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Issue Estimates

Estimates help teams plan and track work by providing a way to quantify the effort, complexity, and confidence level for issues.

Overview

Estimates allow team members to provide their assessment of an issue across three dimensions: Effort, Complexity, and Confidence. Each team member can provide their own estimate for any issue, enabling collaborative planning and consensus-building.

Key Points:

  • Each user can provide one estimate per issue
  • Estimates are append-only - new estimates create new records
  • All three fields (Effort, Complexity, Confidence) are optional
  • Estimates are used for version planning and statistics
  • SUPPORT_REQUEST issues are excluded from version effort calculations
Effort

Effort represents the amount of work required to complete an issue. This is typically measured in story points, hours, or other units that make sense for your team.

Range:

1 to 100 (integer values)

Common Values:

1248or custom values

Power-of-2 values (1, 2, 4, 8) are commonly used in agile estimation, but you can use any numeric value that fits your team's needs.

Usage:

  • Use for sprint planning and capacity estimation
  • Helps identify issues that might need to be broken down
  • Used in version statistics to calculate total effort
  • Can be aggregated across issues to estimate project timelines

Note: SUPPORT_REQUEST issues are excluded from version effort calculations. Their effort values are not included when computing total effort for a version.

Complexity

Complexity measures how technically challenging an issue is, independent of the effort required. A simple task might take a long time (high effort) but be straightforward (low complexity).

Scale: 1 to 5

1 - Simple

Straightforward task with clear requirements

2 - Easy

Minor complexity, well-understood approach

3 - Moderate

Some complexity, may require research or design decisions

4 - Complex

Significant complexity, multiple moving parts or unknowns

5 - Very Complex

Highly complex, many unknowns or architectural implications

Usage:

  • Helps identify issues that might need additional review or expertise
  • Useful for assigning work to team members with appropriate skill levels
  • Can indicate when an issue should be broken down or researched further
  • Tracked separately from effort to provide more nuanced planning data
Confidence

Confidence indicates how certain you are about your estimate. Low confidence might indicate that more research or clarification is needed before starting work.

Scale: 1 to 5

1 - Low Confidence

Many unknowns, estimate is a rough guess

2 - Some Confidence

Some uncertainty, may need clarification

3 - Moderate Confidence

Reasonable certainty, minor unknowns possible

4 - High Confidence

Good understanding, estimate is reliable

5 - Very High Confidence

Very clear requirements, estimate is highly reliable

Usage:

  • Helps identify issues that need more research or clarification
  • Low confidence estimates may indicate a need for spikes or discovery work
  • Can be used to prioritize which issues to refine first
  • Useful for risk assessment and planning buffers
Best Practices

When to Estimate

  • Estimate issues during sprint planning or backlog refinement
  • Re-estimate if requirements change significantly
  • Consider estimating before starting work (IN_PROGRESS status)
  • Update estimates if you discover the work is different than expected

Estimation Techniques

  • Planning Poker: Team members vote independently, then discuss differences
  • Relative Sizing: Compare to previously completed issues
  • T-Shirt Sizing: Use categories (XS, S, M, L, XL) mapped to effort values
  • Three-Point Estimation: Provide optimistic, pessimistic, and most likely estimates

Interpreting Estimates

  • High effort, low complexity: Straightforward but time-consuming work
  • Low effort, high complexity: Quick but tricky work that might need expertise
  • Low confidence: Consider creating a SPIKE issue to research first
  • Wide variance: Team members see the issue differently - discuss to align understanding

Version Planning

  • Use effort estimates to calculate total work for a version
  • Consider complexity when assigning work to team members
  • Account for low confidence estimates with planning buffers
  • Remember that SUPPORT_REQUEST issues don't count toward version effort
Estimate Statistics

The system aggregates estimates to provide useful statistics for planning and tracking:

Per Issue Statistics

  • Median: Middle value across all team member estimates (robust against outliers)
  • Spread: Measure of variability (deviation from median). Configurable method:
    • • MAD (default): Median Absolute Deviation - robust measure of spread
    • • StdDev: Standard Deviation - traditional statistical measure
    • • IQR: Interquartile Range - difference between 75th and 25th percentile
    • • Range: Difference between maximum and minimum values
  • Format: Estimates are displayed as Median ± Spread (e.g., 5 ± 2)
  • Outlier Detection: Estimates that deviate significantly from the mean are flagged (based on standard deviation)

Version Statistics

  • Total Effort: Sum of effort estimates for all issues in the version
  • Effort by Status: Breakdown of effort by issue status (todo, in progress, done)
  • Complexity Distribution: Count and effort distribution by complexity level
  • Confidence Distribution: Count and effort distribution by confidence level

Version statistics use the latest estimate per issue to avoid double-counting when multiple team members have provided estimates.