#NoEstimates

#NoEstimates is a lightening rod.

 

Estimation is one of the lightening rod issues in software development and maintenance. Over the past few years the concept of #NoEstimates has emerged and has become a movement within the Agile community. Due to its newness, #NoEstimates has several camps revolving around a central concept. This essay begins the process of identifying and defining a core set of concepts in order to have a measured discussion.  A  shared language accross the gamut of estimating ideas whether Agile or not including #NoEstimates is critical for comparing both sets of concepts.  We begin our exploration of the ideas around the #NoEstimates concepts by establishing a context that includes classic estimatimation and #NoEstimates.

Classic Estimation Context: Estimation as a topic is often a synthesis of three related, but different concepts. The three concepts are budgeting, estimation and planning. Becasue these three conccepts are often conflated it is important to understand tthe relationship between the three.  These are typical in a normal commercial organization, however these concepts might be called different things depending your business model. An estimate is a finite approximation of cost, effort and/or duration based on some basis of knowledge (this is known as a basis of estimation). The flow of activity conflated as estimation often runs from budget, to project estimation to planning. In most organizations, the act of generating a finite approximation typically begins as a form of portfolio management in order to generate a budget for a department or group. The budgeting process helps make decisions about which pieces of work are to be done. Most organizations have a portfolio of work that is larger than they can accomplish, therefore they need a mechanism to prioritize. Most portfolio managers, whether proponents of an Agile or a classic approach, would defend using value as a key determinant of prioritization. Value requires having some type of forecast of cost and benefit of the project over some timeframe. Once a project enters a pipeline in a classic organization. an estimate is typically generated.  The estimate is generally believed to be more accurate than the orgianal  budget due to the information gathered as the project is groomed to begin. Plans breakdown stories into tasks often with personal assigned, an estimate of effort generated at the task level and sum the estimates into higher-level estimates. Any of these steps can (but should not) be called estimation. The three -level process described above, if misused, can cause several team and organizational issues. Proponents of the #NoEstimates movement often classify these issues as estimation pathologies; we will explore these “pathologies” in later essays.

#NoEstimates Context:  There are two camps macro camps in the #NoEstimate movement (the two camps probably reflect more of continuum of ideas rathe than absolutes).  The first camp argues that a team should break work down into small chunks and then immediately begin completing those small chunks (doing the highest value first). The chunks would build up quickly to a minimum viable product (MVP) that can generate feedback, so the team can hone its ability to deliver value. I call this camp the “Feedback’ers”, and luminaries like Woody Zuill often champion this camp. A second camp begins in a similar manner – by breaking the work into small pieces, prioritizing on value (and perhaps risk), delivering against a MVP to generate feedback – but they measure throughput. Throughput is a measure of how many units of work (e.g. stories or widgets) a team can deliver in a specific period of time. Continuously measuring the throughput of the team provides a tool to understand when work needs to start in order for to be delivered within a period time. Average throughput is used to provide the team and other stakeholders with a forecast of the future. This is very similar to throughput measured used in Kanban. People like Vasco Duarte (listen to my interview with Vasco) champion the second camp, which I tend to call the “Kanban’ers”.  I recently heard David Anderson, the Kanban visionary, discuss a similar #NoEstimates position using throughput as a forecasting tool. Both camps in the #NoEstimates movement eschew developing story- or task-level estimates. The major difference is on the use of throughput to provide forecasting which is central to bottom-up estimating and planning at the lowest level of the classic estimation continuum.

When done correctly, both #NoEstimates and classic estimation are tools to generate feedback and create guidance for the organization. In its purest form #NoEstimates uses functionality to generate feedback and to provide guidance about what is possible. The less absolutist “Kanban’er” form of #NoEstimates uses both functional software and throughput measures as feedback and guidance tools. Classic estimation tools use plans and performance to the plan to generate feedback and guidance. The goal is usually the same, it is just that the mechanisms are very different. With an established context and vocabulary exlore the concepts more deeply.