Velocity chart | Zoho Sprints Help

Velocity chart

About the velocity chart

A velocity chart in agile project management tool help users to track the amount of work a team visually completes across sprints. The system can forecast capacity by backtracking the velocity of the previous performance and set an achievable capacity for current or future sprints.   


Benefits
  • Estimate your team's performance by comparing the committed and completed estimation points.
  • Identify bottlenecks and track sprint progress.
  • Complete your committed estimation points to maintain a steady progress.
  • Plan for upcoming sprints using the average velocity. 

Velocity chart criteria   

You can refine and view velocity chart based on Estimation Points, Hours or Count.

Velocity chart based on Estimation Points 

Estimate your team's performance comparing the total completed estimation points with the total number of completed sprints. This will predict the progress of the upcoming sprints.
 
Average Velocity = Total completed estimation points / Total number of sprints
 
You have completed 400 estimation points belonging to 3 sprints.
 
Hence, the average velocity = 400/3 = 134 points/ sprint

Velocity chart based on Work Hours 

Estimate your team’s performance using the actual work hours spent across sprints. This helps determine average capacity and predict future sprint progress.
 
Average velocity = Total hours completed in completed sprints /Total number of sprints
 
You have completed 10 sprints in a span of 100 work hours.
 
Hence, the average velocity = 100/10 =  10 hours/sprint

Velocity chart based on Item Count 

Estimate your team's performance comparing the completed work items with the total number of sprints. This will predict the progress of the upcoming sprints.
 
Average Velocity =Total work items / Total number of sprints
 
You have completed 20 work items in 2 sprints.
 
Hence, the average velocity =  20/2 = 10 work items/ sprint

Access Velocity Chart   

  1. Navigate to a project.
  2. Select the Reports tab.
  3. Choose Velocity from the Sprints Report section.
  4. The X-axis represents the Sprint and the Y-axis represents the criteria.
    1. When Points is selected, the legend shows the committed and completed estimation points.
    2. When Count is selected, the legend shows the committed and completed work item count.
    3. When Hours is selected, the legend shows the committed and completed work items.
  5. Click the Completed bar to view the list of completed items.
  6. Click the Committed bar to view the list of committed items.
    Click the item and sprint to navigate to the respective item and sprint details section.
  7. Hover over the committed and completed bars to view the total items.

Example

Based on Estimation Points

Here, the team has closed three sprints. The average velocity of the team is calculated by evaluating the committed and completed estimation points.
 
In this chart, you can see that the Shopping Cart sprint has met the goal (Both the committed and completed bars are equal). Whereas the User Interface sprint has not met the goal (The completed bar is less than the committed bar).

Here, the team has closed three sprints. The average velocity of the team is calculated by evaluating the committed and completed estimation points. 


Notes
In this chart, you can see that the Shopping Cart sprint has met the goal (Both the committed and completed bars are equal). Whereas the Category sprint has not met the goal (The completed bar is less than the committed bar). And, for the sprint ' Social Media ' the team has committed points but has closed the sprint without completing any points.

How's the average velocity calculated in this case?
 
Total completed points of all the two sprints is (19+14 = 33), so the average velocity is 33 / 2 = 16.5 ~ 17
 
Based on the performance of the team in the past two sprints, the team's average velocity per sprint is 17. So, they can commit 17 points in the upcoming sprints to equal the committed and completed bars.
 
Based on Work Hours
 
Let's say you have already completed three sprints in a project. The details of the sprint based on work hours are as in the table below:
 
Sprint
Planned Hours
Completed Hours
Sprint 1
120
98
Sprint 2
130
110
Sprint 3
125
116


To forecast the velocity of the future sprints, the completed hours will be considered. Now, let us calculate the average velocity based on the past sprints.

Average completed hours across 3 sprints:
(98 + 110 + 116 ) / 3 = 108 hours

So your team’s average velocity is about 108 hours per sprint.

When the completed hours are rising steadily, the team is improving its consistency. If the planned hours are much less than the completed hours, the planning is too optimistic. For forecasting, you could use 118 hours as the expected capacity for the next sprint.

Based on Count
 
The team has completed 3 sprints in a project. The chart shows its committed count and completed count. Hover over the completed or committed bar graph to view the number of work items completed by a team across multiple sprints. 
 
Sprint 1 had 20 completed work items, Sprint 2 had 24 completed work items, and Sprint 3 had 28 completed work items.

To forecast the velocity of the future sprints, the completed work item count will be considered. Now, let us calculate the average velocity based on the past sprints.

Average completed work item across 3 sprints:
(20 + 24 + 28) /3  = 24 work items

So your team's average velocity is about 24 work items per sprint.

With Velocity chart, you can check the consistency when the work item count steadily increases. For forecasting, you could assign the team 24 work items as the expected capacity for the next sprint. 
 
Choose team velocity

You can view the progress of all the closed sprints as well as the sprints that are assigned to the other admins. However, as a member you can view the progress of the sprints assigned to you.
  1. Go to Report module.
  2. Select View by as Sprint Report.
  3. Select Report type as Velocity. The velocity of the closed sprints of all users will appear.
  4. Select me to view the velocity of sprints assigned to you or other users to view their respective velocity chart.
  5. Switch between count, points or hours to view the velocity based on those measurements.
Notes
Only the workspace owner and admin can view the velocity of all the sprints in the project. If you are the manager you can access the velocity of the sprints assigned to you.

You can see the total completed work items for the closed sprints and can compare the progress of the closed sprints. Based on the number of completed items in your closed sprint, you can track the performance of your workspace members.