Frequent Questions
773 questions
34
votes
7
answers
34k
views
How do you schedule delivery dates in Scrum?
I've run into a constant issue. When a project starts, the client typically has a list of functionalities to be built in to the application. As a team we would like to follow Scrum. But the next thing ...
- 648
16
votes
4
answers
31k
views
What is the typical ratio of PM/EM hours to "work" hours in a project?
What is the rule-of-thumb ratio of Project Manager/Engagement Manager time to overall project time (e.g. man-hours for work products) in a project? I'm especially interested in an answer within the ...
- 942
8
votes
1
answer
3k
views
What are "Consumed Story Points" in Trello?
Some Scrum add-ons allow you to enter both estimated story points and consumed story points. What are consumed story points and how do you measure/estimate them?
22
votes
6
answers
5k
views
In scrum should incomplete stories be re-estimated or does the original estimate get burned down when it's finally completed?
If I have a story that's been estimated at 10 story points and we don't manage to complete it in a sprint how do you handle estimates for the sprint in which it's next included (assuming it gets ...
- 2,071
164
votes
19
answers
100k
views
Why use story points instead of hours for estimating?
After using hours to estimate our projects for a long time and rarely coming within 20% of actual "work-to-ship," I have been told by a handful of people that "points" work a lot better at gauging the ...
- 2,191
75
votes
24
answers
26k
views
How technical should a Project Manager be?
Consider a software project involving a bunch of developers of mixed experience. The PM has the delivery responsibility for the project, but undertakes this through the team members.
When the ...
- 851
25
votes
3
answers
16k
views
In Scrum, how to estimate research stories?
In our Scrum team, when there is uncertainty about a story or the team is not sure about how to implement it, we take up a research story first. Based on the findings of this research story, we are ...
- 11.1k
17
votes
4
answers
6k
views
Should velocity increase with time?
Some scrum masters are concerned with "bumping up" a team's velocity during a sprint, as if a higher velocity is better. But points are a relative measure of the work that a team needs to do for ...
- 709
11
votes
3
answers
777
views
How should we plan work on support issues without a "battery"?
We are working on a very old project with a lot of legacy code. This means that we have around 3-5 unplanned issues every Sprint.
We were handling that with "batteries": time set aside for ...
- 213
11
votes
2
answers
3k
views
What are the definitions and distinctions between Project x Program x Portfolio x Product Managers?
What are the definitions, distinctions and relationship between the following roles?
Project lead
Project Coordinator
Project Manager
Program Manager
Portfolio Manager
Product Manager (optional)
...
- 8,738
5
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Defect Found in Previous Iteration - Bug or New Work?
A previous answer stated that:
On the other hand, if Feature Bar met the Definition of Done in a previous iteration, but bugs were later found after the feature was declared "done," then while you ...
- 14.8k
2
votes
4
answers
7k
views
Why must we define a Sprint Goal for each Sprint?
As a Scrum Team, we are committed to deliver Product Backlog items per the Product Owner's priority. The team doesn't understand why we should define Sprint Goals. How does that help?
- 819
72
votes
5
answers
8k
views
Is Scrum a status report meeting or a developer meeting?
I'm a developer and we started using Agile last year (October 2011). And, it has been rough to say the least. I was always taught Scrum was to discuss the following:
What you did yesterday
What you ...
- 823
40
votes
40
answers
12k
views
What is the Project Management book that left the most impact on you?
If you could recommend a single book that made you a better PM, which one would it be?
19
votes
3
answers
3k
views
Handling bugs in the Scrum process?
I have recently gone live with a big project. To meet a tight deadline some technical debt was accumulated but the true extent only became apparent after go live.
As this is intended to be a ...
- 429