I discussed how to calculate the Costs of Delay in the previous three posts, and then offered an example in Part 3. Notice that the example uses cycle time or how the team feels about the remaining time to think about the value in order to rank the work. (The links to all the posts […]
Ranking work, whether it’s for the backlog, a roadmap, or the portfolio, sometimes feels like throwing darts and hoping for the best. But especially if there’s too much work and a lot of WIP, we have a tool for clarifying that ranking—the Cost of Delay. It does require counting the number of people and easy
In Part 1, I explained the various Costs of Delays with this image: I explained how to calculate the salary costs in Part 1. Now, it’s time to calculate/assess Costs 2, 3, and 4 to decide on the most valuable work. (If you have Manage Your Project Portfolio, there’s an entire section about calculating and
If you’re like my clients (or me!), you have too much work to do. (I’m beginning to think “too much work” is the norm.) But how do you decide what to do first, second, and third? And never? I use Cost of Delay. (I’ve written about how to see the various Costs of Delay, especially
Up until now, when thinking about risks, I defaulted to the risks in the project pyramid. That’s because each project offers different value over the product’s lifetime. (See Product Roles, Part 4: Product Orientation and the Role of Projects for images of why we want ever-increasing product value, but why we might space the projects
Three Planning Ideas to Support Your Future Decisions Many organizations use deliverable-based planning, specifying the various features or products the teams expect to deliver and when. I’m a fan of short-term deliverable-based planning because it focuses everyone on the (few) deliverables. But the pandemic taught us a critical idea: while long-term deliverable-based planning can illuminate
I see too many teams feel frustrated because their managers say the work takes “too long.” (The team feedback loop is the inside of the onion for how agile the organization can be. See Multiple Short Feedback Loops Support Innovation.) The longer the work takes, the more pressure managers exert on the team and the
Do your senior leaders want more predictability about when your team can finish its work? Perfect prediction is impossible, and sometimes, even reasonable prediction is quite difficult (with apologies to Yogi Berra). However, agile teams have one specific “tool” to create better predictability: right-sizing their stories. When a team right-sizes their work, they can create
Agile product leaders (product managers, product owners, and business analysts) all have one goal: How do I support the team in their quest to deliver better and faster? Product leaders do this by helping the team plan with minimums and continually replan. These two workshops help you do that. I offer two versions: for teams,
Up until a few months ago, my office was a disaster. I had a ton of old data: Paper in reverse chronological order on surfaces (most recent on top). Printed articles to read. Notes from previous workshops I wanted to integrate when I updated those workshops. Over the past year, as I realized the pandemic