Glen B. Alleman, MSSM, Vietnam 69-70 · @galleman
21st Jul 2015 from TwitLonger
Interview with Zach and Ryan #Noestimates
Last night I was "interviewed" by Ryan and Zach on the topic of "estimates."
The discussion was about making decisions. And how to make those decisions without estimating the outcomes of those decisions when there is uncertainty. By uncertainty it means lack of knowledge about the future. But not ignorance of the future. If you have ignorance of the future, nothing is going to help.
I've written extensively about this topic, I work in domains where decision making is an everyday practice in the presence of uncertainty. There was agreement on a single idea
You can't make a decision in the presence of a future uncertainty without estimating. Period end of discussion.
This is an immutable principle of MicroEconomics. To make decisions in the presence of uncertainty without estimating will require suspension of that principle. Since #NE says you can, and since I've yet to see any evidence the MicroEconomics is in suspense, the logical conclusion is You Can't Make Decisions Without Estimating. Attempts to redefine the term "estimate" are equally as nonsensical.
We then moved to other issues. How to make better estimates. How to recognize the "pointy haired boss", how to recognize the biases in estimating and all sorts of other useful topics.
This starts with "value at risk." How much are you willing to write off if you don't know "how much?" If you risk exposure is small, estimating is not likely to provide much value. But that decision is not a developer decision, it's the owner of the money decision.
This notion of "it's not your money" appears to be missing from the #NoEstimates paradigm.
The PodCast should come out soon, Hopefully they got all the parts we talked about