Glen Alleman occasionally overdoes the anti-no-estimates rant, BUT he’s bright and systematic. This is worth reading.
I liked this in particular:
With these business principles of software development and projects in general, we can ask and answer five principles of project success
- What dos Done look like in units of measure meaningful to the decision makers?
- What is the Plan to reach done at the needed time for the needed budget, with the needed outcomes?
- What Resources will be needed to reach Done?
- What Impediments will be encountered along the way to Done and what are the handling strategies for each impediment?
- What are the measures of physical percent complete needed to inform the decision makers of progress to plan in order to take corrective or preventive actions to stay on plan?