The Art of Agile Development, 2nd Edition

The Planning Game

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Our plans take advantage of both business and development expertise.

You may know what you want to release, but how do you actually construct a step-by-step plan? That’s where the planning game comes in.

Despite the name, the planning game isn’t a trivial piece of entertainment. In economics, a “game” refers to a situation where “players select actions and the payoff depends on the actions of all players.”¹⁰ That’s what the planning game is. It’s a cooperative game designed to create the best possible payoff.

The planning game is notable for the way it maximizes the amount of information contributed to your plan. It’s strikingly effective. Although the planning game has limitations, if you work within them, I know of no better way to decide the details of your plan.

The planning game is just one part of your overall planning process. It’s a way of breaking valuable, releasable increments into smaller stories. At the end of the planning game, you’ll have a set of stories that are “just right” for development. To recap:

1. Purpose provides the overall goal and current direction.

2. Visual Planning identifies options for valuable increments.

3. The Planning Game provides the step-by-step plan you’ll use to develop each increment.

PLANNING DAY

It’s planning day again, and you’re dreading it. You know exactly what’s going to happen. First, Zachariah and Missy will be 5–10 minutes late. Then Ladonna will project your issue tracker up on the wall. ...