How is the progress of a Folio or a Portfolio calculated

In a former article I described how the progress of a Folio is calculated using the default configuration settings of Tempo Budgets. Progress calculations can differ if you have modified the configurations of your Folio(s). Two different scenarios are explained below - with the EVM module enabled and a scenario without the EVM module enabled.

I assume that you have a deep knowledge of the Earned Value Management (EVM) management technique. Further, it is essential that you understand the difference between a progressively earned progress and a work package progress (also called the 0/100 approach).

There are many ways Tempo Budgets can be configured and each of these affects the way of how the progress of the Folio is calculated. Select the appropriate configurations based on the use case that most closely resembles yours. Note that the progress calculated within Tempo Budgets is essential for forecasting costs and revenue based on the performance.

Progress Calculation without EVM

The configuration page of your Folio has four main concepts/scenarios available in the scope section. These determine the completion ratio calculation of your Folio.

Here are some scenarios using effort fields other than the original effort field.

Progressive progress (Based on the sum of the effort estimate of all issues in scope)

Calculating progress on a portfolio level using the default configuration is described in this article. Below are ways to calculate progress based on 2 types of effort.

Progress calculation based on a fixed total effort estimate

The effort field is a numeric field within a JIRA issue that determines the weight of each issue in terms of effort. For instance if set to Original Estimate, an issue with an Original Estimate of 10 hours will contribute to 10% of the total Earned Value of a Folio which scope totals 100 hours. This should be a field that corresponds to an amount of effort required to complete an issue. The Earned Value Field can also be set to Issue Count, in which case all issues in the Folio Scope will be considered to have the same Earned Value when completed. Any visible numeric field can be used, including any custom fields you may have defined.

In this scenario, the completed original estimates are compared to the fixed total effort (and not to the sum of the original estimates of the issues within the scope).

When the effort field in this scenario is set to a numeric Jira custom field (e.g. Story points) a progressive earned calculation is not available. In this case Story points (or the selected numeric value) is only earned when the status of the issue is within the selected range of issue statuses within the scope section. Example: A Folio has a fixed total effort of 20 story points. Now once an issue with 10 estimated story points is being closed, the Folio will show a progress of 50%. Using a numeric value as the effort field and the “fixed total effort” scenario will ignore all entered worklogs.

Example for a Folio that uses "Original Estimate": 

Assume we have an issue inside our Folio with an original estimate of 50h and our "fixed total effort" is 120h. On the issue (status is in progress) we have logged 25h and a remaining estimate of 40h. According to Tempo Budget´s default calculation the completed original estimate is calculated as:

25h / (25h + 40h) = 38.46% 

that equals to 38.46%  of 50h = 19.23h that have been completed or in other words 120h - 19.23h = 100.77h still to earn. 

The completion ration would be 19.23h / 120h = 0.1603 or 16.03%

However when the issue(s) in the scope gets resolved the earned hours gets equaled to the amount of the original estimate regardless of the amount of hours logged and regardless of the amount of remaining estimates. In our case that would be 50h. Means once the the issue gets resolved the completion ratio will get up to 50h / 120h = 0.4167 or 41.67%

Progress calculation based on a fixed total number of hours logged

The fixed total number of hours logged configuration setting ignores all original and remaining estimates of the issues within the scope of the folio. With this setting the progress calculation will only take into account all logged hours on the issues within the scope and compare it to the total fixed logged hours. This scenario is suitable for work within a fixed contingent of working hours or if you have only an estimation of your complete project. E.g. service or maintenance contracts.

Progress calculation based on project calendar progress

Using this scenario will always adapt the progress of your project according to the calendar progress.

Progress Calculation with EVM

Work package progress calculation

The progress calculation with EVM is a bit different from what we have read about the progress calculation without the EVM module enabled. When EVM is activated it is overwriting the “completed issues” settings from the scope configuration of a Folio. Still the “effort field” and the completion ration settings will keep its meaning and will be used to calculate the total “value” (original estimates, story points, issue count etc.) to earn similar to the progress calculations dealing with non-EVM Folios.

When EVM is enabled, its default configuration is to calculate according to the work package (0/100) approach. Another main difference is the fact that the planned costs are taken into consideration. That means the progress will always be 0% unless you have planned any costs on your Folio.

The work package progress calculation is the default setting when EVM is enabled. Tempo Budgets assumes that you have not “earned” the effort of a JIRA issue unless you have resolved the JIRA issue. You will earn the effort of a JIRA issue only when it is resolved. The scope settings of the Folio will be set to original estimates in the effort field and the completion ratio settings will be ignored for this use case.

The EVM module is enabled and the progressive calculation is disabled

Progressive progress calculation

The progressive progress calculation method can be enabled within the EVM section. The progressive calculation can be enabled for all JIRA issues within the scope of the Folio or only for a subset of the JIRA issues (this scenario will be skipped). We also need to define the task progress method and we select “based on worklogs and remaining estimate”.

Changing the task progress settings to “based on remaining estimate vs. original estimate” will change the progress calculation. In this case, the earned original estimate per issue is calculated as from the progress of each JIRA issue multiplied by the original estimate.

Using different effort fields

Progress calculation with story points as the effort field

When the effort field of the Folio is set to story points, a progressive calculation is not available unless you enable the EVM calculation method. This means that when story points are selected as the effort field, the progress calculation is based on the work package (or 0/100) approach. This applies for any other numeric JIRA fields as the effort field.

Tempo Budgets will by default consider all resolved issues as a finished (completed or earned) working package. Optionally, you can also define JIRA issue statuses as defined complete state of your work packages. From the configuration setup in this example, we consider only resolved issues as a completed work package

Progress calculation with issue count as the effort field

When the effort field of the Folio is set to issue count, a progressive calculation is not available unless you enable the EVM calculation method. This means that when issue count is selected as the effort field, the progress calculation is based on the work package (or 0/100) approach. Selecting issue count as the effort field will ignore all estimation fields on the JIRA issues and assume that all issues have an equal impact on the progress.

Tempo Budgets will by default consider all resolved issues as a finished (completed or earned) working package. Optionally, you can also define JIRA issue statuses as defined complete state of your work packages.

Portfolio progress calculation

The progress calculation of a portfolio follows another approach. The Portfolio progress does not look at the issue progress of the Folios included in the portfolio. Instead, the portfolio progress calculation method is based on the progress of the included Folios and it is weighing the progress according to the planned cost of the Folio. The basic formula of the Portfolio progress is:

(Progress Folio 1 x Planned cost Folio 1 + Progress Folio 2 x Planned cost Folio 2 + ...) / Planned cost of the Portfolio