• Sizing board (a whiteboard or flip-chart or the like; divided into 5 columns: XS, S, M, L, XL)
• Timer
• A set of prepared stories
• A set of 5 X 3 cards
• Tape for attaching the cards to the board

Recipe:

Have the team stand-up in a half circle facing their sizing board.

Shuffle a deck of story cards and place them face down on a table in front of the sizing board. Place a timer next to the cards.

The game begins when the facilitator starts the timer, which is the signal for the first member to perform the following steps:

• pick the top card off the deck
• attach a piece of tape to the card
• read the story on the card out loud
• assigns the card to one of the five columns on the board (XS, S, M, L. XL)
• provide a reason to the group
• start the timer for the next player

It is important assigning the card to one of the five columns has to be the player’s own decision, without any external interference. This is why the player should provide the reason for his or her decision after the card has been assigned. If the player does not assign the card within one minute, the card will be assigned to the column in the middle. The player then restarts the timer for the next player.

After sizing the card, the player presents his or her reason. The reason may be based on expert knowledge, from past experiences, or observations from other projects. It is essential that the rest of the team observes and listens carefully to understand the overall context and development of the board. All other team members are therefore silent without discussions or judgment.

After a few rounds, there should be enough cards on the board to give the team members the option to, on their turn, move an existing card on the board into a different column instead of picking a new card from the deck. As before, the player reads the story out loud followed by a reason which supports the decision to re-size.
Once all user story cards are on the board and sized, each team member, on their turn, can either continue moving cards between columns or simply “pass” if they are satisfied with the current results. If a player does not make a decision within the one-minute time-limit, it will be interpreted as a “pass”.

The game ends when the pile of story cards is gone and every member of the team signals “pass”.

Challenges:
The biggest challenge in the beginning is the lack of a reference story – the Chihuahua (see Doggy Planning). Because no card has been assigned yet, the first player will not have something to compare his or her story to. And since the cards will be shuffled, we won’t know if the first stories are really small, medium, or large until we uncover more stories. This is OK and and important lesson of the game. Every player will have the opportunity to change their mind in future rounds, so the important thing is to just get started. Remember, the game does not stop until all players signal “pass”.

It is quite typical that two or more players disagree about a few assignments, and the card may end up endlessly moving up and down the board. If this happens, just take the card and place it on the bottom of the deck. That way, the sizing can continue and the card should have more context after all the other cards have been sized.

Learning Points:

• Group user stories according to their relative size/effort
• Reach a democratic consensus quickly
• Ensure that each team member has a say
• Learn how user stories are captured
• Actively collaborate in a fun way

Variations

• Play with 3 (S,M.L) columns instead of 5 (XS, S, M, L. XL)
• Begin with 3 columns until the team requests more granularity, then the moderator adds additional columns
• Assign the Fibonacci sequence to the columns (1,2,3,5,8)

CREDIT: Jochen Krebs

This post was submitted by Don McGreal.

Ingredients:

• Whiteboards and/or flip-charts
• Markers

Directions:

Divide the participants in to groups and ask them to graphically represent their current development process. Have them think about roles, artifacts produced, and challenges. Invite them to be creative and to not worry about using any formal notation (UML, Gantt Charts, RUP, etc.). Ask them not to use people’s names, or to criticize personalities.

Each team will then then present their creation to the whole group.

Learning Points:

• This is an interesting and fun way for a facilitator to gain visibility in to what is working and what the challenges are in an organization’s current process.

• This exercise also creates more transparency within a team, by giving people a chance to see how others characterize the process.

Posted by Mike

Ingredients:

• 1 set of planning poker cards per participant.
• http://www.crisp.se/planningpoker/

Directions:

Participants in an estimation meeting are each given a set of cards. Each card contains an estimate. Units used vary, they can be days, ideal days, story points, etc. The cards are numbered to account for the fact that the longer an estimate is, the more uncertainty it contains (e.g 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 20, 40). When an item (feature, task, etc.) is presented, without mentioning numbers, a discussion takes place to clarify assumptions and risks.
Each participant then lays a card face down representing their estimate. Simultaneously, the cards are turned over. If all estimates are relatively close, then there is no more discussion needed, the estimate is recorded and the group moves on to the next item. If some participants had high or low estimates, then they are given a chance to justify their estimate as they may have been thinking of something others were not aware of. Repeat the estimation process until a consensus is reached.

Learning Points:

• The wisdom of crowds is more accurate than individual estimates.
• Using the cards avoids the influence of others while estimating.
• It encourages all team members to participate
• Discourages the talkative members from dominating (too soon anyway).

CREDIT: James Grenning

Posted by Mike

Ingredients:

• Stop Watch

Directions:

Have participants pair up and sit side by side so they’re both facing the same direction. Decide who will be partner A and who will be partner B.

Tell them to write a letter together, one word at a time. Partner A starts with the word “Dear.” Partner B follows with the name of the recipient.” Continue until they have completed writing the letter to the recipient. If they finish the first letter before you call time, have them start another one and continue until notified to stop.

Learning Points:

• Agile development embraces uncertainty and the unknown. The emotional experience of not knowing what is next is intended to quickly emulate the feeling and to setup a discussion about it.

CREDIT: Agile Educator’s Toolkit (v1.7), Kert D. Peterson, Enterprise Agile Group, LLC

Posted by Mike

Ingredients:

• Map with driving directions from Dallas, Texas to Anchorage, Alaska (4000 miles)

Directions:

Each team needs to get to Anchorage to surprise their true love, who is working there. They must create a plan: timeline, what to bring, budget, etc.
Have each team present their plan. Look for over planning (hotel reservations for each night, where to eat, etc.) and under planning (no passport, no miles per day goal, etc.). Ask the teams what they would do if they found out half-way through the trip that their true love has just been transferred 2000 miles away in another direction.

Learning Points:

• The ROI on detailed planning isn’t always there. It is near impossible to predict and to plan for every stop, every meal, every incident encountered on a road trip. But we can prepare for one day at a time, and inspect and adapt as we go.
• Correlate the change in plans with software development and how when the customers needs change, we must be able to adapt. This is in contrast to continuing on with the initial plan which may no longer be of any use to the customer (shelved software).

Posted by Mike

Ingredients:

• 2 equal sets of wooden train track with some complexities (bridges, tunnels, etc)
• Create a set of requirements and put a score on each (Different degrees of complexity and value are important)
• Test the event yourself to get a sense of time

Directions:

• Split into at least two groups
• Split the groups into the “big release” and “iterative” groups
• Tell them that their customer is a parent who want to “buy” a product to keep their child entertained
• Explain that you are willing to pay higher amounts for more requirements being met, for example:
  • A train track with no dead ends is worth $25
  • Bridges that go over track (instead of nothing) are worth $10 each
  • Track that isn’t tense and has some wiggle in it is worth $5 (keeps it from being forced and broken)
  • If every piece can be reached without lifting the train, that is $25
  • If every piece can be reached and crossed in both directions without lifting the train, that is $25
• Tell the “big release” group that they will go until they decide to ship their product
• Tell the iterative group that they should strive to ship a product at the end of every minute (you tell them when they have 10 sec to go)
• Go!
• Every minute, take a snapshot and determine how much money the iterative group would make if they shipped their product at that moment
• When the “big release” group meets all the requirements or calls it quits, stop the game.
  • In theory the iterative group will have banked money over each iteration and made multiple times the amount of money the big bang group would have made. Talk about how long it will take the iterative group before they have to match the other group’s requirements. Talk about how this would play out in real life if each minute was equal to a week of work.

Learning Points:

• Understand how sprints affect delivery
• Delivering business value sooner is more profitable
  • Have a shippable product each sprint to do so
• You can retain customers by giving them something simpler and working to the “real” goal over time
  • would the customer have waited for the “big bang” group to deliver the full product or appeased the crying child with the iterative groups earlier solution (remember… minutes equaled weeks of dev. time)

CREDIT: Kevin Schlabach

Posted by Mike

Ingredients:

• Many coins of varying denominations

Directions:

A customer wants to hire the subcontracting vendor who provides the quickest estimate to sorting a bag of coins. Have teams of participants bid on the project by shouting out bids (in seconds). Let all the teams attempt the exercise and hold them to their bids by timing them. After they have finished, point out that what the customer actually wanted, was to have the coins sorted by date, not denomination.

Learning Points:

• Timelines are often set without due diligence.
• Assumptions are often made without involving the customer. These assumptions may hold true all the way to production.
• If a team had first sorted a sample of coins and demonstrated for feedback, the problem would have been caught before it became too costly.

Posted by Mike