1. Or, the Sources of Variation Game
NoEstimates Game
Or, the Sources of Variation Game
For more info, please contact Matt Philip

2. Big Picture Goal: Deliver the most value!
Each card delivered is a point
Play in “day” rounds
Teams play independently but have interdependency with other teams

3. Setup
Divide into teams of 3-7 people – they do not all have to be same size
Decide as a whole group:
Each player’s role: A, B, C or D. (Wear a “role” tag.)
Size/composition of teams (you can use matrixed workers)
Work notes:
Only 66% of the cards have A work
D work is approximately 75% of B or C

4. Workflow Capacity: 4 points per team member/day
Team members use full effort points in their primary role, half in any other
Cards progress by finishing work in A-B-C-D sequence, though C-D can be done concurrently. A B

5. Team Dependency Some cards have a team dependency.
When you draw a card that has one, also draw a team card to see which team it is dependent upon.
To complete the card, someone from that team must spend time helping you.
Time spent helping another team counts against your capacity.
Team
Dependency
A ❍❍❍❍
B ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
C ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
D ❍❍❍
Team____________ ❍❍❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
Blue

6. Matrixed Workers
For any worker who supports multiple teams, teams need to sort out who gets the effort.
If a person works for multiple teams in one day, he or she deducts 1 capacity point for each additional team.
E.g., role A works on Blue team and Red team in one day (regular capacity of 4 is now 3):
A ❍❍❍❍
B ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
C ❍❍❍
D ❍❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
A ❍❍❍❍
B ❍❍❍❍❍❍
C ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
D ❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
Blue Team
Red Team

7. Blockers
A ❍❍❍❍
B ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
C ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
D ❍❍❍
Team____________ ❍❍❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
For each card in progress, roll the die at the end of the day.
If you roll 1, the card is blocked.
Place a blocker sticky on the card.
At the beginning of the next day, roll the die for each blocked card.
1, 2 or 3 = still blocked (no work can be done on it that day)
4, 5 or 6 = unblocked (remove the sticky, continue work)

8. Rework For each delivered card, roll the die at the end of the day.
B ❍❍
C ❍❍
D ❍❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
For each delivered card, roll the die at the end of the day.
If you roll 1, the card requires rework.
Move the card back to queue D.
In subsequent days, redo the work in queue D.
(Roll for rework only once per delivered card.)

9. Urgent Cards Deliver as soon as possible
Your team loses a point for every day it takes to deliver
A ❍❍❍❍
B ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
C ❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍❍
D ❍❍❍
Team____________ ❍❍❍❍
Estimate
Start Day
Deliver Day
Delivery Time
Urgent

10. Daily Actions
Start: Have a flow-planning meeting to plan day’s strategy
Decide how to use your total effort points
Pull in as many cards as you want and record the day for commit date
Roll to resolve any blocked cards (4, 5 or 6 = unblocked)
Middle:
Tick off work on the cards and move them accordingly
End:
For each delivered card:
Roll die to determine if it needs rework (1 = rework)
Record the day delivered
For each card in progress
Roll die to determine if it’s blocked (1 = blocked)
Cross off the day on the day tracker

11. For your team… What do you estimate your velocity to be?
What do the points translate to in days? For example:
Points-Estimate Range
Days
6-10 points
1 day
11-16
2 days
17-24
4 days
25-39
7 days

12. On your mark, get set, go!

13. Debrief
When we estimate, what is the underlying assumption about its relationship to delivery time?
What sources of variation did you experience?
What was the correlation of delivery times and estimates?
What was the best strategy?
How do we reduce variation?

14. Probabilistic Forecasting
What if you had tried to forecast using estimates?
Do we have better ways of forecasting?

15. Blocker Clustering Keep track of your blockers
For each day that it is blocked, dot the card
At the end of the game, count the blockers:
Number/rate of occurrence
Total number of days blocked
Reason for block

16. Context Switching
If a team concurrently works on more cards than it has team members, it incurs a penalty for each card beyond the team size.
For example:
Cards in progress: 6
Team size: 4 people
Penalty: 2 points (16-2=14 new capacity)