(2024-01-24) Rothman Flow Metrics And Why They Matter To Teams And Managers

Johanna Rothaman: Flow Metrics and Why They Matter to Teams and Managers. I continue to work with people who have trouble with their agile approach. They tell me their relative estimation isn't working for them. They continue to carry over items, from sprint to sprint.

That's when I recommend they use the flow metrics instead of any of their more traditional measures. Because their current measures are not helping.

These metrics expose the principles behind agility. When teams measure these four metrics, they can see their reality and decide what to do, to create a better environment.

Here are the four flow metrics:

• WIP
• Throughput: The number of work items a team/manager can complete per unit of time.
• Cycle time: The time to release value, as a trend.
• Aging: How long a piece of work has been in progress.

Let's start with a team.

Imagine a team that regularly completes one item every week. That's their regular throughput. Now, someone thinks they need “more” done.

A well-meaning person asks the team to start another item this week and finish it. That increases the team's WIP. However, unless the team changes something about how they work, they do not increase their throughput, all because they started one more item.

Now, their throughput has decreased because they're working on two items and did not finish either of them. Worse, their cycle time increases. And now, they have two older items, increasing the age of all the items.

Here are questions the team can ask:

What's the one thing we should work on and finish? (Start with WIP.)

How old is our oldest item? Is that still valuable? (Start with aging.)

What should we change about our work so we can reduce our cycle time? (Focus on cycle time.)

How can we increase our throughput? (Focus on throughput.)

I tend to start with either of the first two questions, because they focus on one thing the team can finish.

Is “one item” always the right number for WIP? No. In Create Your Successful Agile Project, I recommend the team start with the number of people on the team divided by two.

Managers work differently. So the metrics don't change, but management interventions do change.

managers do not deliver features. Instead, they deliver decisions. (decision-making)

The longer managers have decisions in progress (decision aging), the more decisions they have in progress (their WIP). The higher a manager's WIP, the longer the cycle time and the lower the throughput. That means people don't know what to do and decide for themselves. People can't wait any longer for a management decision.

When teams and managers see their WIP, cycle time, throughput, and aging, they can decide what they might want to change. Is it time for more collaboration? Maybe start with the value question first, as in “What's the most valuable thing we can finish today?”