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Agile Estimation and Planning

Rob Morris
CDL Systems
Outline
1. My Background
2. Why do we estimate?
3. How to estimate
a. Traditionally
b. Agilely
4. Firm Fixed Price Estimation
5. The need for Actuals

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Background
„ Pre 1995 - How do we manage software development projects?
„ 1995 - CDL – small contractor, control station for UAVs
„ 1997 - GD Canada (CDC) – fairly large Canadian defence contractor
„ 1998 - Alliant Techsystems – larger American defence contractor
„ 1999 - AAI – Airplane defence contractor – CMM level 5
„ 2002 - Northrop Grumman – Huge defence contractor, F14, F18,
Stealth Bomber CMMI level 5

Agile Manifesto: people over processes

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Why do we estimate?
„ To Plan – When will something be done?
„ To Schedule – What order should we do things in?
„ To Hire – Do we need more people to do the work?
„ To Price – How much will it cost?
„ To Guide Investment – Is doing something worth it?

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Definitions
• Size – something that can be counted/measured.
Hopefully it is representative of effort
• Effort – the actual hours required to write the software.
• Duration – the time on the calendar to get something
done
• Cost – strongly correlated with effort, but duration also
plays a role

Estimated – our educated guess


Actual – measured result

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Estimation is a Probability
0.25

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05

0
0 5 10 15 20 25

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Cumulative Distribution
1.2

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0
0 5 10 15 20 25

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Reality of Estimates
Todd Little at Landmark Graphics did a
study of 100+ projects.
Data coincided with results found by Tom
Demarco

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Results

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Results con’t

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Parkinson’s Law
„ Effort expands to fill the time
Time
0.25

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05

0
0 5 10 15 20 25

-0.05

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Traditional Estimation
„ Pick a size metric – SLOC, function points
„ Select the value for a variety of cost
drivers
„ Experience of requirements analyst
„ Type of project

„ Estimate the size


„ Crunch the numbers = Effort estimate

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
COCOMO II
„ 16 cost drivers
„ Product of the influence of all 16 cost drivers is
1454.
„ Two different projects of the same size (in
SLOC)
„ $10,000 and $14.54 million
„ Changes in the cost drivers from one project to
the next can have a large impact on projects of
the same ‘size’.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Actual Data at CDL Systems
„ Post mortem analysis within CDL Systems
saw variations from 6 LOC/hr to 18 LOC/hr
on very similar projects.
„ Factor of 3 with perfect knowledge of
SLOC (not a very good estimate)

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Lesson Learned
„ The client (or even one person) can have a huge
impact on cost and it can be completely out of
your control.
„ Classify clients like hurricanes, Category 1 to 5.
„ Tardy clients can be costly if they can’t make a
decision
„ Agile – Don’t start developments without
requirements for the iteration.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Agile Estimation
„ Estimate at 3 scales
„ Iteration Plan Estimation
„ Release Plan Estimation

„ Project Estimation

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Estimation Units
„ Ideal Time – how long a task takes if there were no
interruptions
„ Story Point – relative measurement among User Stories
„ User Requirements
„ Feature Lists
„ Use Case Scenario

Velocity – how many estimation units get completed by a


team in a single iteration.

Be on the lookout for dysfunctional behavior

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Techniques
„ Analogous Estimation
„ Planning Poker

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Analogous Estimation
„ This Story is like another Story (maybe a little
more difficult, maybe a little less)
„ Give this Story a comparable estimated value.
„ Estimate against multiple Stories of the same
effort.
„ Analogous estimation is successful due to our
inherent ability to better measure relative size
than absolute size.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Planning Poker
1. Each estimator is given a deck of cards, each card contains a valid
estimate.
„ Power of 2 – 1,2,4,8,16,32
„ Fib – 1,2,3,5,8,13,20,30
2. Story is read and discussed briefly
3. Each estimator selects a card that reflects their estimate.
4. Cards are turned over for all to see.
5. Discussion takes place
6. Re-estimate to try to get convergence.

„ Similar to Wide-band Delphi


„ Research has shown that although planning poker is no better than
wide-band Delphi, participants find it fun.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Iteration Planning
„ Entire team gets together at the beginning
of an iteration.
„ Can include outside stakeholders
„ Estimate each of the items
„ Prioritize the items
„ Use the team velocity to stack the tasks
into the iteration.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Estimating Velocity
„ Use historical data
„ Run an iteration
„ Make a forecast

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Historical Data
„ Previous iteration
„ Running average of past iterations
„ Valid, only when little has changed from one
iteration to the next
„ Technology
„ Domain
„ Product Owner
„ Tools
„ Working Environment
„ Team Size and Makeup
„ Estimators

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Run an Iteration
„ Essentially performs a trial
„ Calibrates the historical data for the
current environment.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Forecast
„ Estimate ideal hours (per developer, per iteration)
„ Allowances for staff meetings, status meeting, planning session
„ Allowance for new staff, interns, etc. (60% for 6 months)
„ Allowances for training
„ Allowances for stat holidays, vacation, flex time
„ Be aware of summer projects
„ Allowances for doctor, dentist, cable guy, Friday lunch
„ 25% overhead to the team lead per developer
„ Eg – 5 person team, 1 intern, 75 hrs/iteration/person
„ On paper 375 hrs
„ Actually with allowances – 217 (~40%)
„ Determine ideal hours per iteration
„ Expand user stories into tasks, estimate the tasks, fill the
iteration.
„ Tasks are like Lego blocks and must completely fit within an iteration

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Release Planning
„ Similar to iteration planning but extend the technique to multiple
iterations
„ Tasks are generally coarser.
„ Two basic techniques
„ Given a release date, continue filling content until the date is reached.
„ Given content, continue adding iterations until content is completed.
„ Schedule can be shrunk somewhat with additional resources but the
best that can be hoped for is about 25% improvement in schedule
with a 50% increase in staff.
„ Maximum team size 5 (including lead)
„ Use forecasting and history if available.
„ Allow time for bug fixing – perhaps allocate an entire iteration

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Firm Fixed Price Estimate
„ Similar to Rough order of magnitude
(ROM), or Not to exceed (NTE)
„ Inherently risky if we use 50% probability
estimates
„ Many of us have to live in this world
„ Sole Source and Competitive Bid

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Firm Fixed Price Technique

„ For each Story produce 2 estimates 50%


and 90% probability
„ Subtract and square the difference
„ Sum the squares
„ Square root of the sum
„ Add sum to 50% sum

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Example
Story 50% (days) 90% (days) Δ2
Plan Flight 15 25 100
Control Weapons 5 10 25
Launch Vehicle 5 7 4
Land Vehicle 20 40 400
Total 45 529

Total = 45 + √529 = 68

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Advantages
„ The greater the difference between the 90%
estimate and the 50% estimate is an indicator
of risk
„ Provide developers with the 50% numbers to
complete the tasks.
„ 50% and 90% confidence can be tested for
accuracy by looking at actuals for all tasks.

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Scope Creep and Rework
„ Scope Creep – new requirements that
were never allocated for in the estimate
„ Rework – Doing work more than once
because client couldn’t make up their
mind

„ Agilist accept these as a fact of life, but


they are still require effort

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Scope Creep and Rework
„ Keep track of out of scope and rework items
„ Every item that is added to your backlog qualify it as in
scope, rework or out of scope
„ Treat them like any other backlog item
„ Even if you can’t recapture out of scope and rework in
this contract, beware of this contractor and adjust
estimates in subsequent contracts with this contractor
accordingly
„ Trying to tighten loopholes in contracts doesn’t work –
leads to red tape and animosity
„ Important to keep track of to determine the accuracy of
the original estimate

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Actuals
„ Pure Agilist – Actuals aren’t necessary
„ Scrum – more concerned with time remaining to create a burn
down
„ XP – weaker concept of ‘Yesterday’s weather’ which is just
number of story points completed by a team in an iteration.
„ Use of velocity somewhat circumvents need for actuals,
but it is course grained.
„ Velocity is a team actual

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Need for Actuals
„ Firm Fixed Price Bidding needs Actuals
„ Need the historical data as a frame of reference for
forecasting
„ When teams are shuffled, individual velocity can aid in
estimation
„ Team concept is great, however we don’t pay teams, we
pay individuals
„ Individual accomplishments should not be overlooked.
„ Actuals provide feedback to staff to improve their
estimates on subsequent iterations

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
Final Words
„ Being agile does not circumvent need for
estimates
„ Traditional ‘size to effort’ techniques have their
problems (cost driver sensitivity, size estimation)
„ Can still use agile techniques in Firm Fixed Price
environments
„ Clients are a huge cost driver – make allowances
for the client
„ Still need actuals

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com
References

„ Software Estimation – Steve McConnell


„ Agile Estimation and Planning – Mike Cohn
„ http://www.toddlittleweb.com/ - Todd
Little

CDL Systems
October 12, 2006 www.cdlsystems.com

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