Another favourite meme of mine posing a light hearted take on a real business challenge.
How often have you seen this when working with teams?
A stakeholder comes to you, perhaps taps you on the shoulder & asks 'Hey, if you could estimate when this will be complete, when would it be?'
You provide an honest answer, you're keen to demonstrate transparency, and yet the number you give, is then anchored as the deadline.
๐๐'๐ ๐ณ๐ถ๐ป๐ถ๐๐ฒ, ๐ฎ๐ป๐ฑ ๐๐ผ๐'๐ฟ๐ฒ ๐ต๐ฒ๐น๐ฑ ๐๐ผ ๐ถ๐.
The term deadline has a history entirely unrelated to business & yet it has become accepted business language. Deadlines for me, don't have much place in an agile world.
There are exceptions & we need to be pragmatic. Regulatory matters, urgent fixes, however these should be the exception, not the rule.
๐๐ฐ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป๐ฎ๐ฏ๐น๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ธ๐ฒ๐ฎ๐๐ฎ๐๐
- Encourage teams to provide ๐ฒ๐๐๐ถ๐บ๐ฎ๐๐ฒ๐, ๐ป๐ผ๐ ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐ฎ๐ฑ๐น๐ถ๐ป๐ฒ๐.
- Shorten feedback loops with your customers. Regular communication breeds trust and confidence which can erode deadline setting behaviour.
- Rather than use RAG status, consider confidence voting
- Acknowledge & understand that things change that may impact estimates. This is ok
- Seek understanding as to why stakeholders are taking estimates to be gospel, and challenging ourselves to ask 'How can we serve our teams and organisations better' in the pursuit of this.
- Use the agile estimation game to demonstrate the challenges around estimation