Recalculate Sprint Team Capacity?

[Smitha Joseph]

I calculate sprint team capacity as

[ (count of team members * 8) - (Sum of the Planned leaves + Holidays)] // team members - DEV & QA resources

Should the sprint team capacity be recalculated with unplanned & sick leaves once the sprint starts? 

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Smitha Joseph 

In my opinion, "no".

There is always uncertainty related to the work requested, the solution approaches the team selects, any forecasting / sizing of work, emergent business priorities, technical impediments, and certainly, the people-related things: 

• availability of people on the team
• shared understanding
• knowledge silos
• team health
• focus
• etc.

During the sprint, the team could identify and communicate to stakeholders when things do not go as expected for the sprint plan and goal.

Perhaps discuss with the team how team-sprint-capacity is being used, its effectiveness to meet that need, and how to learn and experiment to improve when things do not go as planned.  The retrospective is an excellent time to do this.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Smitha Joseph]

@Bill Sheboy   Thank you. I understand the planned capacity remains the same throughout the sprint. Do you recommend having a buffer for the team capacity to meet these uncertainties.  

[Bill Sheboy]

Yes, and...

Sometimes scrum teams leave buffer capacity to help with both uncertainty and emergent opportunities.  Teams may also have production support responsibilities, and that could generate unplanned work.  There are several ways to handle these sources / impacts to work, including using a buffer and ensuring there is enough ready-work to take on if the team finds itself with additional capacity during the sprint.

When the team discusses to learn where they regularly have unplanned work or uncertainty (i.e., known unknowns), perhaps that could be accounted for in planning as a mitigation.  Better still, perhaps the team can identify ways to eliminate such impacts.