The Agile methodology has transformed how teams approach project management. With its focus on speed and flexibility, Agile departs from traditional methods by forgoing the waterfall approach, instead breaking down initiatives into manageable sprints that allow teams to deliver value incrementally and adapt quickly to changes. To do this, teams depend heavily on clear, real-time visibility into initiative progress. Otherwise, staying aligned with goals and deadlines might not be possible.
Burndown charts provide a simple yet powerful tool to meet this need. Originating from the Scrum framework, these charts offer a visual representation of work remaining over time, giving everyone involved a clear image of where the initiative stands compared to its estimated progress. First introduced in the 1990s as part of the Agile movement, burndown charts have become essential for teams seeking to maintain momentum as they work to meet their deadlines.
To reiterate, work within the Scrum framework is completed by small, cross-functional teams, where tasks are planned and executed in short cycles typically lasting no more than four weeks in length. During these sprints or iterations, the team works together uninterrupted, acting as its own authority on how much work should be completed during the cycle. The burndown chart helps teams visualize their progress within the sprint, using a simple line chart drawn between time and work remaining.
The burndown chart illustrates briefly whether the sprint is moving ahead as planned, or whether the team will need to make certain adjustments to hit the established goal. More specifically, it helps teams accomplish the following:
Completing an initiative or sprint within a deadline demands a clear understanding of how much effort will be required. Burndown charts clearly represent the estimated effort remaining for uncompleted tasks, which teams can then use in their reporting. By visualizing and analyzing remaining effort, teams can more easily make changes where necessary to reach their objectives.
One of the greatest advantages of a burndown chart is its simplicity; the chart is easy to understand, and teams benefit from using it as a progress tracker. By visualizing the progress (or lack of progress) on specific initiatives, teams can make course corrections and reevaluate processes in real time.
By analyzing the chart's trajectory, teams can assess whether they are on track to meet deadlines. This insight not only helps manage the current sprint but also informs the planning of future initiatives, allowing teams to make more accurate estimates, set realistic goals, and allocate time effectively in subsequent iterations.
While the traditional burndown chart is a powerful tool, its application can vary depending on the scope and focus of the initiative. Different initiatives and objectives at various levels require tailored approaches to tracking progress. And, while some teams may choose to further specialize or customize their burndowns to meet more specific needs, most charts fall into one of three categories:
Sprint burndown charts are the most used type, designed to track the progress of a single sprint. These charts provide daily insights into how much work remains within the sprint, helping teams identify deviations from the plan and make timely adjustments. This helps them stay on track, maintain focus, and ensure they achieve their sprint goals within the allotted time.
Release burndown charts expand the scope beyond individual sprints to track the progress of a full release (often across multiple sprints). These charts are crucial for software development teams and stakeholders because they provide a visual representation of all user stories and epics planned for a specific release. This allows for better coordination and communication among team members and stakeholders.
Product burndown charts (also known as epic burndown charts), are used for long-term tracking of an entire product backlog or a substantial body of work. These charts offer a strategic perspective, helping teams, Scrum Masters, Product Owners, and stakeholders understand the overall progress of the initiative over an extended period. Product burndown charts assist in prioritization, resource allocation, and release planning.
A burndown chart takes the form of a two-dimensional graph (such as a bar graph or line graph) representing the two critical aspects of project management—the amount of work remaining and the time available to complete it. To do this, it employs several key components:
- The vertical axis (Y-axis)
The Y-axis represents the amount of work remaining in the initiative, often measured in story points, tasks, or hours.
- The horizontal axis (X-axis)
The X-axis represents time, typically displayed as days within a sprint or the entire duration of the initiative.
- Ideal work remaining
This is a straight line that descends from the top left to the bottom right of the chart, depicting the ideal pace of work needed to complete the initiative on time.
- Actual work remaining
This line reflects the real-time progress of the team, starting at the same point as the ideal work line but fluctuating up or down based on the team's actual performance.
eading a burndown chart is easy: Simply compare the actual work remaining line to the ideal work remaining line to gauge progress.
As the chart develops, comparing the two lines provides insight into how well the initiative is progressing; if the actual work is below the ideal work line, then there is less work remaining to be done than anticipated for a given day, and the initiative can be said to be ahead of schedule. If, on the other hand, the actual work line is above the ideal work, then there are more tasks remaining than expected, and the initiative is behind schedule.
Although this setup represents the most-basic burndown chart, it can be further detailed by adding the following elements:
- Scope forecast
A scope forecast anticipates potential changes in the initiative scope (such as adding or removing tasks) based on historical data and trends. By analyzing past initiatives, teams can predict how likely it is that the scope will expand or contract during the sprint. This foresight allows for proactive adjustments, helping the team remain flexible.
- Remaining forecast
This predicts how the burndown will progress over the remaining time in the sprint, offering insights into whether the initiative is likely to be completed by the deadline. This prediction is based on the current rate of progress and historical data, providing a realistic estimate of future performance. Continuously comparing this forecast with the ideal work line can identify any potential delays early and take corrective action to stay on schedule.
Although relatively simple to construct and easy to read, burndown charts nonetheless provide several clear advantages, even when compared to more detail-intensive burnup charts.
- Accurate visualization
Probably the most obvious benefit of the burndown chart is that it offers a clear snapshot of initiative progress. It gives agile teams an easy-to-follow visual representation of how the sprint is going, acting as a status report, and showcasing the most important data to help ensure that everyone involved is on the same page.
- Planning and tracking
Burndown charts offer a clear view into the progress of the initiative —its speed, acceleration, and any slow patches that may arise. This not only improves reporting and analysis; it also helps teams create more accurate plans and goals for future initiatives.
- Issue identification
When the work stalls, team members can refer to the burndown chart to help them locate and resolve root causes before they become significant problems. This reduces the risks involved in initiatives, increasing the likelihood of achieving favorable outcomes.
- Effective communication
By creating a simple graphic detailing progress on the initiative, collaboration and communication becomes easier. Everyone has access to the same source of truth, and everyone can see in real time how far along the initiative is.
Just as one of the greatest advantages of the burnout chart is its simplicity, this lack of complexity can also create challenges. Understanding these limitations and how to address them is key to maximizing the effectiveness of burndown charts:
- Limited scope
The burndown chart represents how many story points have been completed over a given amount of time. It does not measure or showcase the overall scope of work.
- Inability to differentiate change types
Burndown charts can identify changes but cannot distinguish between changes that are a result of completed items or those that stem from increasing or decreasing the number of story points.
Annotating charts with detailed contextual information may be one solution to addressing the burndown chart’s limitations. Alternatively, addressing these challenges may mean incorporating other tools into their project management approach. One such tool is a burnup chart.
Burndown charts are not the only visualization tools within the Scrum methodology. Burnup charts share a similar coordinate system to burndown charts but shift their focus away from what is left to do, to what work has already been done.
In a burndown chart, the amount of work to be done lessens, resulting in a decrease towards the right.
Conversely, in a burnup chart, the amount of work to be completed is depicted as one straight line across the top of the graph, while a second line is used to track work completed. The burnup chart starts at zero and increases towards the right as teams complete their tasks.
In other words, a burndown chart depicts what is left, and a burnup chart helps visualize what has been accomplished. Burndown charts are often the simpler approach, combining completed work and total work into a single line that moves towards zero as the initiative progresses. Burnup charts are slightly more complex, separating work and total work out as two individual lines on the graph. This provides a clearer, more informative picture of the realities of the initiative, helping teams identify specifically where problems may be occurring.
ServiceNow, a leader in enterprise platform accelerating business transformation, provides the tools and resources for organizations to create effective, powerful burndown charts. Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) connects Agile development work to broader business objectives, ensuring that teams are always keeping their focus on strategic goals while optimizing resources and tracking progress in real time. Additionally, the Agile 2.0 Sprint Dashboard allows users to clearly visualize and track story progress. The dashboard incorporates a variety of widgets, including Scope, Percent Completed, Time Elapsed, Committed Points, Blocked Work, and Missing Estimates.
By incorporating detailed and easy-to-read burnup and burndown reports and using the resultant information to create a cumulative flow diagram, the Agile 2.0 Dashboard provides essential insights into the initiative’s current state. This includes scope changes and trends, how much work has been completed and how much still needs to be done, total number of stories, number of stories that may be missing estimates, likelihood of completing the sprint by the deadline, and more. With these insights, teams can better understand the ideal pace of work, how much work is remaining, and if the scope is likely to be completed before the end of the sprint.
Get the insight you need to accurately track and manage your teams in an Agile environment, with ServiceNow. Schedule a demo today!