuring work stays within tolerances, rather than agreeing delivery requirements.

Agile Foundation materials highlight that managing product delivery supports Agile ways of working by enabling empowered teams to self-organize within clearly defined boundaries. By agreeing requirements upfront for each delivery increment, teams gain clarity on what “done” looks like while still retaining flexibility in how they achieve it. This process ensures that specialist products meet agreed quality standards and are delivered in line with project objectives.

By formally agreeing the requirements for specialist product delivery within the managing product delivery process, organizations balance governance and agility, ensuring transparency, accountability, and effective value delivery.

The concept of “being Agile” rather than merely “doing Agile” is a central theme in Agile Foundation guidance. “Being Agile” refers to adopting the Agile mindset, values, and principles as a way of thinking and behaving, rather than simply applying a set of tools, ceremonies, or techniques. This mindset emphasizes adaptability, collaboration, continuous learning, and responsiveness to change, which is best represented by option B.

Agile foundations clearly distinguish mindset from mechanics. While timelines, documentation, and techniques have their place, they are secondary to people, interactions, and the ability to respond effectively to changing circumstances. Adaptability means welcoming change, even late in development, when it improves value for customers and stakeholders. Collaboration emphasizes close, ongoing cooperation between cross-functional team members, business representatives, and customers, ensuring shared understanding and faster decision-making.

Option A focuses on strict timelines and task completion, which aligns more closely with traditional predictive or plan-driven approaches. Agile recognizes that rigid timelines can reduce flexibility and discourage learning. Option C emphasizes document-driven processes, which contradict the Agile value of prioritizing working solutions over comprehensive documentation. Documentation is useful, but it should support value delivery, not dominate it. Option D highlights Agile techniques for efficiency, which reflects “doing Agile” rather than “being Agile.” Techniques such as stand-ups, boards, or retrospectives only create value when guided by an Agile mindset.

In Agile foundations, “being Agile” enables teams to continuously inspect and adapt their ways of working, improve relationships, and deliver meaningful outcomes. By focusing on adaptability and collaboration, organizations create environments where teams can respond effectively to uncertainty, learn from feedback, and consistently deliver value, which is the true intent of Agile.

The Managing Product Delivery process includes agreeing on and controlling the requirements for the delivery of specialist products. This process ensures that team managers understand the scope and quality expectations before work begins and that delivery aligns with the project plan.

Initiating a project and starting up a project establish overall direction but do not handle detailed delivery requirements. Managing a stage boundary reviews progress and plans the next stage.

This process maintains clarity and accountability for delivery within PRINCE2’s framework, facilitating effective control over specialist products.

In PRINCE2 Agile, a Backlog is the prioritized list of requirements, features, or user stories that define what needs to be delivered for a product. It is a dynamic and evolving list that is continually refined and re-prioritized to ensure the most valuable work is done first. The backlog acts as a single source of truth for what the team needs to deliver and provides transparency to stakeholders regarding progress and priorities. It aligns with agile principles and practices such as Scrum, where the Product Backlog contains all desired work for the product.

The Project Canvas is a high-level tool used for defining project scope and objectives, the Release Map plans releases and iterations, and the Project Log tracks issues, risks, and actions but does not list prioritized requirements.

Reference https://publications.axelos.com/prince2agile2016/content.aspx?page=pra_126 &showNav=true&expandNav=true

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in PRINCE2 Agile is recognized as a tool that can assist in reducing uncertainty and ambiguity by providing data-driven insights, predictive analytics, and automation of routine tasks. This support helps teams better understand changing environments and respond faster, thereby addressing complexity associated with change initiatives.

While AI can add complexity if misused, PRINCE2 Agile focuses on its beneficial role in supporting decision-making and reducing unknowns rather than complicating governance or communication.

Agile Foundation guidance, aligned with PRINCE2 Agile concepts, explains that integrated elements are used to describe different aspects of how a project is structured and delivered. Among these elements, the “people” element specifically defines who is working on the project and who is affected by the project, making option D the correct answer.

The people element focuses on roles, responsibilities, relationships, and stakeholders involved in the project. It identifies not only the delivery team members but also sponsors, users, customers, suppliers, and any individuals or groups impacted by the project’s outcomes. Agile and PRINCE2 Agile both emphasize that successful delivery depends heavily on people, collaboration, and clear accountability. Understanding who is involved and affected ensures effective communication, engagement, and decision-making throughout the project lifecycle.

Option A, the project context, describes the environment in which the project operates, including organizational, regulatory, and external factors, but it does not specifically define who is involved. Option B, the PRINCE2 practices, focuses on areas such as risk, quality, plans, and progress, providing guidance on what needs to be managed rather than who is involved. Option C, the PRINCE2 processes, outlines the flow of activities and decision points during the project, not the people performing or impacted by them.

Agile Foundation documents stress that Agile delivery is people-centric. Self-organizing teams, empowered roles, and active stakeholder involvement are core to Agile success. The people element supports this by ensuring clarity around roles, expectations, and collaboration pathways. By clearly defining who is working on the project and who is affected by it, teams can build trust, manage stakeholder needs effectively, and adapt to change more smoothly. This alignment of people with purpose and value delivery is central to both Agile principles and PRINCE2 Agile integration.

A well-recognized challenge when merging traditional project management with Agile approaches is the use of different terminology, making option B the correct answer. Agile Foundation materials highlight that traditional project management and Agile have evolved from different perspectives, each with its own language, concepts, and assumptions. When these approaches are combined within the same organization or project, misunderstandings often arise due to terminology differences rather than fundamental conflicts in intent.

Traditional project management commonly uses terms such as scope, milestones, deliverables, baselines, and change control, while Agile uses concepts like backlog, iterations, increments, velocity, and value delivery. Even when the underlying goals are aligned, different terminology can create confusion among stakeholders, project managers, Agile teams, and senior leadership. This confusion may lead to misaligned expectations, incorrect reporting, or resistance to Agile practices, as people may interpret the same words differently or assume conflicting meanings.

Option A, lack of clear processes, is generally not a common issue because both project management and Agile provide structured approaches, albeit in different forms. Option C, lack of guidance at the project level, is also not accurate, as Agile Foundation guidance increasingly addresses how Agile can operate at team, project, and organizational levels. Option D, the use of a flexible framework, is actually a benefit of Agile rather than a challenge.

Agile Foundation documents emphasize that overcoming terminology differences requires education, shared understanding, and alignment rather than choosing one approach over the other. By establishing a common language, clarifying roles and expectations, and focusing on value delivery rather than labels, organizations can successfully integrate Agile ways of working with project management governance. Addressing terminology differences early helps reduce friction, improves collaboration, and enables a more effective hybrid or Agile-informed project environment.

Agile Foundation guidance, aligned with PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile, explains that the closing a project process is primarily used to formally accept the project product, making option C the correct answer. This process ensures that the project has delivered what was agreed, that acceptance criteria have been met, and that the project can be closed in a controlled and orderly manner.

The closing a project process confirms that all products have been completed, approved, and handed over to the appropriate operational or business teams. Formal acceptance of the project product is critical because it provides clarity that delivery is complete and that responsibility for the product has transitioned from the project to ongoing operations or use. Agile Foundation documents emphasize that even in Agile environments, clear closure and acceptance are essential to good governance and benefit realization.

Option A, controlling the link between the project manager and the delivery team, relates to the managing product delivery process, not closing a project. Option B, ensuring the project is viable, is the purpose of the continued business justification principle and is reviewed throughout the project lifecycle, not just at closure. Option D, ensuring focus remains on delivering the stage’s products, aligns with the controlling a stage process, which operates while work is still ongoing.

Agile Foundation materials highlight that closing a project is more than an administrative step. It also includes confirming that benefits management responsibilities are handed over, lessons learned are captured, and stakeholders agree that the project objectives have been met. In Agile and PRINCE2 Agile contexts, this formal closure provides confidence to senior management that investment has delivered its intended outcomes.

By formally accepting the project product, the closing a project process ensures clarity, accountability, and a clean transition from project delivery to operational use, reinforcing disciplined governance while remaining compatible with Agile delivery approaches.

Speaking the language of leadership is essential for securing leadership buy-in when scaling agile. This means framing agile benefits, risks, and requirements in terms that resonate with leaders—such as business value, risk management, and return on investment—rather than just agile jargon.

While empowering teams (D) and emphasizing agile practices (C) are important, without leadership understanding and support, agile scaling is unlikely to succeed. Ensuring all decisions come from leadership (B) contradicts agile principles of decentralization and empowerment.

Effective communication tailored to leadership priorities fosters alignment and commitment.

Psychological safety is a critical enabler of effective Agile teams, and Agile Foundation materials often reference the four progressive levels of psychological safety: inclusion safety, learner safety, contributor safety, and challenger safety. Among these, contributor safety is the level that specifically encourages individuals to share their ideas, knowledge, and skills openly while making meaningful contributions to the team’s work.

Contributor safety exists when team members feel trusted and empowered to apply their skills, experience, and ideas without fear of embarrassment, rejection, or negative consequences. At this level, individuals are not only accepted as part of the team but are also encouraged to actively participate, take ownership of tasks, and contribute value. Agile environments rely heavily on this level of safety because collaboration, cross-functional work, and self-organization depend on people confidently sharing what they know and what they can do.

Option C, inclusion safety, is more foundational. It ensures that individuals feel accepted and respected as members of the group, but it does not necessarily mean they feel safe enough to contribute ideas or skills. Option D, learner safety, focuses on the ability to ask questions, experiment, and make mistakes in order to learn. While important, it centers on learning rather than contribution. Option A, challenger safety, represents the most advanced level, where individuals feel safe to challenge existing ideas, processes, and decisions. This goes beyond sharing skills and ideas into constructive dissent.

Agile Foundation guidance emphasizes contributor safety because Agile teams thrive when every member actively contributes to delivering value. When contributor safety is present, teams benefit from diverse perspectives, improved problem-solving, higher engagement, and stronger accountability. This level of psychological safety directly supports Agile principles such as collaboration, transparency, and continuous improvement, making option B the correct answer.

In Agile Foundation guidance, the team coach plays a key role in supporting one or more Agile teams in adopting and improving Agile ways of working. A core responsibility of the team coach is to liaise with the agile coach, making option A the correct answer. This relationship ensures alignment between team-level coaching and organization-wide Agile adoption.

The team coach focuses primarily on the day-to-day effectiveness of the team. This includes helping the team understand Agile principles, improve collaboration, enhance communication, and continuously improve their ways of working. The agile coach, on the other hand, typically operates at a broader level, supporting multiple teams, leaders, and the organization as a whole in embedding Agile culture and practices. By liaising with the agile coach, the team coach ensures that insights, challenges, and progress at the team level are shared and addressed consistently across the organization.

Option B, liaising with the project manager, is not a primary responsibility of the team coach in Agile foundations. While coordination may occur, Agile reduces dependency on traditional command-and-control roles. Option C, liaising with the chief product owner, is also not central to the team coach role, as product ownership focuses on value and prioritization rather than team dynamics and Agile maturity. Option D, liaising with project assurance, aligns more with governance and compliance functions rather than coaching responsibilities.

Agile Foundation documents emphasize that effective coaching relies on collaboration between coaching roles. The team coach provides detailed, practical feedback from the team, while the agile coach offers strategic direction, consistency, and organizational support. This collaboration strengthens Agile adoption, helps remove systemic impediments, and ensures that teams are supported both locally and at scale. By liaising with the agile coach, the team coach helps create a coherent, sustainable Agile environment focused on continuous improvement and value delivery.

The Progress Review Workshop is the key forum to assess the current status of the project and address challenges or issues affecting progress. It typically involves reviewing the current stage or release against plan, assessing risks, issues, and dependencies, and agreeing on corrective actions or decisions to keep the project on track.

While retrospectives (B and C) focus on reflecting and improving team practices, and team planning (A) looks ahead to upcoming work, progress reviews are focused on monitoring, control, and decision-making at the project or stage level.

This workshop aligns with PRINCE2’s principle of manage by exception, enabling timely interventions without unnecessary escalation.

The Project Backlog is the artifact used to describe the project’s major products in the form of epic user stories. Epic stories are large, high-level user stories that capture significant features or product components that may later be decomposed into smaller, more detailed user stories in the product backlog.

The Project Backlog provides a strategic view of what the project intends to deliver and supports planning at the project level, including releases and stages. It bridges the gap between business requirements and team-level delivery.

The Product Backlog (C) contains detailed user stories ready for development but is typically more granular. The Release Map (B) plans releases and iterations but does not list epic stories. The Project Dashboard (A) is a reporting tool, not a repository of requirements.

The use of epic user stories in the project backlog aligns with agile practices for managing scope and enables incremental delivery aligned with business priorities.

In Agile Foundation guidance, the progress practice focuses on understanding, monitoring, and communicating how work is advancing toward agreed objectives and outcomes. Burn charts are a key tool used to support this practice, making option B the correct answer. Burn charts provide a simple, visual representation of progress over time, enabling teams and stakeholders to see how much work has been completed and how much remains.

Burn charts, including burn-down and burn-up charts, are widely used in Agile environments to support transparency and informed decision-making. A burn-down chart shows the remaining work decreasing over time, while a burn-up chart displays completed work against the total scope. Both formats help teams assess whether they are on track to meet their goals within a given timebox or delivery stage. Agile Foundation materials emphasize that progress should be measured based on delivered value and completed work, not on effort spent or activities performed.

Option A, the Agilometer, is used to assess the suitability and risks of Agile adoption rather than tracking delivery progress. Option C, trading or swapping, relates to scope flexibility and prioritization, allowing teams to exchange lower-value work for higher-value items while staying within constraints. While useful, it does not directly measure or visualize progress. Option D, the team skills matrix, supports capability development and resource planning, not progress tracking.

Agile Foundation documents highlight that effective progress tracking builds trust and supports governance without excessive reporting. Burn charts enable frequent inspection of progress, early identification of issues, and timely adaptation when trends indicate potential problems. They also support the principle of manage by exception by providing clear evidence when tolerances may be exceeded. By offering a shared, easily understood view of progress, burn charts strengthen transparency, collaboration, and confidence in Agile delivery, making them an essential tool for the progress practice.

Agility is defined as the ability to embrace and respond to change quickly and effectively. It is a core principle of agile methods, enabling organizations and teams to adapt to evolving business needs, customer feedback, and external factors while delivering value continuously.

This definition contrasts with traditional change control, which often aims to prevent changes (C). Agility promotes flexibility, learning, and continuous improvement, but the belief that anyone is capable of learning (D), while important, is a cultural aspect rather than a direct definition of agility. The sequence of actions (A) relates more to processes than agility itself.

Understanding agility as the capacity to adapt ensures project approaches remain relevant in dynamic environments.

Agile Foundation guidance, aligned with PRINCE2 and PRINCE2 Agile practices, explains that the organization practice is responsible for defining the products to be delivered and clarifying who will deliver them. This makes option C the correct answer. The organization practice focuses on establishing and maintaining a clear project management team structure, roles, responsibilities, and relationships to ensure effective delivery.

A key purpose of the organization practice is to ensure that accountability for producing each product is clearly defined. This includes identifying roles such as project manager, product owner, team members, and supporting roles, and ensuring that everyone understands what they are responsible for delivering. By defining who is involved and how they interact, the organization practice creates the foundation for collaboration, decision-making, and governance.

Option A, plans, focuses on when and how work will be carried out rather than who will deliver specific products. Planning answers questions about timelines, sequencing, and dependencies but assumes that responsibilities are already defined. Option B, the business case, explains why the project is worthwhile by outlining expected benefits, costs, and risks, not who will deliver products. Option D, risk, addresses uncertainty and potential threats or opportunities, not product ownership or delivery responsibility.

Agile Foundation documents emphasize that clarity of roles and responsibilities is especially important in Agile environments, where teams are empowered and self-organizing. The organization practice supports this empowerment by setting clear boundaries and accountability while avoiding unnecessary hierarchy. It ensures that everyone involved understands their contribution to value delivery and how their work fits into the wider project.

By defining both the products to be delivered and who will deliver them, the organization practice supports transparency, effective collaboration, and confidence among stakeholders. This clarity enables Agile teams to work autonomously within agreed structures, supporting consistent, high-quality delivery aligned with Agile and PRINCE2 Agile principles.

Agile Foundation guidance clearly states that the project retrospective workshop is the workshop designed to extract actionable insights for future iterations, making option C the correct answer. Retrospectives are a core Agile practice focused on learning, reflection, and continuous improvement. Their primary purpose is to help teams and stakeholders understand what has happened, why it happened, and how future ways of working can be improved.

During a project retrospective workshop, participants reflect on recent iterations or delivery stages, examining aspects such as collaboration, communication, processes, tools, quality, and decision-making. The emphasis is not on assigning blame, but on identifying patterns, root causes, and opportunities for improvement. From this reflection, the team agrees on concrete, actionable actions that can be implemented in upcoming iterations to enhance effectiveness and outcomes.

Option A, the progress review workshop, focuses on assessing current status, deliverables, and performance against plans or objectives. While it may highlight issues, it does not primarily aim to generate improvement actions. Option B, the project initiation workshop, occurs at the start of the project and establishes vision, scope, and approach, rather than extracting learning from experience. Option D, the team planning workshop, concentrates on selecting and organizing upcoming work, not on analyzing past performance or improving ways of working.

Agile Foundation documents emphasize that retrospectives are essential for embedding a culture of learning and adaptability. By regularly extracting actionable insights, teams can continuously refine their processes, strengthen collaboration, and improve quality and delivery speed. Retrospectives also support psychological safety by creating a structured space for honest discussion and shared ownership of improvement. This focus on turning reflection into action ensures that learning is applied, not just observed, making the project retrospective workshop the primary mechanism for driving improvement across future iterations.

Delegation poker is a collaborative game used to define and clarify decision-making authority within teams. It helps teams agree on who has the power to make decisions for specific areas, from the team level to senior management. Using cards representing different levels of delegation, team members discuss and align expectations, ensuring clarity and reducing conflicts.

This technique fosters transparency, shared ownership, and empowerment, which are critical for agile teams operating under PRINCE2 governance. It also helps balance autonomy and control, supporting the principle of manage by exception.

Other options: a team skills matrix documents competencies, personas represent user archetypes for design, and magic estimation is a sizing technique — none focus on decision authority.

Delegation poker aligns well with PRINCE2 Agile’s emphasis on defined roles and empowered teams.

PRINCE2 Agile was specifically developed to address the challenge of applying Agile approaches within large, complex, and highly governed environments. Agile frameworks are highly effective at the team level, but Agile Foundation materials recognize that organizations often struggle when attempting to scale Agile across multiple teams, complex dependencies, regulatory constraints, and formal governance structures. This makes option B the correct answer.

Agile frameworks such as Scrum or Kanban focus on small, empowered teams delivering value iteratively. However, when initiatives become larger—spanning multiple teams, suppliers, and organizational units—challenges arise around coordination, assurance, reporting, and decision-making. Senior stakeholders often still require visibility, control, and confidence around investment, risk, and progress. PRINCE2 Agile bridges this gap by combining Agile delivery techniques with the governance, roles, and controls provided by PRINCE2.

Option A is incorrect because Agile frameworks are designed to be flexible rather than rigid. Option C is also not the primary challenge addressed by PRINCE2 Agile, as most Agile frameworks clearly define core roles, even if they differ from traditional roles. Option D is incorrect because Agile frameworks are explicitly designed to be combined with other methods, which is one of Agile’s strengths.

Agile Foundation documents explain that PRINCE2 Agile enables organizations to “blend” Agile delivery with project management governance. It allows Agile teams to work iteratively while ensuring alignment with business objectives, risk management, and stage-based oversight. By providing guidance on how to tailor governance without constraining agility, PRINCE2 Agile supports scaling Agile in complex environments. This makes it particularly valuable for organizations transitioning to Agile while still needing structure, assurance, and control at the enterprise level.