The #NoEstimates movement has been a hot topic on Twitter for several years. So, to investigate that and a few more topcics we interviewed Dimitar, who has published some work on forecasting as a way to remove expert-opinion based estimates and has a long experience with Kanban.
Dimitar runs his own company and shares with us how he is able to make bids for projects without the slow and painful process of asking experts for their opinion on the duration of speculative projects, after all, even if his teams were to estimate their projects, they might not win the bid.
Dimitar suggests, among other things that we should be looking at flow efficiency instead of putting more effort into improving estimates.
Estimation vs Forecasting, the critical difference
In order to dispel the usual conflation of estimation and forecasting, Dimitar explains his view of each of those activities, as well as what the differences mean for us in practice. We discuss the Reference Class Forecasting technique as well as some of the mental biases that cloud our ability to reliably estimate the work we have ahead. For more information on the mental biases we face in the use of estimates, we discuss the findings described in Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow by Daniel Kahneman.
The roots and philosophical inspiration sources for #NoEstimates
Dimitar finalize this BONUS episode by exploring some of the sources of inspiration for the work that has been done on #NoEstimates. Among many sources of inspiration we talk about Antifragile: things that gain from disorder, by Nassim Taleb; several books by Eliyahu Goldratt; and many others.
Learn how #NoEstimates came about what what led to it’s discovery and establishment in the software development industry. If you want to know more about how to apply #NoEstimates in practice you can also read the #NoEstimates book.
About Dimitar Bakardzhiev
Dimitar is an expert in managing successful and cost-effective technology development. With his blend of technical, managerial and operational expertise, he effectively combines the theory and practice of Agile and Kanban Method to deliver business results.
As a Lean-Kanban University (LKU)-Accredited Kanban Trainer (AKT) and avid, expert Kanban practitioner and Brickell Key Award 2015 Finalist, Dimitar puts lean principles to work every day when managing complex software projects. Dimitar has been one of the leading proponents and evangelists of Kanban and has published David Anderson’s Kanban book as well as books on Lean, Theory of Constraints by Goldratt and Deming’s Theory of Management in the Bulgarian language.
You can link with Dimitar Bakardzhiev on LinkedIn and connect with Dimitar Bakardzhiev on Twitter.
You asked what influences led to #NoEstimates. For me it was noticing that my estimates were almost always wrong, even when I felt confident they were right.
Then I started seeing all the dysfunction we had around estimates, and realized it was time to stop.