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Shouldn't that lead to a team discussion about why the estimates differ so drastically? In most circumstances, the reasons would be inaccurate assessment of sco

Shouldn't that lead to a team discussion about why the estimates differ so drastically? In most circumstances, the reasons would be inaccurate assessment of scope or complexity. Clearing up misconceptions like that can be a great boost for productivity. "Oh, you can do it like THAT?! I was not aware. I'll take a shot at implementing the feature using that approach."

LtWorf 4y ago
It did. I said I would not stop doing it until he'd stop. So we just continued this way.
steveBK123 4y ago
It inevitably does and then everyone slowly starts estimating everything at the middle point size in the agreed spectrum, with only 2-3 outliers
acdha 4y ago
Theoretically, yes, but if you’re spending half of your time on process overhead there isn’t much left to do that well and most of the time there’ll be enough differences from sprint to sprint that it’s plausible that this time was late for other reasons, until you have a sufficiently long data set to show that it’s a trend.
throwaway284243 4y ago
> "Oh, you can do it like THAT?! I was not aware. I'll take a shot at implementing the feature using that approach." Next performance review, your manager goes: It seems like you're not really aware of a lot of techniques of how to solve problems efficiently. Maybe you should do more pairing with the other seemingly much better developers to strengthen your skills. And now you've cornered yourself as a junior for the next 2 years, who was "hired on the wrong level". All of this is assuming that the team members will prioritise the performance of the team higher than their own performance, of which there are no incentives. The incentives is to make yourself look as good as possible (don't admit your idea is inferior), and skew the playing field to your advantage (insist on using the tools you know best) etc. People simply don't spontaneously cooperate and simply don't "just get along" in a situation like this. Even in hippie communities where everything is voluntary and there is no personal gain to be had, it still falls apart because some people just don't cooperate. So how do you expect that to happen in a situation with money involved, and competition between people? Why do the software industry and scrum think they have spontaneously discovered how people always just get along, inside a basic weekly planning schedule? That would literally be a nobel peace prize right there.

LtWorf 4y ago

It did. I said I would not stop doing it until he'd stop. So we just continued this way.

steveBK123 4y ago

It inevitably does and then everyone slowly starts estimating everything at the middle point size in the agreed spectrum, with only 2-3 outliers

acdha 4y ago

Theoretically, yes, but if you’re spending half of your time on process overhead there isn’t much left to do that well and most of the time there’ll be enough differences from sprint to sprint that it’s plausible that this time was late for other reasons, until you have a sufficiently long data set to show that it’s a trend.

throwaway284243 4y ago

> "Oh, you can do it like THAT?! I was not aware. I'll take a shot at implementing the feature using that approach." Next performance review, your manager goes: It seems like you're not really aware of a lot of techniques of how to solve problems efficiently. Maybe you should do more pairing with the other seemingly much better developers to strengthen your skills. And now you've cornered yourself as a junior for the next 2 years, who was "hired on the wrong level". All of this is assuming that the team members will prioritise the performance of the team higher than their own performance, of which there are no incentives. The incentives is to make yourself look as good as possible (don't admit your idea is inferior), and skew the playing field to your advantage (insist on using the tools you know best) etc. People simply don't spontaneously cooperate and simply don't "just get along" in a situation like this. Even in hippie communities where everything is voluntary and there is no personal gain to be had, it still falls apart because some people just don't cooperate. So how do you expect that to happen in a situation with money involved, and competition between people? Why do the software industry and scrum think they have spontaneously discovered how people always just get along, inside a basic weekly planning schedule? That would literally be a nobel peace prize right there.