Agile User Story Estimation
Estimate user stories by thinking about the solution effort, additional testing effort, and risk level. Assess the solution effort, then increase the estimate if testing effort or risks exceed typical levels.
Solution effort
| Story Points | Guidance | Solution | Effort |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tiny, one line change; typo | Obvious; 0 unknowns | Very low; I could do many of these in a day |
| 2 | Minor change; configuration updates | Known; little to 0 unknowns | Not demanding; soundness check level code review |
| 3 | Small, scoped feature; requires insignificant research or cross-team coordination | Generally known; few unknowns | Will have to focus, requires meaningful code review and tests, needs 1 session of concentration |
| 5 | Complex feature; requires little research or cross-team coordination | Have an idea; limited research of known unknowns | Complexity or amount of work to be done requires a couple sessions of concentration |
| 8 | Large, complex feature; requires some research or cross-team coordination | Concept and the goals understood; solution requires some research that can only be done as part of the work | Complexity or amount of work to be done requires several sessions of concentration |
| 13 | Very large, complex feature; requires significant research or cross-team coordination | Concept and the goals understood; solution requires significant research that can only be done as part of the work | Complexity or amount of work to be done requires many of sessions of concentration |
| ≥ 21 | Anything you feel would be greater than 13 story points should be broken down into smaller tasks or time-boxed instead. | ||
Testing effort
| Bump ups | Testing effort |
|---|---|
| Baseline | Zero additional testing effort beyond standard practice |
| +1 step | Testing effort exceeds standard practice and is equal to the effort of the implementation |
| +2 steps | Testing effort exceeds standard practice and is greater than the effort of the implementation |
Risk level
| Bump ups | Risk level |
|---|---|
| Baseline | All risks owned outside of this ticket, accepted, resolved, or mitigated |
| +1 step | Low to moderate risk owned and accepted as part of this ticket |
| +2 steps | Moderate to high risk owned and accepted as part of this ticket |
Risks should be explicitly stated and actions to address each categories with ROAM.
- Resolved
- the risk is known and should be stated, but does not need action now
- Owned
- someone has taken ownership of addressing the risk, but not yet resolved
- Accepted
- the risk cannot be resolved, so it has to be understood and accepted for what it is
- Mitigated
- a plan has been created to eradicate the risk
Remember: Bugs don’t get points because fixing what’s broken is not delivering new value. Otherwise we could get double accounting for a feature poorly completed.
Rubric created by Jeremiah Lee and Chesley Brown. (CC BY-SA 4.0)