12 ProductManagementJournalVolume 7 ESTIMATION It’simportanttowriterequirementsata‘productlevel’sothatall aspectsoftheproductnecessarytosupportthefeaturesarebuilt beforeitcanbeconfirmedasfinished.Forexample,auserstory describinghowausermustbeabletochangetheirpasswordneedsto drivethedevelopmentteamtocreatetheuserexperience,theuser helpscreens,thedatabaseinteraction,theemailconfirmationofthe passwordchangeetc.Writingatthislevelmakesitfareasierforthe productownertoprioritiserequirements. Whiletheproductownerisresponsibleforpresentingtheir prioritiesduringthesprintplanningmeeting,theydon’t,atthatstage, knowtheeffortrequiredtobuildthefeature.Thesprintplanning meetingprovidesthatinsightandtheproductownerwillchooseto changeprioritiesif,forexample,2requirementshaveidenticalbusiness valuebut1takestwiceasmuchefforttobuild. Tracking and estimation OneofthemostcommonthingsthatisusedinScrumisataskboard tomanageandtrackthestatusofworkinaSprint(seephotoonp.19). Typicallyarowisallocatedtoeachuserstorywithcolumns representingToDo,Underway,ToVerifyandDone. EstimationinScrumissimplifiedbyonlyevaluatingdevelopment tasksrelativeto eachother.Thisis donebyawarding pointsforthesizeof eachtask.Scrum doesn’tuseman- daysestimates.As eachsprintisthe samelengthoftime, theteamlearnshow manytotalpoints canbedeliveredina singlesprint.Thisis knownastheteam’svelocity. Thevelocityofdevelopmentistracked usingaburndownchart.Thisisupdatedregularlyasnewstoriesare Fig.7Example releaseburndown chartwith4-week sprints Points complete Sprint completion dates Actual 25 Nov 23 Dec 20 Jan 17 Feb 16 Mar 13 Apr 11 May 8 Jun 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 Target WiseWords “One shouldalways play fairwhenone has the winning cards.” Oscar Wilde, Irish poet and playwright