---
title: "Planning Poker"
chapter: false
weight: 52
---

One popular approach to estimating story points is a process called **“Planning Poker ®”**.   The rules are fairly simple:  

1. The team takes a story from the project backlog.  The person who wrote up the story briefly explains what the story entails.

2.  Without any discussion, each team member silently decides on their points estimate for the story.  Typically, each team member will have a set of cards with the various points numbers on them.  Each team member selects the appropriate card with their point estimate and places it face down on the table.  

3.  Once everyone has decided on their estimate, everyone simultaneously reveals their estimate by turning over their selected card.

4. If everyone has come up with the same estimate, that becomes the estimate for the story.  But usually there is some difference among the estimates.  In that case, each team member briefly explains the rationale for their estimate.  Discussion is kept to a minimum to avoid getting too much into the weeds.

5. The team repeats steps 2 to 4.

It’s not uncommon for the estimating to take a few iterations before the team arrives at consensus.  Of course, sometimes consensus is harder to reach.  That’s when a good facilitator is important.