Agile Concepts - II “Agile” Estimating & Planning Nupul Kukreja 5 th November, 2014

Agenda “Agile” estimating & planning – For agile projects – For non-agile projects too Why planning fails? Scheduling – Release & Iteration planning Tracking and Communicating Benefits of Agile Planning Guidelines for Agile Estimation and Planning

“Agile” Estimating & Planning Estimation and planning can be lightweight too! Doesn’t imply estimating and planning for “agile” projects only Question to answer: What should we build and by when? – How big is it? – When will it be done? – How much can I have by then?

PLANNING IS EVERYTHING. PLANS ARE NOTHING. Field Marshal Helmuth Graf von Moltke

Purpose of ‘Planning’* Why do we do it? – Reduce risk & uncertainty – Supporting better decision making – Establishing trust (i.e. frequent delivery) – Conveying expectations Planning is a ‘quest for value’ – Attempt to find an optimal solution of the overall product development question: What should be built? *Agile Estimation & Planning – Mike Cohn 6

A Good Plan One that stakeholders find sufficiently reliable One that can be used as basis for decision making – Approximate time to market – An idea of the set of features Made more precise as project moves on Is a ‘living’ artifact showing the current status of the project to avoid last minute surprises Is planned around ‘value’ 7

Why Planning Fails? Planning by activity instead by features “Activities” never finish early Activities are not independent Lateness passed down the schedule Multitasking causes more delays Features not developed by priority Ignoring uncertainty  revised estimates Estimates become commitments

Agile Approach to Estimating/Planning Agile Manifesto: Individuals and interactions over processes and tools Working software over comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over contract negotiation Responding to change over following a plan That is, while there is value in the items on the right, agilists value the items on the left more

Agile Approach to Projects Work as one team Work in short (2 – 4 week) iterations Deliver something each iteration Focus on business priorities Inspect and adapt

Agile Approach to Planning Accuracy of plan decreases the further we attempt to plan Multiple “horizons” for planning Market Research Agile Project Planning

Conditions of Satisfaction

AGILE ESTIMATION & PRIORITIZATION Recap of what has already been covered

Estimation & Prioritization Estimating size: – T-shirt sizing (S, M, L, XL …) – Story-points – Ideal days – … (refer Estimation lecture) Keep duration estimate independent of size Prioritize features w.r.t. size and “other” important dimensions (lecture on VBRP)

SCHEDULING Release and Iteration Planning

Release Planning Determine Conditions of Satisfaction Estimate (theme) User Stories Select stories and a release date Do in any sequence Estimate Velocity Select an iteration length (~2 wks) Prioritize User Stories Iterate until the conditions of satisfaction for the release can be met

Estimating Velocity By when will you be done? A major challenge for planning a release Avoid point estimates Techniques: – Historical values Only applicable if “everything” is the same – Run an iteration (or 2 – 3) and predict – Make a forecast Estimate team hours Estimate total hours on project/release Arbitrarily select stories and break into tasks to fill number of hours Get velocity from above  convert to 90% CI range

Release Plan – Look and Feel Iteration 1Iteration 2Iterations 3 – 5 As a user, I… 3 As a user, I… 8 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 8 As a user, I… 2 As a user, I… 3 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 3 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 3 As a user, I… 2 As a user, I… 1 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 5 As a user, I… 2 Not fixed in stone – updated frequently especially if major changes in velocity/features

Iteration Planning Release plan provides high level view of “value delivery” Iteration plan  Short-term, detailed view – What to work on in the next 2 weeks? – What to work on today? (Daily plan/stand-ups) Stories being worked on broken into tasks – Ex: Design UI (16 hours) – Refactor DB schema (10 hours) – Determine business rules (6 hours) – Specify acceptance tests (8 hours) Tasks NOT allocated to individuals!

Iteration Planning – Cont’d Velocity Driven Commitment Driven

TRACKING AND MONITORING

Release Burn-down(up) Charts

Iteration Plan StoryTo Do Tests Ready In ProcessTo VerifyHours As a user, I can… 5 Code the… (8) Code the… (5) Test the… (6) Y Code the… NK (6) Code the… DL (4) Code the… BB (4) 33 As a user, I can… 3 Code the… (8) Code the… (5) 13 As a user, I can… 2 Code the… (3) Code the… (6) Y Code the… SK (4) 13

Benefits of Agile Planning Replanning occurs frequently Estimates of size and duration are separated Plans made at separate levels Plans based on features not tasks/activities Small stories keep work flowing Work in process eliminated each iteration Tracking at team level (instead of individual) Uncertainty acknowledged and planned for

Guidelines for Agile E&P 1.Involve the whole team 2.Plan at different levels 3.Keep estimates of size and duration separate using different units 4.Express uncertainty in either functionality or date 5.Replan often (start of each iteration) 6.Track and communicate progress 7.Acknowledge importance of learning 8.Plan features of right size 9.Prioritize features 10.Base estimates and plans of facts 11.Leave some slack 12.Coordinate/sync teams with look-ahead planning.