Fruit Salad Game
This is a great activity for when you are introducing relative sizing or estimation to a team. It can be used to illustrate how estimations can shake out assumptions, showing the differences in what we believe is needed to complete a task, how to do so, and the risks involved. It can also be used to create your first story point scale for your own backlog.
This version does not actually require any fruit; rather, you use index cards with fruit names. As a facilitator, you act as the Product Owner in the session. The team gives relative estimates for preparing different types of fruits to build the end product: a fruit salad.
4-any
15-30 min
Calm
Preparation
- Prepare cards for the backlog with fruit names.
- Select a number of fruits that would be well-known in your group (e.g. apple, pear, banana, grape, orange, strawberry).
- Select a fruit that is harder to prepare (e.g. coconut).
Steps
- Explain to the group that they have just joined the fruit salad industry. You are the Product Owner and the group is the team building the fruit salad.
- Go through a simple Definition of Done, e.g. the fruit needs to be cleaned or peeled, and the pieces must be in easy-to-eat sizes.
- Draw a horizontal line and explain that it is a scale of relative size, smallest to the left. Mention that size includes all kinds of factors such as time, effort, risk, and uncertainty.
- Pick a card with a mid-range fruit, like an apple. Give them a minute or two to ask any product questions. For example, do you want it sliced or diced?
- Put this card around the middle of your scale.
- Pick a fruit that will be the easiest to prepare, like a grape. Give them the opportunity to ask questions, and then ask them if they think this fruit card is smaller, the same, or larger in size.
- Place the card at the left end of the scale once you get a consensus that it is smaller.
- Continue adding fruit cards to the board by asking if the fruit preparation is the same size (place above), smaller (to the left), or larger (to the right) compared to cards already put up on the scale.
- If people disagree, dig into why. This usually highlights different assumptions for what needs to be done or different techniques. These will be great examples in your debrief.
- Introduce the group to the beginning of the Fibonacci sequence: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, and 21.Put the 1 under the fruit furthest to the left (possibly a grape).
- Ask if they think the card(s) just to the right is twice as big. If yes, put a 2 underneath the fruit(s). If they think it is more than twice, then continue to see if they think it is 3 or 5 times larger.
- Once completed, review the scale and move any fruit that doesn’t seem to be in the right number column.
- You can now apply this fruit scale to your own stories.
Debrief
Ask the group questions to find out what they learned and observed, reinforcing the benefits of early feedback.
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How did different assumptions affect your estimates? (e.g. some might assume you peel a pear, while others leave the skin on).
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Did you feel comfortable asking the Product Owner to express their wishes? (e.g. did anyone suggest squeezing the citrus fruit for juice rather than cutting it?).
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How did “risk” (like opening a coconut) impact where you placed the fruit on the scale compared to just “effort”?
Bonus tip
- Unknowns: Select a fruit that is unlikely for anyone in the team to know about (e.g. Bacuri) to discuss how they handle items where the effort is unknown.
- Large Items: Once you reach 21 you may opt to have a column for any fruit seen as huge, or use a sequence such as 20, 50, 100 to represent items that need breaking down.
- Anchoring: You can demonstrate the concept of “anchoring” by introducing a good or bad example of a Product Owner influencing the team’s estimate before they speak.
- Real Work: Go straight into your own stories using the fruit scale. Start with a grape equivalent, the smallest thing you could ever do (e.g. a text change).
- Business Value: Use the backlog for talking about value. You as a product person have a vision; share it, and get input or feedback from the team on what order provides the most value.
What you need
- Cards with fruit names
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Whiteboard and markers
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Blue tack
Creator
Variation of activity by Steve Blockman