Category Archives: Release Planning

Agile Release Planning – Some Questions & Issues

Last week I did an Agile Release Planning workshop.  Several different kinds of people there, including from 3 different firms. And some new questions and issues. Some things I should have said: The Agile Release Planning Day is the beginning, not the end. I did say that, but not well enough. Whatever you do the […]

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BVPs, SPs, Fun, and the Game – Pt 1

We mentioned this Agile Carolinas session in an earlier post.  And some description.  Here we explain more. To Start Let’s start with Game, because that’s what it’s all about. Well, more clearly, it is about a wonderful life, for the Team and for the Customers.  And everyone else. That means we must deliver a wonderful […]

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Agile Release Planning – Questions

QUESTIONS Joe – during an agile release planning session how long do you estimate it will take for Business Sponsors to point approx 50 stories? Actually, I’m estimating we will need 32 stories for 6 months. Yes, I’m looking to hold an ARP at the end of Feb for 1 feature. Thanks, Craig REPLY First, […]

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BV Points – 1

QUESTION Hi Joe – reading your ARP book, and you talk about BV and highest number is 100. But, what is the harm in using regular 1,2,5,8,13 Fibonacci numbers for business value? I do get when you find R that it will be lower. R = Bv (5) / SP (5) would mean an R […]

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Ideas Behind Agile Planning: It Helps to Have a Plan

Revised: 11/21/2020 (Original: 9/21/2020). This idea is a bit controversial, depending on who you talk to. First, let’s agree partly with the opposite idea. It can be painful to have a plan.  It can hurt.  Especially if managers will lock the “delivery date” in stone, as we say, and want to punish us if we […]

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Ideas behind Agile Planning: Iterative and Incremental

When we start the work (and the plan) we do not know everything. As I have suggested, if we know half of everything we need to know (to have a perfect plan) that, in my experience, would be a better-than-average start. So, we start. And we start with the notion that the plan will never […]

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Ideas Behind Agile Planning: Adapting Better

In 2001, “Responding to Change over Following a Plan” seemed like a pretty aggressive step. (That is the last of the four Agile Manifesto lines.) Today, from a customer’s viewpoint, it is not enough. Customers want a better adaptation to change, and not just attitude or relatively obvious things like more or faster releases. They want […]

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Ideas Behind Agile Planning: Responding to Change

The line from the Agile Manifesto is: “Responding to Change over Following a Plan.” But let’s take this further in two main ways. 1) Change can be good. To me, in Waterfall, we always thought of change as bad. It was mainly bad because it forced us (eventually) to change the plan which was a lot of […]

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Ideas Behind Agile Planning: Get Everyone Involved

OK, it sounds good, get everyone involved. But what does it mean? And why do we suggest it? It means many things. Here are some: Everyone gets to contribute. Eleven heads are better than one. Get everyone on the same page at the same time. Visibility. Everyone can see it at the same time. We can […]

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Ideas Behind Agile Planning: Prioritize Our Stupidity

We could phrase this as “prioritize our learning,” but I find it fun and a good chuckle to be humble enough to admit we are stupid. Human beings, at least in regard to planning, are stupid in two ways: (1) incompletely informed, and (2) we just do stupid things. But I am referring particularly to the initial […]

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