SAFe Government Practitioner SGP Exam Questions

20 Sample Questions

---

Topic 1: SAFe Lean-Agile in government

What does it mean to “think in terms of value streams” when adopting a Lean-Agile mindset?

⬜ Prioritize individual tasks over broader objectives
⬜ Focus on optimizing individual team performance
✅ Identify and prioritize the end-to-end delivery of value to the customer
⬜ Centralize decision-making authority

What is the primary benefit of embracing a Lean-Agile mindset in an organization?

✅ Improved collaboration and innovation
⬜ Slower decision-making
⬜ Increased bureaucracy
⬜ Reduced transparency

---

Topic 2: Lean-Agile Mindset

What principle from the SAFe Core Values explains the purpose of the PI Planning retrospective?

✅ Relentless improvement
⬜ Respect for people and culture
⬜ Innovation
⬜ Flow

What is the Manifesto for Agile Software Development?

✅ A shared set of values and principles intended to improve software development
⬜ A set of four values and twelve principles that help organizations implement systems thinking
⬜ A value system that only applies to software development
⬜ A set of practices that originated from Scrum

---

Topic 3: SAFe Lean-Agile Principles

Which SAFe principle ensures the maximum benefit is generated by understanding trade-offs between risks, cost of delay, operational costs, and development costs for each program and Value Stream?

✅ Take an economic view
⬜ Assume variability, preserve options
⬜ Apply systems thinking
⬜ Build incrementally with fast, integrated learning cycles

Which statement is true about optimizing batch sizes for newly-formed SAFe teams in a program?

✅ Batch size optimization happens over time as teams figure out the balance between holding cost and transaction cost
⬜ Batch size is optimized immediately by looking at transaction and holding costs
⬜ Batch size is already optimized if there is continuous flow
⬜ Batch size is optimized when transaction and holding costs seldom change

---

Topic 4: Agile Teams

What are two attributes of high-performing teams? (Choose two.)

✅ Experience mutual trust
✅ They are self-organizing
⬜ High-performing teams can be larger than the typical Agile team
⬜ High-performing teams do not require the assistance of a Scrum Master
⬜ Members of the team value uniformity

---

Topic 5: Agile Release Train (ART) and Solution Train

A large government program currently kicks off separate “siloed” projects for each new initiative, forming new teams that disband after delivering all contracted requirements. To adopt SAFe, what structural change should the agency make to improve the flow of value?

⬜ Continue using siloed project teams but add more documentation to coordinate between them.
⬜ Move people to whichever project has the highest priority at the moment to maximize utilization.
⬜ Plan all solution details upfront for each project, then assign teams to execute strictly to that plan.
✅ Establish long-lived, cross-functional Agile Release Trains aligned to value streams, continuously delivering a flow of Epics from a prioritized backlog.

When should government technology programs be organized as Solution Trains?

⬜ When the program crosses multiple agency divisions or branches
⬜ When the cost of the program exceeds $100M
⬜ When the program involves classified information
✅ When the size and complexity require two or more ARTs

---

Topic 6: PI Planning

Which SAFe event provides a cadence for synchronization and alignment across multiple government agencies in a Large Solution?

✅ PI Planning
⬜ Sprint Review
⬜ System Demo
⬜ Daily Standup

In SAFe for Government, what is the primary purpose of aligning governance reviews with the Program Increment (PI) cadence?​

⬜ To enforce strict compliance with initial project plans
✅ To streamline oversight and reduce delays by synchronizing reviews with development cycles
⬜ To conduct comprehensive audits at the end of each fiscal year
⬜ To separate governance activities from development processes​

---

Topic 7: SAFe Events

What are three reasons the Innovation and Planning (IP) Iteration is critical to success in SAFe? (Choose three.)

✅ It creates a guard band that ensures program predictability on cadence
✅ It ensures time for creative problem-solving needed by knowledge workers
✅ It provides a consistent time for PI Planning
⬜ It creates a predictable window to allow for personal time off
⬜ It is the only way a government ART can afford to do hackathons
⬜ It provides the only time the Product Management can conduct backlog refinement
Source: https://scaledagileframework.com/innovation-and-planning-iteration/

What supports early risk identification and mitigation in a SAFe government program?

⬜ Holding risk reviews only at the end of a PI
✅ Regular System Demos and Inspect & Adapt events
⬜ Relying solely on contract status meetings
⬜ Removing uncommitted objectives from tracking

---

Topic 8: Program Vision and Roadmap

What is the primary purpose of the Program Vision in SAFe government programs?

⬜ To define team-level tasks and responsibilities
⬜ To outline the detailed technical specifications
✅ To provide a shared direction and context for the Agile Release Train
⬜ To establish fixed budget allocations for each team

In a SAFe Roadmap, which PIs are committed?

✅ The first one
⬜ The first three
⬜ All
⬜ The first two

---

Topic 9: Feature and Capability

What is the primary purpose of defining system attributes using Features in a government SAFe program?

⬜ To define contract milestones in advance
⬜ To delegate all compliance responsibility to vendors
⬜ To document the entire system design before development begins
✅ To express system behaviors and capabilities in a value-focused way

How does defining system attributes with Features support compliance in SAFe government programs?

⬜ By ensuring requirements are fixed before development starts
⬜ By assigning all compliance testing to vendors
✅ By enabling traceable, testable expressions of system capabilities
⬜ By deferring reviews until final delivery

---

Topic 10: Agency Strategy

How does SAFe recommend structuring large government programs to stay aligned with agency strategy?

⬜ Use traditional project structures with fixed scope and milestones
⬜ Prioritize system design before identifying mission goals
✅ Organize around long-lived Value Streams and Agile Release Trains (ARTs)
⬜ Separate teams based on vendor and government affiliation

Which represents a good example of an agency Strategic Theme?

⬜ Comply with agency development lifecycle regulations
⬜ Reduce agency IT spend
⬜ Improve cost and schedule performance of IT projects
✅ Create a ‘one-stop shop’ for all citizen-facing services provided by the agency

---

Topic 11: Lean flow of Epics

What are Business Epics in SAFe?

✅ System attributes that deliver business value
⬜ Solution descriptions for the business
⬜ An Agile term that is equivalent to a government program
⬜ Solutions to address financial constraints

Which statement best describes the Lean-Agile alternative to traditional project-based development in government?

⬜ Create fixed-scope, fixed-funding projects with annual delivery targets
✅ Manage Epics in continuous flow using a prioritized backlog and long-lived teams
⬜ Outsource projects entirely to reduce delivery overhead
⬜ Delay execution until detailed upfront planning is complete

---

Topic 12: Lean Budgeting

In Advanced Lean-Agile government, what is the primary benefit of using Lean budgeting?

⬜ It allows government agencies to spend freely without controls.
⬜ It provides a way to allocate funds to individual teams.
✅ It promotes continuous funding and adaptability.
⬜ It centralizes budgeting decisions within the government.

What two visual reporting tools can be used to help maintain fiduciary tracking of government technology programs? (Choose two.)

✅ Feature progress charts
✅ Burn-up charts
⬜ Detailed spreadsheets
⬜ Pro formas
⬜ Integrated master schedules

---

Topic 13: Lean Estimating and Forecasting

Which statement is true for estimating and forecasting in SAFe?

✅ ART velocities are used to conduct ‘what if’ analysis
⬜ Feature estimation is independent of team-level input
⬜ Epics should be estimated by the Epic Owner
⬜ Work breakdown structure to the task level helps increase estimation accuracy

Why is cadence-based forecasting preferred over traditional project planning in Lean-Agile environments?

⬜ It eliminates the need for scope negotiation
⬜ It locks delivery into quarterly milestones
✅ It allows for regular adjustments based on actual team throughput
⬜ It reduces stakeholder involvement in estimation

---

Topic 14: Acquisition Practices

What change in acquisition practices is essential for enabling Lean-Agile development in government?

⬜ Awarding contracts based only on lowest cost proposals
✅ Introducing modular contracts that support incremental delivery and collaboration
⬜ Relying on fixed-scope, fixed-price contracts with detailed up-front planning
⬜ Extending the timeline for vendor selection to ensure exhaustive documentation

What is a primary risk of continuing to use traditional acquisition models in Agile programs?

⬜ Overspending on contractor rates
⬜ Excessive documentation burdens
⬜ Delayed system integration
✅ Forcing vendors into waterfall behaviors, undermining Agile execution

---

Topic 15: Build in Quality and Compliance

What events in SAFe provide objective evidence of built-in quality and compliance?

✅ System Demos
⬜ PI Planning
⬜ Backlog refinement
⬜ ART syncs

In SAFe, how is compliance integrated into the development process?​

⬜ By conducting compliance checks only at the end of the project
⬜ By assigning compliance responsibilities solely to a separate team
✅ By embedding compliance activities throughout the development lifecycle
⬜ By minimizing compliance to accelerate delivery​

---

Topic 16: Governance Practices

What is governance in a SAFe context?

✅ A framework for decision-making to ensure programs achieve desired mission outcomes
⬜ Oversight that is provided by the PMO
⬜ Agency level regulations that ensure compliance with federal laws
⬜ Participatory budgeting events conducted twice annually by LPM

What is the purpose of governance on a Lean-Agile government program?

✅ To provide a framework for decision-making to achieve desired mission outcomes
⬜ To ensure the Solution is delivered within fixed time, cost, and scope constraints
⬜ To ensure compliance with statutory and regulatory requirements
⬜ To ensure contractors are accountable for how taxpayer money is spent

---

Topic 17: Implementation Roadmap

Which two statements accurately describe the SAFe Implementation Roadmap? (Choose two.)

✅ It reflects success patterns from previous implementations of SAFe
✅ It provides recommended sequencing of role-based training
⬜ It ensures standardization with software life cycle best practices
⬜ The steps in the roadmap must be followed in order
⬜ All steps must be complete with the first ART before launching additional trains
Source: https://framework.scaledagile.com/government-creating-high-performing-teams-of-teams/

An agency is ready to undertake a large modernization effort. Though the agency ensures the correct implementation of all stage gates in their SDLC, projects seem to always be over budget. They are exploring the use of SAFe due to the success stories from other agencies. What is the appropriate first step?

⬜ Map all stage gates to Agile events
⬜ Train Product Owners in the principles, practices, and benefits of adopting SAFe
⬜ Start an Agile project with an internal Agile Scrum Master
✅ Identify and train change agents that will lead the effort

---

Topic 18: Lean Agile Leadership

Which aspect of leading by example challenges Lean-Agile leaders to ‘walk the talk’ by being a role model of desired professional and ethical behaviors by acting with honesty, integrity, and transparency?

✅ Authenticity
⬜ Emotional intelligence
⬜ Life-long learning
⬜ Decentralized decision-making

What occurs when leaders create an environment for risk-taking that supports change without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career?

✅ Psychological safety
⬜ Decentralized decision-making
⬜ Emotional intelligence
⬜ Alignment