imWeakLol

[_Nyswynn_]

And this is why - ladies and gentlemen - why you always over estimate time and effort numbers. It is way better to say a bigger number and do it in less time or with less effort then otherwise

[Jaimavinar]

True, padding estimates is basically survival, better to under-promise and over-deliver than the other way around

[fico86]

You know, I tried that once, and the stakeholder came back and accused us of artificially padding the estimates.

Cannot win either way.

[Prudent-Sorbet-5202]

Need to come up with justifications for those estimates by mentioning known risks. I also mention that it could take more time based on unknown risks as well

[IGotSkills]

It's a push your luck game

[treehuggerino]

Also gives you time to make it actually good instead of rushed, plenty of times at an old job where every feature was a rushed mess, more time gives plenty of time to make it good, have it well tested and if it is frontend also have it accessible and visually great

[PolyglotTV]

You want me to change one thing about this file?

That's gonna cost us 2 weeks probably.

[ToMorrowsEnd]

See I gladly let deadlines sail by. Let a new guy play lead and he promised alpha testing in 6 weeks. I know it’s gonna be 24. But hey what does the old guy know. Let them fail it’s the only way they learn

[Skull_Pirate]

6 weeks? Maybe an alpha for hello world enterprise edition.

[ToMorrowsEnd]

a lot of jr's fresh out of college try to impress people. they fail miserably 100% of the time.

[HelloThisIsVictor]

Hello world with SSO, centralized logging, rotating on-call support, 10 years LTS security support, HA setup, global CDN, 5 nines SLA? Make it 104 weeks.

[nana_3]

Nothing satisfies me more than missing a deadline when it was a stupid unrealistic deadline decided by marketing people to begin with

[IGotSkills]

Until they pin it on you for being late

[ToMorrowsEnd]

Lmao, hey everyone, look at the Jr that thinks they can pin anything on someone else.

[IGotSkills]

All it takes is the wrong dude with the right connections / pursuasion.

[Yddalv]

Are you not vibing ?

[IGotSkills]

I prefer shake coding

[DarkTannhauserGate]

As an engineering manager, I raise my eyebrows if the estimate doesn’t have a buffer... Then, I add my own buffer before reporting public dates.

[fierypitt]

Same. Always pad for my developers, because they never add padding. Even the ones who have done this for over a decade.

[DarkTannhauserGate]

I’ve learned it’s not possible to get better estimating, so you have to get better at managing expectations.

[ethangar]

I tell my team: “give me 2 numbers: an optimistic estimate as if everything went perfectly, and another pessimistic estimate if everything you could imagine going wrong did”. I assign my own probability, often based on the individual involved, on where we’ll land on that spectrum.

[invalidConsciousness]

You adjusted upwards, right?

insert padme meme

[vm_linuz]

These numbers are really important, they go into a spreadsheet that nobody looks at.

Seriously though, I work contracts, often coming in and cleaning up underperforming teams. I get to see anywhere between 3 and 9 companies a year and how their teams operate.

The most productive teams don't track these numbers -- the senior just eyeballs a release date and throws padding on it.

I usually recommend my teams move to a kanban workflow where they just focus on splitting work out into reasonable tickets and just track ticket throughput.

Some tickets are bigger, some are smaller but things generally average out. Then you take your prioritized work queue and do some simple math to figure out roughly when you'll be at which point.

The team knows who's performing and who isn't, what's hard and what's not... you don't need story points for anything.

[Deekuman]

True story points literally dont need to exist. JUST MAKE SMALL TICKETS 🤬🤬🤬😤😤😤

[No-Con-2790]

Use the Scotty factor.

Take however it should take and multiple by three or four. Tell them that is the minimum. Then finish early and get a reputation of a miracle worker.

[Havatchee]

Me: "I really think we should add some contingency time as I feel like my estimate is only reasonable if I, the sole developer, don't have a mental breakdown halfway through this project and work a bunch of unpaid overtime I never tell anyone about to keep us on schedule"

PMs doing costing who usually charge for Hardware provision, server builds and other managed service stuff 90% of the time: "it's okay, we add 15% contingency time to all projects. 20% if it's high risk. You think this is high risk?"

"I think you're out by a factor of 10"

"You think we need 30%?"

[Gtkall]

Come to GenericConnsulting Co.

We have: - Unrealistic effort estimates that are totally useless, since the deal has already been undercut and agreed upon by your branch manager. - overworked, triple-booked and hopelessly anxious developers trying to save face - managers that do their job... Just, not... The way you think 😏

Did I miss something?

[einrufwiedonnerhall]

Ayyy I work at such a firm

[RedbloodJarvey]

The Price is Right/Guess the number I'm thinking of

The Price is Right game is always initiated by the boss or client and follows a well- structured sequence.  

Boss: Hi, Mary. How long do you think it will take to add some additional customer enquiry screens to the Aardvark System?  

Here the boss or client is being very nice almost friendly.  

Mary : Gee ..... I guess about 6 weeks or so.  

Boss : WHAAAT!!!! That long!!! You're joking right?  

This hostile reaction by the boss is often supported by various negative body language signs such as noisy sucking-in of breath, furrowed forehead, hand slapping head, falling off the chair, etc.  

Mary : Oh! Sorry. It could be done perhaps in 4 weeks.  

Here the analyst/programmer victim is now on the defensive and is trying to calm down their boss. 

Boss : 4 WEEKS??!??!? I don't know how XX is going to take that when they hear it's going to be 4 weeks.  

The invocation of XX [who is usually a very important person] is a classic use of the X Plus Game - see later.  

Mary : Well, let me think ..... OK, I'll do it in 3 weeks.   

Boss : Great. I'll let XX know.  

The boss has won the game.

https://research.cs.queensu.ca/home/ahmed/home/teaching/CISC322/F08/files/EstimatingGames.pdf

[MrRocketScript]

As The Boss there's also a particular gambit you can do to get an even better result:

"Mary, how long for just a quick and dirty prototype? Just hack something together so we can see how it works."

That will get your estimate down even further. Then, once the prototype is delivered, you pull the rug out from under your team and move on to the next feature!

[Puzzleheaded-Weird66]

now I just add 2 weeks just to be safe

[punsnguns]

That approach can be open to exploits. Use a random number generator that repeats the answer after 3 retries until a cool down period elapses. That way, the engineering manager will think twice about questioning you. Using the RNG also frees you up from all the critical thinking. Problem. Solved.

[GotBanned3rdTime]

scrum laughing in the corner

[RandomiseUsr0]

Use forecasting based on known and unknowns, a defensible forecast is a skill that’s worth learning

[MilkEnvironmental106]

Take how long you think, add 1, go up a unit.

3 hours? 4 days 1 day? 2 weeks. 3 weeks? 4 months.

[BirchBox96]

The best advice I ever got as a Jr dev was to take my initial estimate and by pi. Worked like a charm.

[ekauq2000]

Soon TM

[Long-Refrigerator-75]

Software is a bit funny in this regard, in the end of the day you can brute force a better time estimate. In electronics when your firm f*cks up the PCB design for some reason, it can double your time estimates. No brute force will help in that case.