Planning with Agile User Stories

What is Agile's approach to the Cone of Uncertainity?

Agile breaks the project down bit by bit over time using Agile Iterations or Scrum Sprints. The Development starts with the highest value first.

Does Agile use Project Requirements?

Agile projects don't use traditional Project Requirements. Instead the Product Owner maintains a set of User Stories for the project.

What is Business Rules in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

B - Business Rules: Sometimes you'll see there's a lot of complex value in the Epic. When that happens, you may want to split that Epic down into Business Rules.

What is Complexity in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

C - Complexity: When breaking down a Epic into User Stories, the User Stories themselves may have similar levels of Complexity.

What is Data Operations in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

D - Data Operations: You may want to break up your Epic based on common data operations, like CRUD.

What is Effort in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

E - Effort: This is how the User Story may be broken down by the Development Team's effort.

What is Entry in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

E - Entry: Sometimes the team may want to break down the Epic by how the customer enters the data.

What is Flow in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

F - Flow: This is how the User Story may step through the application's workflow.

What are a list of common challenges to think about when creating User Stories?

INVEST I - Independent: This does not mean that your User Stories are functionally independent, but means that they are independently valued. N - Negotiable: The Product Owner shouldn't create User Stories that focus too much on how to deliver the request. You want the Development Team to negotiate with the Product Owner. V - Valuable: The customer value is the most important part of the User Story. Without it the Product Owner can't prioritize the Product Backlog. E - Estimable: When the Development Team can't estimate the User Story it usually means the User Story is too big or not clearly described. Usually the smaller the User Story, the clearer the description. S - Small: A User Story should be delivered within a two week Sprint. T - Testable: You don't want your User Story to be subjective.

What is Knowledge in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

K - Knowledge: Sometimes the Product Owner will present the Epic and the team will need additional Knowledge.

What is a Rough Order of Value (ROV)?

Planned groupings of Epics that can be delivered over time. To create a Release Plan you can gather the Stakeholders, Product Owner and Scrum Master to discuss Epics and the Team's Velocity. This should provide a rough idea as to the Release Plan Schedule.

What are Project Requirements?

Project requirements strive to be written in clear, direct language. It's usually when you turn this clear language into work that you realize that there's a lot of room for misinterpretation.

What is Relative Estimating?

Relative Estimating compares what you don't know against what you do know. For example, you may not know how much a lion weighs, but you can guess it may be three or four dogs. The estimation is not meant to be precise. Instead it gives you a starting point, a way to start the discussion on what it takes to deliver your User Story.

How do you calculate velocity?

Take the average of the first three Sprints. - Sprint 1 - 16 points - Sprint 2 - 15 points - Sprint 3 - 17 points - 16 + 15 + 17 = 48 points - 48 points / 3 Sprints = 16 Story Points/Sprint or Velocity

What is a Product Owner?

The Product Owner represents the customer. The Product Owner focuses on the user's experience, and not what goes into creating that experience. The Product Owner will prioritize the work based on their view of the product.

What are common ways to split Epics into User Stories?

The best way to remember these groups is by thinking of the acronym F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K or Flow, Effort, Entry, Data Operations, Business Rules, Alternatives, Complexity, and Knowledge.

What is the Cone of Uncertainity?

The longer you work on a project, the more expensive it is to make changes. - Projects are the most uncertain before they start. - As the project moves forward through time, it becomes more expensive to make changes. The Cone of Uncertainty narrows, but the cost of making changes increases.

What is the project's Agile Charter mission?

The mission is what everyone will do to accomplish the vision.

What is Velocity?

The rate at which teams can complete work within a time frame within an environment that has: - A rigorous, but consistent pace - Predictable and practical workday - Data-driven pacing

What is Groupthink?

The tendency of group members to privilege consensus over debate by agreeing with the most popular opinion.

What is the project's Agile Charter vision?

The vision should answer one question, why are we doing this project.

What is an Agile Charter?

- An Agile Charter is an agreement and not a plan. - It sets up the initial direction and record the project's reason for starting. - It should list what every party wants from the project. - A good Agile Charter should be one page or less and it should have three main sections: vision, mission and success criteria.

What are three things an Agile team can do to make sure it's not producing too much documentation?

1. An Agile team should document continuously and not wait for a final draft. 2. All the documentation should be collaborative. 3. The primary purpose of the documentation should be the continuation of the project. Remember, an Agile team focuses on the highest value deliverable. When the team is working on creating documents, it means that they're not working on creating valuable software.

What are the 3 C's in User Stories?

1. Card: User Stories are best recorded on a three-by-five card. You don't want to overwhelm the group with a list of information. Instead, you want to have a group conversation. 2. Conversation: The User Story is a conversational vehicle. 3. Confirmation: This is another way of saying Acceptance Criteria or AC. This is confirmation that everybody knows how to deliver the User Story. This is typically written on the back of the index card. It's very important that the AC closely matches the User Story on the front of the card.

What are the two reasons Agile teams use Relative Estimates?

1. It takes away from the false comfort of precision. The team accepts the fact that the estimates will be imprecise. It's a way to say, it's OK that you don't know, but it's time to guess. 2. It keeps the team from confusing estimates from commitments. - An estimate is a best guess. - A commitment is often a worse case scenario. This is why for Agile planning, you want estimates and not commitments.

What does a User Story accomplish?

1. It uses the customer's language. The User Story is only about the What and the Why. The Product Owner should not be concerned about the How, that is up to the Development Team. 2. The User Story is immediately linked to some business value.

What are Alternatives in F.E.E.D.B.A.C.K?

A - Alternatives: Some Epics can easily be broken into User Stories with alternative criteria.

What is a User Story?

A User Story is a conversational vehicle. It's a short story from the users perspective about what they find valuable in the product. A common User Story format is: As a [User Role], I [want, need, can][goal] so that [reason] For example: "As a [standard customer], I [want] to [see a list of benefits of upgrading] so that [I can see if it's worth the cost to upgrade to premium."