Culture & Organisation
40 free practice questions with explanations
PassNova has 40 free DevOps Foundation practice questions on Culture & Organisation, each with a clear explanation. Practise them in the browser with instant feedback — 100% free, no sign-up, on any device. Updated for 2026.
Culture & Organisation: example questions & answers
Here are 6 example questions from this topic. Practise the full set of 40 free in the browser.
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A central goal of DevOps culture is to break down the 'wall of confusion'. What does this term refer to?
- A The complexity of legacy programming languages
- B The barrier between an organisation and its competitors
- C The gap between marketing and sales departments
- D The friction and conflicting goals between Development and Operations teams ✓
Answer: The 'wall of confusion' describes the friction caused when Development is incentivised for change while Operations is incentivised for stability, creating conflicting goals and poor handoffs.
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What is the primary purpose of a blameless post-mortem after an incident?
- A To learn from the failure by examining systemic causes without punishing people ✓
- B To produce a report for auditors only
- C To delay any changes until the next quarter
- D To identify which individual caused the failure and penalise them
Answer: A blameless post-mortem focuses on understanding the systemic and process-related causes of an incident so the organisation can learn and improve, rather than assigning individual blame.
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Westrum's organisational typology classifies cultures as pathological, bureaucratic, and generative. Which type is most associated with high-performing DevOps organisations?
- A Generative ✓
- B Hierarchical
- C Pathological
- D Bureaucratic
Answer: Research shows that a generative (performance-oriented) culture, characterised by high cooperation and information flow, strongly correlates with high-performing IT and DevOps organisations.
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What does the concept of a 'cross-functional team' contribute to DevOps?
- A It ensures each specialist only ever works in their own silo
- B It removes the need for any operations skills
- C It centralises all decision-making with management
- D It brings together varied skills so a team can build, test, and operate a product end-to-end ✓
Answer: Cross-functional teams combine the skills needed (development, testing, operations, security) to deliver and run a product end-to-end, reducing handoffs and increasing ownership.
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The phrase 'you build it, you run it' promotes which cultural shift?
- A Building and running are kept strictly separate
- B Development teams take ownership of operating the software they create in production ✓
- C Operations teams take over all coding responsibilities
- D Software is run only by an external vendor
Answer: 'You build it, you run it', popularised at Amazon, means development teams own their services in production, which improves quality, accountability, and feedback.
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Why is psychological safety considered important in a DevOps culture?
- A It eliminates the need for monitoring tools
- B It allows the organisation to skip testing
- C It guarantees promotions for all team members
- D It encourages people to speak up, raise concerns, and admit mistakes without fear ✓
Answer: Psychological safety lets team members raise problems, experiment, and admit mistakes without fear of punishment, which is essential for learning and continuous improvement.