What are the best strategies for managing technical debt during estimation and planning?

1 Acknowledge and track technical debt

The first step to managing technical debt is to recognize and document it. You can use tools like code analysis, code reviews, testing, and feedback to identify and measure technical debt. You can also create a backlog of technical debt items, prioritize them based on their impact and urgency, and assign them to your team members. By tracking technical debt, you can monitor its growth and reduction, and communicate it to your stakeholders.

2 Include technical debt in your definition of done

Your definition of done (DoD) is a set of criteria that determines when a user story or a sprint is completed. It should include not only functional and non-functional requirements, but also quality standards and technical practices. By including technical debt in your DoD, you can ensure that your team delivers code that meets your expectations and avoids creating new debt. For example, your DoD can include code formatting, refactoring, documentation, testing, and code coverage.

3 Estimate technical debt as part of your user stories

When you estimate the effort and complexity of your user stories, you should also consider the technical debt associated with them. You can use techniques like planning poker, T-shirt sizing, or story points to account for technical debt in your estimates. By estimating technical debt, you can allocate enough time and resources to address it, and avoid underestimating or overcommitting your work. You can also use your estimates to compare the value and cost of your user stories, and prioritize them accordingly.

5 Review and refactor your code regularly

Another strategy to manage technical debt is to review and refactor your code regularly. Code review is the process of examining and improving your code quality, readability, and maintainability. You can use tools like peer review, pair programming, or code analysis to conduct code reviews. Refactoring is the process of changing your code structure without changing its functionality, to make it more efficient, clean, and easy to understand. You can use tools like automated refactoring, test-driven development, or continuous integration to support refactoring.

6 Educate and collaborate with your team and stakeholders

The final strategy to manage technical debt is to educate and collaborate with your team and stakeholders. Technical debt is not only a technical issue, but also a business and cultural issue. You need to educate your team and stakeholders about the causes, consequences, and benefits of technical debt, and how to avoid or reduce it. You also need to collaborate with them to align your goals, expectations, and priorities, and to make informed and transparent decisions about technical debt.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?