How to determine the number of story points or velocity for the first sprint?

1. INITIAL SPRINT
VELOCITY PROBLEM
Dejan Radic
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2. Introduction
• Story points in Scrum
• Velocity – mean value of story points per sprint
• Relative measure
• How to determine the number of story points or velocity
for the first sprint?
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3. Using past data
• Using velocity measurements from previous sprints
• Possible if team is well established
• What about new teams? Which work possibly on:
• new project (with different complexity)
• using new technology (learning curve)
• using Scrum for the first time
• Using data from other teams doesn’t make sense
• Misleading claims like: “50 story points per team member
per sprint”
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4. Convince management to wait
• Estimates won’t be known upfront
• Realistic data would give better results in the long run
• It takes more than one sprint to get adequate velocity
• Management doesn’t like it
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5. Guesstimate
• Give management a guessed number
• “Planning is a team activity!”, they say 
• Give too high number => burn out
• Give too low number => management not satisfied (but
causes overall team sense of accomplishment)
• “Add more people to increase velocity!” (not in collision
with Brook’s Law)
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6. Risk mitigation
• Following steps lead to better guesstimates*:
• Estimate product backlog using story points
• Choose a 2 points reference story (more for better approx.)
• Break it down into tasks
• Time-estimate tasks using Planning poker (hours instead of points)
• Calculate “hours per point” approximation
• Calculate team capacity (in hours) per sprint
• Extrapolate team velocity (in points) per sprint
• Tell management a range, for example:
• Team capacity is between 100 and 130 hours per sprint
• Hours per point is 5
• Velocity approximate is between 20 and 26 points
* Not general recommendation, only when absolutely necessary
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7. Additional problem
• Deliver “Potentially Shippable Product” or “Minimum
Viable Product” at the end of the sprint
• Product Owner’s priorities sometimes don’t match
architectural needs
• That can lead to drastic architectural changes between
sprints
• Result is a delay (more story points for architecture
changer items)
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8. Further reading & references
• Quora question: How do you estimate in Scrum when
velocity is unknown?
• James Grenning paper: Planning Poker or How to avoid
analysis paralysis while release planning
• Mitch Lacey’s book: The Scrum Field Guide
• Nick Lee’s Medium article: Solving the Problem of How
Many Story Points to Commit to in your First Sprint
• Ritesh Tamrakar, Magne Jørgensen paper: Does the Use
of Fibonacci Numbers in Planning Poker Affect Effort
Estimates?
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