Test your knowledge: Time estimation
1. What are the benefits of providing accurate time estimates for individual tasks? Select all that apply.
- They enable you to avoid purchasing expensive project management software.
- They help you accurately track task progress.
- They help you predict if a milestone may go over a deadline.
- They establish a better sense of the overall project timeline.
2. As a project manager, you try to get an accurate time estimate for a task by communicating with an expert. After considering their time estimate, you are unsure if it includes all steps of a task, so you ask them to explain each step in detail.
What strategy for getting an accurate time estimate did you choose?
- Assess the expert’s confidence level in their estimate.
- Ask the expert how likely they think it is that an assumption might not work out and how it would affect their estimate.
- Check the expert’s understanding of the task.
- Check the expert’s estimates against the actual time spent on similar tasks in previous work.
3. As a project manager, you try to get an accurate time estimate for a task by communicating with an expert. After receiving their time estimate, you ask questions like, “What equipment do you suppose you’ll have?” and “How many people do you expect to work on the task?”
What strategy for getting an accurate time estimate did you choose?
- Ask the expert how likely it is that assumptions they have might not work out and how it would affect their estimate.
- Check the expert’s estimates against the actual time spent on similar tasks in previous work.
- Discuss the assumptions the expert may be making when they give an estimate.
- Assess the expert’s confidence level in their estimate.
4. As a project manager, you try to get an accurate time estimate for a task by communicating with an expert. You ask them to think back to a task that resembles the one for this project and describe what was the same, what was different, and if thinking about this previous task changes their estimate.
What strategy for getting an accurate time estimate did you choose?
- Ask the expert how likely they think it is that their assumptions might not work out and how it would affect their estimate.
- Check their understanding of the task.
- Check the expert’s estimates against the actual time spent on similar tasks.
- Discuss the assumptions the expert may be making when they give an estimate.
5. What type of time estimate considers how long it takes to complete a task, plus the time it takes to test the product?
- Effort estimate
- Conservative estimate
- Timeline estimate
- Total duration estimate
