User story points

Why we estimate?

Why story points NOT hours?

From the latest Standish group survey

68%Fail to meet original

estimates

We are not good at estimation

Acceptable numberProject is too

big

Deception: best/worst case

And also…

Software projects are complex

Software projects are complex

maintainability

testabilityscalability

security

changing requirementsHours estimation is not good enoughWhy story points?

More accurate

Comparing size

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Less variation

Stable reference stories

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14

15

70 minutes 30 minutes

VS

Office to People square

140 minutes 60 minutesOffice to the bund

Difference

40 minutes

80 minutes

Continuous improvement

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20km

30km

40km

sprint sprint sprint

Release planning

Velocity

Start using story point?

1 dimension: Effort

2 baseline user stories

“2” & “5”

Compare size to baseline storiesFrom start to “Done”

Improve estimation

Inspect & Adaptive

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Key take away• Estimation is a skill. It requires practice

• Baseline stories need to be understood & accepted by all team members

• Baseline stories should not changed from sprint to sprint till you (the team) are too fast

• Make comparison based on effort, not complexity, not business value, etc. 1 thing in a time

Try: estimation exercise

Try: decide 2 baseline user stories with your team

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Thank you!