An estimate is a guess about how long the work will take - made without actually doing the work.
The estimate needs to provide us some value, so it can’t just come out of thin air. But it also doesn’t need to be exactly right and take weeks and weeks to determine. There is a balance.
We want that guess to be cheap (spending as little time as possible to make it), so we can get on with the actual work. And because of that estimates are intentionally imprecise.
The less precise we’re able to be, the faster we can make the estimate.
We can use broad ranges (for example, 3–7 days) when uncertainty is high, and then tighten the range as we learn more. With a goal to get the smallest range that gives us value.
Don’t waste time chasing false precision.
Discussions for your team
- How precise do our estimates need to be?
- Does it make more sense for us to use ranges (3–7 days) or single numbers?
- How much time should we spend estimating before we start work?
- When and how do we update estimates as we learn more?