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Karrie Day is a certified career coach and strategist with a passion for helping her clients define and reach their professional goals. She offers career advancement services such as brand development, resume writing and critiques, job search strategies,
The process of relative estimation is a key function within any agile methodology. Interviewers ask this question to determine how a candidate would drive this core team process that is continuously used in SAFe.

Karrie Day is a certified career coach and strategist with a passion for helping her clients define and reach their professional goals. She offers career advancement services such as brand development, resume writing and critiques, job search strategies,
Remember to include the discussions that occur before actual estimates are given. These are key to helping team members understand the scope and right-size their estimates. Additionally, be sure to mention your preferred approach to conflict resolution when team members disagree on estimates.

Karrie Day is a certified career coach and strategist with a passion for helping her clients define and reach their professional goals. She offers career advancement services such as brand development, resume writing and critiques, job search strategies,
"I would begin with a review of the scope of the user story. The team would discuss any assumptions regarding the basic definition of completion and any must-have user expectations or business rules that need to be considered.
From there, I would allow everyone on the team to offer their estimate. The estimates given are not specific to each role. They are estimates for the total size of the user story. Additionally, the estimates are not given in terms of hours or days. They are relative estimates that are made by comparing the size of the new story, to other upcoming stories, or to similar stories that have been completed in the past. The teams I work with use a Fibonacci scale of 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 13. Anything above a 13 typically needs to be decomposed into smaller jobs.
After everyone provides their number, we discuss any sizing disagreements. The parties who disagree offer the logic behind their estimate and the team determines how to proceed. If there is a deadlock, we defer to the individual who is most likely to do the work for the story and go with their estimate."

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Written by Karrie Day
30 Questions & Answers • SAFe Agilist

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