Your organization is executing a portfolio of projects, and you are managing a critical ERP implementation with a 18-month timeline. At month 10, the portfolio review board redirects your two most experienced technical resources to a new executive priority project for the next 90 days. These resources are currently assigned to critical path activities for database migration and integration testing. Your resource manager can provide three junior resources as replacements, but they lack ERP experience. The portfolio manager states this is non-negotiable due to business priorities. Your analysis shows that using junior resources will likely cause 6-8 weeks of schedule delay and increase risk of integration defects. What should be your PRIMARY response?

Question

Accepted Answer

The correct answer is D. When resource constraints are imposed by portfolio-level decisions, the project manager's responsibility is to assess options for minimizing impact and provide stakeholders with realistic forecasts based on the new constraints. The decision has been made at the portfolio level (stated as non-negotiable), so the project manager should focus on adaptive responses: analyzing schedule compression opportunities, quantifying realistic impacts, evaluating risk mitigation options, and providing transparent communication about revised projections. This demonstrates professional accountability and problem-solving rather than resistance. Option A is the main distractor because while accepting the change and developing risk responses is partially correct, it prematurely commits to baseline changes and specific mitigation (external consultants) without first exploring whether schedule compression techniques could offset some or all of the delay. The project manager should exhaust options for minimizing impact before accepting a 6-8 week delay. Additionally, the experienced resources might be able to front-load critical knowledge transfer or documentation during transition, which should be explored before committing to external support costs.

PMP Practice Question: Process — Predictive, Hard

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