Follow-up progress with a burn-down chart
A burn down graph is a simple tool to follow up your progress:
Start with an empty graph. On the y axis you put a scale for story points where your total amount of story points for the project is 90 percent up.
Put a dot at the level of your total sum of story points. The reason for not putting the total on the top is because it's normal to discover more work that was not found in advance and there needs to be room for that.
On the x axis you put a scale where the calculated delivery date is about 80 percent away.
Put a dot at the targeted delivery date.
Draw a dotted line between the two dots. This is the ideal line and will help us see deviation from plan.
A burn down graph with a dotted line between the starting number of story points in the project and the date when the work is expected to be done
If you're used to GANTT diagrams, you may miss the connection between work and people. That's the whole idea; it's up to the people who do the work to decide...
