From Burnout Charts to Measurable Success

The only proof of progress is in the working software, not any burnout chart. Measuring effort becomes even more complicated when dealing with bugs. Using activity metrics to assess progress creates the wrong incentives for prioritization. While activity metrics can help check team collaboration, they cannot reflect progress.

If the team cannot provide the expected functionality, it could be due to a dependency or rule they lack. In such cases, it should be removed from the backlog or sprint, as those stories won’t impact the business. A cross-functional team comprises members with expertise across various technical domains.

Valuable initiatives produce an observable change in someone’s way of working. Often, the short description of a story leaves a lot of ambiguity about the scope of the change. Design experiments around those assumptions and turn them into user stories.

If a story does not fit into the expected pattern, raise the alarm early and consider rewriting it. Throw out or replace fake and misleading accounts. Even planning to check the outcome after delivering a story makes teams write better user stories. It has the same effect as test-driven development does on code. It provides focus and clarity and leads to better solutions. Their behavior change determines the completion of a user story. Quantifying the desired changes and ensuring they are observable and measurable is essential. When identifying a change, ask yourself, “How much?” to provide its significance.