Workshop on Agile Requirements, Estimation & Planning July 24, 2011

Overview:
The way project’s requirements are documented has impact on the success of the project and its cost. Agile requirements are captured in the form of User stories which are simple, clear, brief descriptions of functionality from the perspective of a user. Defining requirements as user stories is one of the most broadly applicable techniques used in agile processes.
For decades, delivering on time has been a great challenge in software development. Everyone knows how important Estimation is, in traditional software development. In agile software development one of the most important things for all, is how agile teams can quickly get good at delivering on time. This poses lot of challenges in estimating the requirements to know how much time they take to deliver for release. There is not enough clarity on how to estimate the time taken for a release, and iteration. How to estimate tasks for iteration is another added challenge.
This course aims at answering the above questions on capturing requirements using user stories, Estimation in Agile Projects and Planning Agile projects.

Workshop Description:
The course has been designed to provide comprehensive knowledge practical skills for anyone interested in understanding user stories, estimation techniques for agile projects.
Special emphasis is laid to enhance the understanding among the participants in the form of simple simulation exercises for Release planning, iteration planning.
What You Will Learn
This course will include the following topics:
• Learn how to create user stories for agile requirements.
• Write and evaluate user stories
• Guidelines for writing user stories.
• The importance of estimating size and deriving duration
• The differences between story points and ideal time
• The advantages of an relative measure of size
• Different Techniques for estimating
• When to re-estimate
• How to perform release planning and iteration planning
• How to track releases and iterations
Pre-requisite: Knowledge of Scrum is preferred.
Target Audience:
• Developers/Sr developers
• Designers and Senior Designers
• Technical Leads, QA Leads and QA Engineers.
• Scrum Masters, Product Owners
• Project and serious project managers
• Process Excellence.
• Pre Sales Personnel
COURSE OBJECTIVES:
The course helps participants to understand
• Learn how to create user stories for agile requirements.
• Write and evaluate user stories
• Learn how to conduct story writing workshops
• Write acceptance tests for user stories
• Understand certain guidelines while writing user stories
• Learn to prioritize and estimate user stories for iterations and releases
• Gain deeper understanding on the difference between Traditional and Agile Planning
• Agile estimation techniques
• Agile release planning and Iteration Planning
• Gain the required theoretical and practical knowledge on using an agile approach to planning and estimation
Takeaways from Workshop :
• Writing Agile Requirements using user stories
• The Agile Estimation techniques
• Release Planning and Iteration Planning.
• Templates used for Release Burn Down, Iteration Burn Down
Delivery Method:
The course is a mix of instructor lead, and designed to enable participants learn, experiment and implement the techniques of Estimation through simulation exercises.
Course Content:

Module 1: User Stories in Agile
1) User stories
• What is User Story?
• Where are the details of users’ story?
• Card, Conversation and Confirmation
• Some examples of Users story.
• Why User Stories?
• Developer and Customer Responsibilities.
2) Writing Good User Stories
• Independent
• Negotiable
• Valuable
• Estimatable
• Small
• Testable
Exercise: defining user stories
3) Story Writing Workshops
4) Guidelines for Writing User Stories
5) Acceptance Testing user stories
Quiz: User stories



Module 2: Agile Estimation
1) An Agile Approach
• An agile approach to projects
• An agile approach to planning
• Traditional Estimation V/s Agile Estimation
2) Techniques for Estimating
• Estimating by analogy
• Disaggregation
• Planning Poker
• When to use planning poker
• When to re-estimate
3) Measuring and Monitoring Velocity
• What is Velocity?
• Estimating Velocity
4) Estimating Size with Story Points
5) Estimating in ideal days
6) Choosing between story points and Ideal days
Quiz: Agile Estimation



Module 3: Agile Planning and Tracking
1) Release Planning
• Estimating the size of product back log
• Fixed Date projects
• Fixed scope projects
• Creating Release Backlog
2) Iteration Planning(Sprint Planning)
• Velocity-driven planning
• Commitment-driven planning
• Creating Iteration Backlog
3) Tracking in Agile
• Updating release burn down
• Updating sprint burn down
Quiz: Agile Planning and Tracking
Exercise (1.0 Hour)
• Estimation , Planning and Execution

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