Team Actual, Average and Forecasted Velocity

It goes well with one of the following solutions:

• Iteration Generation for Team (58884b19-17e0-4d07-bf99-6cd0874d0056)
• Iteration Generation for Agile Release Train (ART) (5170cf26-77e6-4d16-96f3-c11a5b86f876)

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Solution Overview

There is a default field, Velocity, available for Team Iterations. It's calculated based on an effort completed in a Team Iteration when you use the Finish Team Iteration function. This approach doesn't work if you don't use this function, so in most cases, you see 0 in this field. 

The solution enables a new way to calculate Velocity based on effort completed in a Team Iteration, however, the Velocity value will be updated right when a User Story or Bug is moved to its final state so that you can track the actual Velocity as a Team Iteration progress.

The solution also enables several additional velocity fields and calculations for them:

• Initial Velocity (for a Team)
• Forecasted Velocity (for a Team Iteration)
• AVG TI Velocity (for a Team)

Initial Velocity for a Team

Team Initial Velocity field will appear on a Team view. This field is needed when you start using the system, and there are no finished Team Iterations yet. This field will be used to calculate Cost per Point or other important details for Costs or Capacity. Later, when the actual Velocity starts calculating, the field will be ignored.

You can set a Team Inital Velocity on a Team view:

or on the Team and Team Iterations Velocity view in the left menu.

Actual and Forecasted Velocity

Actual Velocity represents Effort completed in a Team Iteration. It'll be updated as soon as some User Stories or Bugs are closed in a Team Iteration and will be equal to sum of their Effort.

Forecasted Velocity (for a Team Iteration) represents effort forecasted to be finished in the current and future Team Iterations based on finished Team Iterations Velocity.

Forecasted Velocity is calculated as the average Velocity of the last 5 (or less) finished (with End Date < today) Team Iterations. It is calculated for the current and future Team Iterations only, so we can later see a Team's progress and compare the Forecasted Velocity with actual Velocity. It's updated for all the future Team Iterations as soon as a Team Iteration is finished, so we can better predict the future Velocity. If there are no finished Team Iterations yet, it's equal to the Team Initial Velocity.

Example:

• If there are 3 Team Iterations with total completed Velocity = 36 points, then Forecasted Velocity = 12.
• If there are no finished Team Iterations and a Team Initial Velocity = 10, then Forecasted Velocity = 10 for all the current and future Team Iterations.

If you started using the solution when there were already finished Team Iterations in the system, we need to make an initial calculation for the Actual and Forecasted Velocity.

To calculate Actual Velocity:

• Go to Automation Rules
• Open Initial - Copy TI Effort Completed to Velocity automation rule
• Click Save and Trigger button

As a result Completed Effort in Team Iterations will be copied to Velocity field.

To Calculate Forecasted Velocity and configure the other Automation Rules:

• Go to Automation Rules
• Open the following rules one by one:
  • Initial - Set TI Forecasted Velocity
  • Update TI Forecasted Velocity when TI Velocity is updated
  • Daily Team AVG TI Velocity calculation
  • Update Team AVG TI Velocity when TI Velocity is updated 
• Click Raw JSON button
• Set the IterationAmount parameter to the max number of Team Iterations you'd like to use in the calculation. By default it's 5. It'll use the up to 5 (or less if less exists) existing Team Iterations going ahead
• Open Initial - Set TI Forecasted Velocity automation rule
• Click Save and Trigger button

As a result, Forecasted Velocity will be calculated based on the finished Team Iterations Velocity.

AVG TI Velocity (Team Iteration Average Velocity for a Team)

AVG TI Velocity (for a Team) represents a Team Average Velocity. It will be calculated based on the Velocity of the finished Team Iterations for this Team or based on a Team Initial Velocity in case there are no finished Team Iterations. 

Example:

• If there are 3 Team Iterations with total completed Velocity = 36 points, then TI AVG Velocity = 12.
• If there are no finished Team Iterations and a Team Initial Velocity = 10, then TI AVG Velocity = 10

If you started using the solution when there were already finished Team Iterations in the system, we need to make an initial calculation for the AVG TI Velocity. To do that:

• Go to Automation Rules
• Open Daily Team AVG TI Velocity calculation automation rule
• Click Save and Trigger button

As a result, AVG TI Velocity will be calculated based on the finished Team Iterations Velocity.

Please check out the following video to see the solution in action.

Solution Configuration (optional)

If you rename Team Iterations, for example, into Sprints, then AVG Sprint Velocity may not make sense for you. The field can be renamed, and the rules need to be adjusted to start using a new custom field for calculations.

Rename AVG TI Velocity field

• Go to Settings -> Custom Fields
• Open TI AVG Velocity field
• Rename it to the needed value, for example  AVG Sprint Velocity

Update Automation Rules

• Go to Settings -> Automation Rules
• Update the following rules one by one:

• Update TI Forecasted Velocity when a Team Initial Velocity is updated
• Daily team AVG TI Velocity calculation
• Update team AVG TI Velocity when TI Effort Completed is updated 

• Open a rule -> click the Raw JSON button
• Update the parameter as shown in the video below
• Save the rule

Update Actual and Forecasted Velocity view

• Open Team and Team Iterations Velocity view in the left menu
• Go to Actions -> Setup View
• Add the (AVG Sprint Velocity in our example) renamed field to the Teams list

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Version: 1.1