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Scrum: How to estimate new/unknown areas?


Basic rule - “Never assume anything”.

Estimating something new is very difficult for all the teams. You can provide an estimate only if you have basic knowledge of the area.


Following are few guidelines

New Domain – New Product Owner

Ideally the Product Owners should have the required domain knowledge.


  • If you are planning to get a new PO for the project, ask him (or her) to work with the existing PO. Even after the transition the old PO (if possible) should be available to help.
  • Bring domain experts from other projects/department/companies for workshops/discussion/training.
  • Ask the new team members to start executing the regression test cases to understand the business domain.
  • Subscribe to articles, magazines related to the domain.



New Technology


  • Do time boxed spikes but organize frequent feedback/brain storming sessions to discuss the new knowledge.
  • Do a POC 
  • Bring the experts for short talks/training if required.




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Comments

kush said…
very useful...and nice one...:)
June 29, 2012 at 2:00 AM
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