workloadschatting

Workloadschatting is the process of estimating the amount of work required to complete a set of tasks. The term blends the English 'workload' with the Dutch 'schatting' (estimate) and is used in Dutch-speaking contexts to inform planning and resource allocation.

The primary purpose is to support capacity planning, scheduling, and performance forecasting by providing a basis for staffing, timelines, and balancing workload across teams and processes.

Common methods include expert judgment, analogical estimation, parametric models, bottom-up estimation, three-point estimates, and Agile techniques such as planning poker and velocity-based planning.

Inputs typically include a work breakdown structure, task descriptions, scope, team size and skills, availability, historical data, and risk considerations.

The process generally involves breaking work into discrete tasks, collecting estimates, aggregating them with buffers for risk and uncertainty, validating them with stakeholders, and updating estimates as new information becomes available.

Benefits include improved predictability and resource utilization, while challenges include uncertainty, optimism and availability biases, scope changes, and data quality limits.

Applications span software development, manufacturing, and service delivery, and tools range from project management software and capacity planning systems to the use of a work breakdown structure and historical databases.

In practice, a team may use planning poker to estimate backlog items in story points, then convert to person-hours using observed velocity, adjusting estimates as the project evolves.