PMP · Question #1182
A global company hired a project manager for a new implementation at all of its sites. After reviewing the business case and project charter, the project manager notes that the project team has differ
The correct answer is A. Coordinate virtual meetings to assess the project team's communication needs.. For a geographically dispersed project team, the project manager should first coordinate virtual meetings to assess specific communication needs and challenges to establish an effective communication plan.
Question
A global company hired a project manager for a new implementation at all of its sites. After reviewing the business case and project charter, the project manager notes that the project team has different locations and regions to consider. What should the project manager do to address this situation?
Options
- ACoordinate virtual meetings to assess the project team's communication needs.
- BInform the project sponsor of this situation and request cultural orientation training.
- CCoordinate virtual and face-to-face meetings at each site to improve communication.
- DInform the steering committee of the situation and request additional resources.
How the community answered
(34 responses)- A82% (28)
- B3% (1)
- C9% (3)
- D6% (2)
Why each option
For a geographically dispersed project team, the project manager should first coordinate virtual meetings to assess specific communication needs and challenges to establish an effective communication plan.
When managing a globally dispersed team, the initial step to address communication is to understand the specific needs, challenges, and preferences of the team members across different locations and regions. Coordinating virtual meetings to assess these needs allows the project manager to gather vital information before establishing a tailored and effective communication plan.
While cultural awareness is important, requesting cultural orientation training is a secondary step; the immediate priority is understanding communication needs to facilitate collaboration across different locations.
While face-to-face meetings can be beneficial, immediately planning them for all sites without first assessing specific communication gaps or needs can be inefficient and costly, especially with global teams.
Informing the steering committee and requesting additional resources is premature without first assessing the communication needs and developing a plan to address them internally.
Concept tested: Communication planning for dispersed teams
Source: https://www.pmi.org/pmbok-guide-standards/foundational/pmbok/project-communication-management
Topics
Community Discussion
6
Zlatan X.Mar 5, 2026A is the correct choice here. Assessing communication needs across distributed components is a governance-level first step, and virtual meetings let you identify stakeholder and team requirements before committing to any specific engagement strategy.
Mei-Ling H.Mar 21, 2026Confirmed A on my exam attempt last month. The key word in the stem is "assess" - before you can improve communication across regions like option C suggests, you first need to figure out what those needs actually are.
Ola B.Mar 23, 2026Good catch on assess being the trigger word, and worth labbing this one: spin up two Azure tenants in different regions, run a dependency visualizer across them, and you will see the assessment report maps exactly to option A before any cross-region optimization even makes sense.
Ola B.Apr 17, 2026A is correct. Before you do anything else you need to figure out what the team actually needs, so spin up a quick virtual sync and let them tell you where the gaps are instead of assuming face-to-face is the fix.
Wesley A.Mar 12, 2026Failed my first attempt partly because I kept jumping to expensive solutions like C and D when the question was really just asking about planning. A is correct because before you schedule face-to-face meetings or request resources, you need to assess what the team actually needs, and virtual meetings across regions are the right first step. Does anyone have a clean way to remember when PMI wants you to stop at assess versus when they want you to jump straight to action?
Imani T.Apr 6, 2026Confirmed A on my attempt last week. The key is the question asks what the PM should do to address the situation, and assessing communication needs comes before scheduling a bunch of face-to-face meetings at every site. Anyone know if PMP still treats "assess needs first" as the default for distributed team questions, or has the agile mindset content shifted that at all?