Section 2: Integration Management

QUESTION 11
You need to make a major change to the equipment used on your project. You know of a product that meets your needs, but you are worried because your brother owns the company that produces the product. What should you do?
A. Negotiate a good deal for the project with your brother.
B. Let the customer know of the issue.
C. Submit the bid and allow your brother to negotiate with the contracting office.
D. Eliminate your brother from bidding.

Answer: B
Explanation:
Project managers have a professional and social responsibility to ensure that any conflicts of interest do not compromise the legitimate interests of the customer. The project manager knows that the customer will benefit from the information and must present it.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 498

QUESTION 12
Your project sponsor is extremely happy with the project performance to date. To celebrate, he wants to hold a party with dancing and liquor for the entire team. You are concerned because the company policy states that “no alcohol can be served at company events.” What should you do?
A. The project sponsor is responsible. Hold the event as a good team-building experience.
B. Inform human resources that the sponsor is serving alcohol at a company function.
C. Tell the project sponsor that the party is a great idea, but no alcohol can be served.
D. Suggest the event be held outside of working hours.
Answer: C
Explanation:
As the project manager, it is your professional and social responsibility to ensure that company policies are followed throughout the project.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 486

QUESTION 13
Another project manager has a family emergency and must leave. He has asked you to fill in for him during a team meeting to discuss a minor problem with the project. He has already distributed a detailed agenda and provided you with a copy. When you attend the meeting, several members of the team are making fun of the absent project manager’s ethnic heritage. Your company does not have a formal diversity policy covering such behavior. What should you do?
A. Because your company does not have a written diversity policy, there is nothing you can do.
B. Report the incident to the other project manager.
C. Hold the meeting as if nothing happened.
D. Begin the meeting with a discussion of diversity and professional behavior.
Answer: D
Explanation:
Choice B does not problem solve; it is more like withdrawal.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 488

QUESTION 14
You are halfway through a major network rollout. There are 300 locations in the United States, with another 20 in England. A software seller has just released a major software upgrade for some of the equipment being installed. The upgrade would provide the customer with functionality they requested that was not available at the time the project began. What is the BEST course of action under these circumstances?
A. Continue as planned, your customer has not requested a change.
B. Inform the customer of the upgrade and the impacts to the project’s timeline and functionality if the upgrade is implemented.
C. Implement the change and adjust the schedule as necessary because this supports the customer’s original request.
D. Implement the change to the remaining sites and continue with the schedule.
Answer: B
Explanation:
Professional and social responsibility includes looking after the customer’s best interests. Therefore, choice A cannot be best. In this case, the schedule and scope are already approved and all changes must go through the integrated change control process. Therefore, choices C and D cannot be best.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 483

QUESTION 15
In the process of reviewing the status of your team’s work assignments, you learn that the project has fallen behind schedule by one week. The project has high visibility within the organization and is completely datedriven. The project finish date is still two months out and you think you can recover the time over the next month or so. What is the BEST course of action for reporting the project status?
A. Report the project on schedule. This is not a significant slippage and there is still time to recover.
B. Report the project on schedule. Most project management plans are not accurate to less than one or two weeks anyway.
C. Report the project one week behind schedule and include recommended corrective actions.
D. Report the project one week behind schedule and then issue a new report next week showing the problem fixed.
Answer: C
Explanation:
Choices A and B are unethical. Choice D is still not necessarily telling the truth. Choice C not only describes the problem but also provides you with a chance to show your plan of action to resolve the problem.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 491

QUESTION 16
You are assigned to a project that senior management has already decided to outsource. As a project manager, you need to work with the contracts department to select the vendor and then oversee the vendor through project completion. Company policy requires that a project of this size go through a formal bid process. A vice president in your company tells you that his friend owns one of the companies that might bid on the project and that the company would be an excellent choice as a vendor. This vice president has a reputation for making or breaking careers. What is generally the BEST course of action?
A. Follow the bid process, and show the vice president why the favored vendor is or is not the best choice.
B. Obtain written permission to bypass the formal bid process.
C. Let the evaluation team know that management has a favorite vendor.
D. Let the contracts department handle the situation.
Answer: A
Explanation:
As a project manager, it is your responsibility to provide criteria to the contracts department based on the project needs, and to protect your project along the way. Choice B is not practical. Choice C will increase the chance of incorrect results during the evaluation. Choice D is not correct project management practice.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 486

QUESTION 17
A floor in one of the office buildings a company owns is now available for rent. It is imperative that the space be rented within one month. The only offer that has been received is from a company that is a competitor.
What is the BEST thing to do in this situation?
A. Offer the space to the customer under a short-term lease agreement.
B. Report the issue to management and inform the customer of their decision.
C. As part of the lease agreement, include a non-competitive agreement.
D. Tell the customer that your company has decided to use the space.
Answer: B
Explanation:
It is professional and social responsibility to disclose conflicts of interest to the customer, management, and others.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 490

QUESTION 18
You are the project manager for one part of a new program in your organization. You are four months into a three-year project when your project team makes significant discoveries on your project. What is the BEST thing to do?
A. Make certain the discoveries are included in the project lessons learned.
B. Make certain the discoveries are in the monthly status report.
C. Make certain you mention the discoveries at the senior management meeting in two months.
D. At the weekly meeting, make certain you tell the other project managers involved in this program about the discoveries.
Answer: D
Explanation:
The sooner such discoveries are made known to other project managers, the better you can improve the capabilities of colleagues in your company. It is part of a project manager’s professional and social responsibility to build such capabilities. The discoveries should also be documented in the status report (choice B), especially if that report has a wider distribution.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 491

QUESTION 19
You are a project manager for one of many projects in a large and important program. At a high-level status meeting, you note that another project manager has reported her project on schedule. Looking back on your project over the last few weeks, you remember many deliverables from the other project that arrived late.
What should you do?
A. Meet with the program manager.
B. Develop a risk control plan.
C. Discuss the issue with your boss.
D. Meet with the other project manager.
Answer: D
Explanation:
Professional and social responsibility dictates that you should confront the situation first with the other project manager (choice D) to find out if the other project is really on schedule and thereby confirm or deny your information. Choice A or C would be the second step if choice D validates your concern. Choice B would be a more likely choice if it referred to an earlier step in risk. But choice D remains the best answer.
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 491

QUESTION 20
Over lunch with another project manager, you discuss ways to identify risks on your project. The next day, the other project manager sends you risk identification software created by her company with a copyright date of 1998. What should you do?
A. Find out if using an old format would be acceptable.
B. Obtain approval from your legal department.
C. Share some of your templates with her to improve competencies.
D. Send the software back.
Answer: D
Explanation:
Any software created by a company is owned by that company. As nothing is said about a license agreement, the other project manager probably does not have the right to send it to you, nor do you have the right to use it. Choice A is not the best choice in this situation since you might not have the right to use the software at all. Since this issue deals with legal rights, you might have selected choice B, but it is not the best choice, as you and your company can be liable for infringing on the project manager’s company’s rights. It is best to send it back and then clarify (choice D).
Source: PMP® Exam Prep Page: 486