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When Will It Be Done?: Lean-Agile Forecasting to Answer Your Customers' Most Important Question
The definitive guide on Lean-Agile forecasting that gives you all the tools you need in order to answer your customers' most important question.
If you have ever been asked “When Will It Be Done?” (WWIBD) then you have been asked to make a forecast. My guess is that when you were asked that question, you struggled mightily to answer it. You struggled because there are so many possible things that could go wrong (and go right) when trying to forecast the completion date an item. I am even going to guess that whatever prediction you made ended up being wrong. The fact that you were wrong was not because you were incompetent or because you did not try hard enough. You were wrong because we think about forecasts incorrectly. This book clear up that confusion and will give you all the tools you need in order to make accurate forecasts. Your customers demand predictability from you and you demand predictability from your teams. Isn’t it time you started to deliver on your promises?
If you have ever been asked “When Will It Be Done?” (WWIBD) then you have been asked to make a forecast. My guess is that when you were asked that question, you struggled mightily to answer it. You struggled because there are so many possible things that could go wrong (and go right) when trying to forecast the completion date an item. I am even going to guess that whatever prediction you made ended up being wrong. The fact that you were wrong was not because you were incompetent or because you did not try hard enough. You were wrong because we think about forecasts incorrectly. This book clear up that confusion and will give you all the tools you need in order to make accurate forecasts. Your customers demand predictability from you and you demand predictability from your teams. Isn’t it time you started to deliver on your promises?
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Published June 13, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
April 7, 2020
How can you create a forecast of the release date of your project without guessing? This book offers an interesting approach using the data available in your project, Scatterplots and Monte-Carlo simulations to steer you away from estimates to a more scientific approach. I have yet to try those ideas with my data, but it addresses many of my concerns I have with other approaches.
The main point of a forecast is that we have to update it as the project goes along. Like in the example of the path of a Hurricane and the updates of the forecasted path that happens every 8 hours by the Hurricane Center. Only when we are able to update our forecasts do they stay relevant. Otherwise they are useless and only prevent us from doing the work to finish the project.
The author wrote another book on this topic (Actionable Agile Metrics for Predictability) where he explained all the theory behind his claims. For me, that book was too often referenced and after the 5x time it was just disappointed that he did not add an excerpt of the main points as an appendix to this book. In addition to this downside, the images did not work on the Kindle, which is bad for a book that relies so much on graphics. Therefore, only 4 stars.
The main point of a forecast is that we have to update it as the project goes along. Like in the example of the path of a Hurricane and the updates of the forecasted path that happens every 8 hours by the Hurricane Center. Only when we are able to update our forecasts do they stay relevant. Otherwise they are useless and only prevent us from doing the work to finish the project.
The author wrote another book on this topic (Actionable Agile Metrics for Predictability) where he explained all the theory behind his claims. For me, that book was too often referenced and after the 5x time it was just disappointed that he did not add an excerpt of the main points as an appendix to this book. In addition to this downside, the images did not work on the Kindle, which is bad for a book that relies so much on graphics. Therefore, only 4 stars.
March 19, 2019
This book has a lot of repeat content as the last book from the same author. However I'm still rating this very highly. The methods described here have completely changed the way we forecast delivery times for our team. If your team needs to answer questions about delivery times this comes highly recommended.
The big revelation about these methods is that focussing on predictability has a ripple effect through your ways of working. It has for example complete changed the way we do standups. Instead of doing a round of justifying what we are working on, we are actively engaged in getting stuff through our system.
The big revelation about these methods is that focussing on predictability has a ripple effect through your ways of working. It has for example complete changed the way we do standups. Instead of doing a round of justifying what we are working on, we are actively engaged in getting stuff through our system.
March 7, 2021
Just like the first book from Daniel Vacanti this one is also a must read for everyone working with agile practices: managers, agile coaches, scrum maters, developers, POs ... I would recommend this book to everyone.
July 8, 2025
This book is a worthy sequel to Daniel's first book "Actionable Agile Metrics for Predictability" (AAMfP).
Where AAMfP introduces the concepts this book is about forecasting when work will be done. It helps to have read AAMfP but Daniel introduces the concepts and tools that are needed in this book as well.
First it explains how to forecast single items of work. Then it goes on to discuss forecasting multiple items of work before it combines the two and offers concrete examples of where to use the techniques in your agile environment.
Three case studies towards the end of the book add real-world experience and examples to the topics of this book.
Highly recommended for anyone working in an agile team and wanting to improve their forecasts.
Where AAMfP introduces the concepts this book is about forecasting when work will be done. It helps to have read AAMfP but Daniel introduces the concepts and tools that are needed in this book as well.
First it explains how to forecast single items of work. Then it goes on to discuss forecasting multiple items of work before it combines the two and offers concrete examples of where to use the techniques in your agile environment.
Three case studies towards the end of the book add real-world experience and examples to the topics of this book.
Highly recommended for anyone working in an agile team and wanting to improve their forecasts.
March 29, 2025
A must-read book for any Agile practitioner, and it’s easily done in two or three days. Never again will I estimate, and neither will I produce forecasts based on averages. (Instead, I will use cycle-time histograms and Monte Carlo methods.)
For a LeanPub book however, it does not live up to agile principles of continuously improving or being customer-friendly. The graphics are hard to read (albeit colored) on the ebook and all but impossible to decipher in b/w print. There are many typos and obviously wrong illustrations. An update is due.
For a LeanPub book however, it does not live up to agile principles of continuously improving or being customer-friendly. The graphics are hard to read (albeit colored) on the ebook and all but impossible to decipher in b/w print. There are many typos and obviously wrong illustrations. An update is due.
May 13, 2019
Of all the methods for managing software projects I have studied, this is the only one whose focus is on making the development process predictable. At the end of the day that is what is needed and everything else is just chaff that needs to blow away.
Highly recommended.
Highly recommended.
March 24, 2021
This is the second book by Daniel Vacanti. As the author clearly states few of the chapters are a repeat from the first book which can be skipped. This book gets bit into detail about forecasting. It provides some basic information to help answer the question, “When will it be done”. I would recommend to read the first book and then read this one.
February 5, 2020
This is an excellent book, typos notwithstanding. (I don't think that epithet means what the author thinks it means.) What I really liked is that this book provides a lot of good advice that can be applied right away. In addition, I really liked that the author presented the concepts, and then explained why the concepts were important. This kind of meta-level explanation of what is really important and why is invaluable. The author presents a very convincing case to abandon Scrum in favor of Kanban. There are many challenging notions, such as estimation is a waste of time; don't do it. But the case is very convincingly made. The author shows how to make accurate forecasts based on historical data (even small amounts of recent data), and how to improve processes to optimize flow. This book has changed how I will manage projects going forward.
April 23, 2020
This is THE book that's going to give you all the clues to properly implement the Manage Flow principle of the Kanban Method. And even without any knowledge of Kanban, it will teach you simple forecasting techniques that can turn your guesstimates into predictions based on actual data. More interestingly, as a side effect, applying these techniques will significantly improve the predictability and efficiency of your process.
September 24, 2020
This was extremely good. I've read a few books on software estimation but this is the only book where I finished reading and was excited to try out the methods mentioned. I originally purchased the Kindle edition but after finishing I ordered the paperback as it's something I want to have in my library to be able to refer to quickly as a reference. The methods presented made sense and the author backed them up with data and relevant case studies.
December 23, 2024
Despite big self-published energy (typos, bad typesetting, hard to read images) this is pretty good. Very readable and personable despite the formatting messiness. Important thing about books like this is whether you walk away from them wanting to try out some new stuff and that definitely happened here - I don't know how applicable this stuff will end up being to my work but I'm excited to give some of it a shot in the new year.
March 12, 2021
Ok call me biased, I'm a fan of Dan Vacanti talks, I'm fully convinced flow is the way to go. Still I found more than expected there, plenty of rationale and actionable things to do with how we forecast work and put things under control. Definitively a great read. (there are a few typos/copywriting errors in the text)
April 30, 2020
Very good and in deep analysis about agile metrics.
May 17, 2020
Very simple to understand and apply, I'm just wondering what is stopping us from doing it already...
March 28, 2022
4.5 stars
Brilliant book. Learnt so much. Wish I had my own copy. It's the kind of book that's good to keep for reference.
Brilliant book. Learnt so much. Wish I had my own copy. It's the kind of book that's good to keep for reference.
February 9, 2023
I have read it right after Actionable "Agile Metrics for Predictability: An Introduction". The book explains some concepts more thoroughly like how the Monte Carlo simulation works. The book is practical. It has changed how we do things in my team.
May 4, 2025
Very practical and to the point
This was an amazing book full of insights and practical tips that could be incorporated immediately to the teams and workflows
This was an amazing book full of insights and practical tips that could be incorporated immediately to the teams and workflows
February 5, 2020
Once I finished this book, I had to present the key concepts to our team straight away. It totally changed how we look at our kanban board, not only focusing on flow but also building in predictability in our process. It's also a very engaging read.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews