One of the most transformative shifts in our API Connect team is moving away from traditional estimates and embracing story points. Importantly, velocity, which is the measure of how much work the team can deliver in a sprint, can only be truly established and tracked using story points.

This change helps us work together better, estimate more accurately, and focus on delivering value instead of only arguing about hours.

Part 1: Story Points Demystified: A Team Sport

Why Story Points?

Story points represent relative effort required to complete a user story. Unlike hours, they don’t try to predict exact duration but instead account for:

Complexity: How complicated is the task?

Risk and uncertainty: Are there unknowns or potential blockers?

Volume of work & time needed: How much needs to be done?

For example, implementing a basic API health check might be a 2-point story, while building a multi-layered analytics dashboard (like in our earlier example) might be an 8-point story due to higher complexity and integration effort.

Why Story Points Are Collaborative

In our Scrum pod, story points aren’t determined by a single developer or manager. Instead, the entire team contributes to estimation using Planning Poker, ensuring:

·      Everyone’s perspective is considered, including Architect.

·      Hidden complexities surface during discussions.

·      The whole team shares ownership of the estimate and the work.

This is why story pointing feels like a team sport: the goal isn’t to “guess right,” but to align on what’s involved and create shared understanding.

For example, during estimation for the example story, the team:

Compares relative size: Is this analytics story more complex than the 5-point API filtering story from last sprint?

Discusses hidden complexities: Data aggregation challenges and UI performance requirements.

Agrees on story points: After discussion, the team reaches consensus on an 8-point effort, reflecting time, effort and risk.

This collaborative approach encourages shared understanding and commitment.

Part 2: The Scrum Pod Evolution: From Chaos to Consistency

As new developers joined the API Connect team, our Scrum pod evolved dramatically. Initially, we experienced disorganization and relied heavily on a few specialists. Over time, deliberate Agile practices and collaboration transformed us into a consistent, high-performing unit.

From our experience, these are the stages you can expect:

Early Stage

·      Reliance on individual expertise creates bottlenecks.

·      Velocity fluctuates, and the team struggles to meet sprint commitments.

·      Knowledge silos limit collaboration and adaptability.

Growth Stage

·      Velocity begins to stabilize as team members share knowledge.

·      Mentoring help developers expand skills across domains.

·      Conduct events like Bug Fest to encourage collaborative testing on new and critical features

·      Motivate team members to contribute to all parts of the code base as the team evolves toward maturity.

Mature Stage

·      Workloads are balanced, and the team achieves predictable delivery.

·      Any member confidently picks up stories, regardless of their original domain expertise.

·      Everyone contributing an equal share of story points

·      Collaboration replaces dependency, and the team embraces end-to-end ownership.

Supporting the Pod’s Evolution

Cross-Skilling: Developers expand beyond their primary roles by conducting playbacks to share their learning and creating supporting documentation.

Psychological Safety: A culture of openness encourages innovation and continuous improvement.

Scrum Master Guidance: The Scrum Master facilitates growth by coaching and reinforcing Agile principles.

This evolution transforms our API Connect team into a predictable and resilient delivery unit, capable of adapting to change and continuously delivering value.

Next: Read Blog 3 to discover how cross-functional teams and SMEs drive resilience and achieve Agile Nirvana.