Guessing is not a strategy: How to build decision velocity with AI and real-time data
June 10, 2026 | Live Webinar
The Art of Finding the Real Release
I once heard Bob Martin say, “The first thing you know about any release is the due date.” Everyone in the crowd chuckled because it rang true. In my experience, after the date is set, the features and budget follow (the features being large and the budget being small).
Anyone can demand everything delivered tomorrow; that’s easy. But in a world constrained by reality, identifying the right features needed at the right time for the right cost is somewhat of an art. Finding the balance of schedule, scope and costs and getting buy-in from the key stakeholders to support the release plan is hard. But it is necessary if you want to be effective at delivering value.
The art of effective release planning includes following some basic practices:
-
Identifying the key stakeholders and what’s valuable to them
-
Gleaning the few, key objectives from a sea of wishes and wants
-
Seeing past pre-conceived notions of scope to identify meaningful groups of features that deliver value
A recent project with a new client illustrates these practices in action. “We’ve already cut all the scope we can. What remains is the absolute essential requirements we must have in V1,” said the project manager. I had heard this before and I knew it wasn’t true.
The team had already “trimmed down” …
Please log in or sign up below to read the rest of the article.
ADVERTISEMENTS
|
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." - Pablo Picasso |