How much time should you allocate to refining your backlog?

Ideally ideas that are not aligned with your product vision are not even brought up during refinement, because they're not even brought forth since people know they don't align with our vision. Stakeholder feedback can happen at any point in time, and is not something which limited to refinement, nor are changing requirements.

Backlog refinement is a crucial Agile practice where the product development team reviews and enhances the items in the product backlog. It involves clarifying requirements, adding details, and prioritizing tasks. This iterative process ensures that backlog items are well-prepared and ready for sprint planning, contributing to smoother development and better alignment with project goals.

Refining the backlog is a fundamental piece in the great scheme of planning a release; however, it is not an easy task to maximize the efficiency of this ceremony. In my team, we often introduce the concept of '3 Amigos', which is an opportunity for myself (the team's Product Owner), the Scrum Master/BA, the Dev Lead and the QA Lead to "pre-refine" the backlog items, making sure that all use cases are defined in the Acceptance Criteria, and that the scope of the story is perfectly clear. When we reach our weekly refinement session, where the entire Scrum Team participates, the work is in a perfect shape. The more efficiently we use the time, the more ordered the backlog will be!

As a PO, dedicating enough time to backlog refinement is vital for the success of the project. While there's no hard rule for the exact amount of time to allocate, it's generally recommended to spend about 10-15% of your total capacity on activities such as grooming user stories, clarifying requirements, prioritizing backlog items, and ensuring that the backlog is ready for the upcoming sprints. However, the actual time spent may vary depending on the complexity of the project, the size of the backlog, and the team's maturity level. Ultimately, the goal is to keep maintaining a well-prepared backlog while having enough time for collaborating with stakeholders and supporting the development team during sprints.

The most important thing to achieve during refinement is common understanding of what are we trying to achieve and why does it matter? All the other points mentioned are of secondary importance.

The most important goal of a Refinement session is to achieve shared understanding. Every other output/outcome (estimations, more stuff written on the PBI's, pre-planning, etc) should be a by-product of that shared understanding.

Backlog refinement is crucial as it ensures that the list of tasks and user stories is well-defined and prioritized. It helps teams maintain clarity on what needs to be done, reducing ambiguity and fostering better planning. This process promotes efficient use of resources, improved teamwork, and ultimately, the delivery of valuable products or services to customers.

Building software needs a plan, not just code. Imagine a house: blueprints guide the team and ensure everyone has what they need. Backlog refinement does the same for software. It clarifies tasks, gathers team input, and ensures everyone's ready for success. Think of the backlog as the blueprint: each item is a task, like building a room, with details like size, function, and dependencies. Just like a clear blueprint helps builders avoid problems, a well-refined backlog empowers software teams. It promotes efficiency, high-quality products, and the ability to predict progress. It's a roadmap for a smooth build

The core thing of refinement is getting common understanding of what we want to achieve and why we want it. Everything else is less of less importance.

Refine after major project milestones or releases when requirements may change. Revalidate with stakeholders. Refine when new information surfaces that changes priority or understanding of backlog items. Adapt based on learning. Refine when new stakeholders join and need to provide input on existing backlog items. Get their feedback. Refine when major assumptions prove invalid and impact backlog item scopes or effort required. Refine when item estimates seem inaccurate based on actual work completed in sprint.

There's nothing inherently wrong with refining work during the Sprint or Sprint Planning. Doing things just-in-time can be sensible. However, it depends on what you're doing and it may lead to roadblocks that could have been prevented.

You should refine your backlog regularly, ideally before each sprint planning meeting in Agile development. This continuous refinement ensures that the backlog items are well-defined, prioritized, and ready for implementation. It allows the team to have a clear understanding of the upcoming work, reduces uncertainty, and improves the efficiency of sprint planning and execution.

You should refine your backlog regularly throughout your project's lifecycle. Common practices include reviewing and refining the backlog during sprint planning meetings in Agile methodologies or during project planning phases in other project management approaches. It's essential to keep the backlog up to date to ensure that it reflects the current priorities and requirements of your project.

Backlog refinement should be an on-going process, not tied to any specific event or milestone. It needs to happen frequently enough that you have enough stories refined prior to the sprint planning to address the aspirational sprint goal. This gives the team the material to work with in sprint planning in terms of how to deliver the goal and also the basis of a discussion with the Product Owner if the aspirational goal is deemed to not be achievable in the sprint. I generally find that two one hour sessions a week with the team is sufficient as long as the stories are small. However the team should be free to schedule further sessions if they need them, or to cancel the scheduled ones if they are not required.

The 10% guideline for allocating sprint capacity to backlog refinement might work for some teams, but it's not a one-size-fits-all rule. Teams should evaluate how much time they need based on their specific context and the quality of their backlog. A small, well-maintained backlog might require less time, while a large, complex one might need more. The focus should always be on achieving shared understanding and preparing backlog items for upcoming sprints.

The amount of time you should allocate to backlog refinement can vary based on several factors, cannot go by book, including the project's size, complexity, team size, and development methodology (e.g., Agile, Scrum). Some factors to look at are on top of your best judgement: Frequency Sprint Planning Big one- Ad Hoc Refinement, Legal/Compliance Product Maturity Stakeholder Involvement Tools and Documentation Continuous Improvement Beating the drum here-Dependencies

Allocate at least 1 hour each week for backlog refinement to ensure stories are clear and actionable. During refinement, use Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) to define acceptance criteria.

Backlog grooming is a continuous placeholder so that the team can keep the backlog ready to be picked up in the sprint planning. And teams don't have to complete this activity in one session and that means the activity will continue further on. The duration should depend upon the length of the sprint itself i.e. if it's a 2 week sprint then 1-2 hours of backlog grooming makes sense and if it's a longer sprint duration then the team should tweak grooming duration as well. This all depends how well the backlog is maintained i.e. if there are enough meaningful stories added by the product owner and also by the engineering team, the lesser time it might take to groom the backlog.

To refine your backlog effectively you need to analyze each of the user stories and ask if this story is complete enough with details so that it can be properly estimated and reviewed with the team for accepting it into the sprint. If your user stories lack clarity to the importance of the request or the expected outcome then more information is needed from stakeholders. While there are many methods listed here to help define a user story, the goal is to reach shared clarity and understanding with the team on what the acceptance and outcomes will be.

Schedule regular backlog grooming sessions, such as 30-60 minutes every 1-2 weeks. This provides adequate time for the team to refine the backlog without sacrificing too much development time. Remove obsolete, duplicate or low-value items to keep the backlog clean and focused. Archive rather than delete in case they become relevant later. Reassess prior estimates for existing backlog items based on new knowledge. Update estimates if needed.

To refine your backlog effectively, prioritize items based on business value, ensure clear and concise user stories, break down large tasks into smaller, manageable pieces, involve stakeholders for feedback, and continuously reassess and reprioritize items to align with project goals. Regular grooming and collaboration are key to maintaining a refined backlog.

Most likely you have to do one and only one thing when it comes to backlog refinement - identify the tests that fulfil what is expected from your PBIs. Everything else can be optional. If this is done well, everything should ideally fall in place. For e.g., to identify the tests the team needs to understand the requirement well, this would require research-analysis-brainstorming, this will result in better clarity and scope for estimations, and once automated these tests will provide the confidence to integrate & deliver continuously. So if the question is how can you refine your backlog effectively, the answer is "identify the tests for your PBIs".

A simple piece of advice that is sometimes forgotten: Clarify responsibilities for who prepares what for these meetings. Consistently demand this preparation from everyone and allocate sufficient time in capacity for it.

A messy, cluttered backlog is hard to work with. Categorize, prioritize, and clean it up. Without a guiding vision, it's difficult to prioritize backlog items. The product owner needs to communicate the big picture.

One of the biggest pitfalls I see over and over again in these sessions is inexperienced people being overridden by experienced people. This leads to them not really understanding the story or the solution. As a result, they become less and less engaged in the session, which can lead to major inefficiencies in the sprint planning and the actual sprint. In this meeting, it is important to make sure that everyone understands what is to be developed. Even if that means the session needs to be longer as without this.

Heading into the backlog refinement session without an agenda of topics/stories to discuss is an anti-pattern. Preparing the topics/stories to be refined must be done before the session. It will make the flow of the refinement better, lowering the chance of sidetracks and convoluted conversations. Also, the topics/stories must be sent in advance to the stakeholders so that each and everyone can prepare and have meaningful inputs for the upcoming session. Just like with any meeting, ‘No agenda, No attenda’

Unclear requirements - Poorly defined items cause confusion, incorrect estimations, and rework. Prioritization struggles - Failure to prioritize by value, dependencies, and risks creates chaos. Overloaded backlog - Too many items without refinement leads to bloat and lack of focus. Inadequate time - Underestimating the need for regular refinement sessions impacts backlog health. Estimation issues - Improper estimation techniques or lack of consensus hinder planning accuracy. Resistance to change - Reluctance to groom and remove obsolete items clutters the backlog. Avoiding these pitfalls through active participation, clear requirements, disciplined prioritization, and consistent refinement ensures an effective, streamlined backlog.

A pitfall when using Story Points: endless discussions about the exact number or calculating an average of the provided numbers or picking the max./min. number to end auch discussions. A good practice is to use consent based decisions instead of consensus and to set time boxes for discussions/ re-estimation. Focus of the Product Backlog refinement should be on understanding the problem and the user needs, not on finding solutions and how to solve the problem.

Involve the right people - product owner, Scrum master, developers, UX designer etc. Their diverse perspectives lead to better refinement. Use relative sizing techniques like story points rather than hours to estimate effort more accurately. Keep the sessions interactive, collaborative and time-boxed to get the most value. Record outcomes and share with stakeholders for transparency.

Backlog refinement should be a continuous process where the Developers and Product Owner meet daily and discuss on the prioritized and non-prioritized user stories to get clear insights on the actual requirement, the feasibility, testing, risks etc. and derive better approaches and solutions. Communicate the risks to the stakeholders and also get clear and revised requirements from them on timely basis. It's not an official scrum event but a collaborative approach for better functioning of the scrum and making the process more transperant aiming at value delivery within time.

Don't forget the 'human element' in backlog refinement. It's not just about numbers and tasks. Listening to your team's feedback can offer insights no metric can capture. This not only helps in refining the backlog but also makes everyone feel valued. So, take a moment to ask not just 'What are we doing?' but also 'How does everyone feel about this?' It can make a big difference.

Backlog refinement is essential in the Scrum process. It is not mentioned as an "event" since it is not recurring in the Scrum Sprint like the other events are. It is at the discretion of the Scrum team to plan it and to make sure it takes place when it makes sense. The refinement is not there to work on items that are already in the current sprint. We refine the Product Backlog to make sure we have enough Product Backlog Items Ready for about 2 or 3 sprints. This will ensure a team can speed up and the next steps are clear. The Product Owner is responsible for a Product Backlog that is as Ready as possible. They may ask the Developers to help on clarifying. Try to focus on "What", not on "How" during a refinement session.

What I find valuable and essential is the pre-work from the product owner, this effort really improves the effectiveness and efficiency of the team. The product owner should be able to address a considerable amount of question from the team, in order to reduce the back and forth between the stakeholders and the team. Essentially, when the team meets to groom the backlog... they will have a number of questions which needs to be addressed right away without going back to the stakeholders. An experienced product owner is able to anticipate the questions coming from the team and prepare for it. If need be, engage the stakeholder with a technical profile to do the pre-work before the actual grooming.