When talking about projects following the Agile framework, agile time estimation is one of the most effective methods for determining when your product will be finished and when you will hit specific milestones. When you say “estimation”, the first thing to pop up in front of you is “time”. Although agile accommodates this measure of estimation in terms of hours and days it will take, however, there is another way of estimation and that is through effort. Effort is represented in terms of story points. This can include the scale, difficulty, and risks associated with the task and in turn shows how much time it will take to overcome these problems and difficulties.
The two distinct methods of measuring tasks and stories are time and story points. Nevertheless, they cannot be substituted for one another. For your project and your development team, one or the other may really be more advantageous. So, which one is ideal for your project?
Agile Time Estimation
Estimation through time is the usual go to method for most people. After all, the majority of things—like work schedules, milestone dates, and investment portfolios—use time as a measure. As a result, the management is interested in learning how much work a team member can do in a given period of time. Using this method, management is able to forecast not only when a given work will be completed, but also when the entire project will be completed. By using this technique, they may keep team members accountable for their work and quickly identify when deadlines have not been met.
Pros and Cons
While time estimation is common and simple to use, is it ideal for you? Despite having a lot of benefits, there are a few disadvantages for specific teams and types of projects. For example, there are some tasks that can not be expressed in terms of time, like, features that have not been entirely defined yet or big tasks where one can easily miscalculate the time.
Another problem with using time based estimation is that time is is a renowned stress giver. If the estimated times are off by even a small amount, it can cause team members and stakeholders to be under a lot of pressure. This sort of pressure in turn causes performance issues.
Story Points Estimation
Story points estimate, as opposed to time estimation, addresses the complexity of a User Story. They may, of course, also be used to estimate work from the Product Backlog. The story points associates with at least of the following things: the amount of work to be done, the difficulty of the said work, and the uncertainty involved in carrying out the work.
Story points give this assessed effort a numerical value. It’s crucial to realize, though, that these figures are completely meaningless outside of the context of the comparisons being made. They are only meaningful in comparison to other stories or tasks that have also been assessed using story points. For example, a user story might only put in an effort of 6, which only means something when compared to another story with an effort of 9. In comparison to 9 story points, 6 story points are rather simple whereas 9 story points are more difficult.
Pros and Cons
In recent times, more and more teams have begun using story points estimation, especially software related projects. This is due to the following reasons:
1- It accommodates large scale complex projects.
2- It reduces the stress on team members.
3- It allows for more collaboration than time estimation (Scrum Poker).
4- It caters for a more diverse team.
Apart from these advantages, it is not all perfect. Since story points are an abstract concept, it is harder to comprehend. Knowing how to compare to other user stories or tasks and stories from previous finished projects is a requirement.
So, in conclusion, theres no single method that is best for all sorts of projects and teams. It depends on the requirements of the project.
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