Planning poker is sometimes also called a "pointing poker" or "scrum poker". It's a useful technique that product teams can use to guess and estimate the effort that is needed for tasks that in a project management backlog. These estimations are based on the consensus obtained from the entire group which makes them more accurate and engaging than other planning methods.
The method was first created by James Grenning in 2002 and later popularized by Mike Cohn in the book "Agile Estimating and Planning".
Firstly, the team needs to agree on what type of numbers they would use for their estimates. The most popular choice are cards with fibonacci numbers. Once this is agreed on, the scrum master will hand out identical decks of cards to everybody. The decks are kept minimal on purpose with considerable number jumps to make the decision making process easier.
In the next step, the scrum master or project manager read the story aloud. If there are any questions that needs to be asked or the story needs to be clarified, this is the time to do it.
Team then discusses the story. Are there any roadblocks? How many team members will be involved in completing this task? How will any delays be tackled?
Now it's the time to vote. Each person within the group will privately select a card with the number related to the effort that they think this story will take. The higher the number, the more effort will be needed to complete this story.
Last step is reaching the consensus. If everyone reaches for the same number, they can agree on the effort required and move to the next story. If the numbers don't match, participants with the higher or lower estimates will need to discuss and convince others on why they think the number should be different.
We're currently working on a free planning poker tool that you will be able to use as a standalone software and as a part of your virtual office in flat.social!
Collaborate with your team in real-time using the simple and powerful planning poker tool.
Whether you're using flat.social daily as a virtual office or just for a certain subset of your meetings, you will be able to integrathe the planning poker tool straight into your meeting!
It's as simple as adding the planning poker tool room into your virtual space and flying into it to start :)