How to become better at task estimation
One of the tasks when writing software, give an estimation of how much a certain feature is going to take to implement. For the Product Owner or project leader or some other internal customer, it will define which features he or she will get within an amount of time. So it will help the product owner with his or her decision-making, whether the feature must be in the upcoming sprint or not.
We can also determine the velocity with a software estimation, creating a commitment for the team to meet the sprint goals. By knowing how much a task is gonna take to implement, we can put that number of tasks within a sprint which can be handled by the team. Not meeting sprint goals will bring the team into a negative emotional state: “whatever we do, we don’t make it this sprint”. So, people won’t even try their best to meet the sprint goals.
Task estimation seems to be a difficult part of our job as software engineers. Most of the times, it takes more time to deliver features than initially estimated. Why is this and what can we do about it?
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