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2.2.5.3

Concept · under Schedule management

Story points, velocity and burn charts for the PMP® exam

Story points size backlog items relative to each other, velocity turns a team's completed points into a forecast of its own delivery, and burn charts plot progress against scope over time. Put that data on a board or chart where the team and visitors pass by, kept current by the team, and you have an information radiator: status for whoever looks, without a report or a meeting.

Exam
PMP
Domain
Process
Domain weight
41%
Packages
9
Updated
Oct 13, 2026

01The vocabulary, sorted

Story point
A relative size for a backlog item that folds effort, complexity and uncertainty into one number. For this team, a 5 is about two and a half times a 2. The scale belongs to the team that set it.
Planning poker
Estimators reveal their cards at the same moment, then the highest and lowest explain their reasoning before the next round. The simultaneous reveal keeps the first number spoken from anchoring everyone else.
Velocity
The points a team completes per iteration, averaged over recent iterations. It forecasts that team's own delivery and nothing else.
Burndown chart
Work remaining plotted over time, falling toward zero.
Burnup chart
Work completed rising toward a separate total-scope line. Added scope moves the top line, so progress and scope growth stay distinguishable.
WIP limit
On a kanban board, a cap on how many items a workflow column may hold at once. A full column means finishing something before pulling anything new.

02Forecasting a release from velocity

Say the last three sprints closed 33, 29 and 31 points, an average of 31, and 186 points remain in the release. At the average, 186 / 31 = 6 sprints. At the slowest recent pace, 186 / 29 ≈ 6.4; at the fastest, 186 / 33 ≈ 5.6.

Report six to seven sprints. Round partial sprints up, because a sprint is a timebox you either have or do not, and give the range rather than the single average; the spread is information the sponsor needs.

03Where these artifacts connect

The 2026 content outline adds graphic-based questions (PMI® ECO, as of October 2026), so expect to read a burn chart off the screen as well as define one.

Release forecasting is one part of schedule management. Points size the work; value decides its order. Ordering the backlog by value is covered in value-based and incremental delivery. Boards and burn charts are also status artifacts, and how they fit reporting and closure is on project status, artifacts and closure. When these artifacts run alongside a predictive baseline, see predictive, agile and hybrid approaches.

04Read the team's numbers

Treat every chart and figure here as one team's own data.

Work packages 9

  1. WP 01An agile release plan requires a clear reforecast trigger rule. Which rule best balances sensitivity and stakeholder confidence?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: A clear threshold plus a persistence condition triggers a reforecast only on a real trend, so forecasts stay stable yet responsive.
    2. BReforecasting every sprint reacts to normal noise and erodes confidence.
    3. CNever reforecasting ignores empirical data, which defeats adaptive planning.
    4. DA rule that depends on one person's request is not something stakeholders can rely on.
  2. WP 02The team treats story points as fixed hours. What is the best corrective action?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: Planning from the team's own historical velocity lets points work as relative size and removes the need to convert them to hours.
    2. BAdding buffer to points-as-hours keeps the original misconception.
    3. CFixing one point at eight hours formalizes the error.
    4. DDropping velocity gives up the empirical forecast that relative sizing makes possible.
  3. WP 03A project team is using story points to estimate the effort required for various product backlog items. What is the primary advantage of this estimation technique?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ANo estimating technique guarantees exact time, and story points are not meant to.
    2. BStory points are set in team estimation sessions such as planning poker.
    3. CCorrect: Story points compare items by relative effort, complexity and uncertainty, which is faster and often more reliable than estimating exact hours.
    4. DAn estimate does not ensure work finishes inside the timebox.
  4. WP 04A project team is using velocity as a metric to forecast completion dates. If the team has completed 120 story points in 6 iterations and has 200 story points remaining, approximately how many more iterations will be needed to complete the project?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: Velocity = 120 / 6 = 20 points per iteration, so 200 / 20 = 10 more iterations.
    2. B20 is the velocity, not the number of iterations left.
    3. C6 is the number of iterations already completed.
    4. D12 does not follow from these figures.
  5. WP 05In an agile project, the team is planning to use a burndown chart to track progress. What information does a burndown chart provide to the team?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: A burndown chart plots work remaining over time, and its slope shows how fast work is being completed.
    2. BDefect counts per iteration belong in a quality chart.
    3. CResource utilization is a capacity view, not what a burndown shows.
    4. DCost variance comes from earned value analysis, not a burndown chart.
  6. WP 06A project team is using a kanban board to manage their workflow. Which of the following metrics would be MOST useful for identifying process bottlenecks?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: Cycle time shows how long items take to move through the flow, and where items slow down reveals the bottleneck.
    2. BVelocity measures how much the team completes per iteration, not where work gets stuck.
    3. CA burn-up rate shows progress against total scope, not delays at particular stages.
    4. DStory point estimation sizes work before it starts and measures nothing about flow.
  7. WP 07A project team is experiencing workflow issues with tasks being started but not completed, causing bottlenecks. Which technique from Lean or Kanban methodologies would BEST address this problem?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACorrect: WIP limits cap the work in progress, so the team finishes items before starting new ones and bottlenecks become visible.
    2. BMore people do not fix a flow problem and may add coordination overhead.
    3. CMore detailed descriptions do not stop work from piling up in progress.
    4. DMore status meetings report the bottleneck without removing it.
  8. WP 08A project manager is leading a software development project using an agile approach. The team has been working in two-week iterations but is consistently failing to complete all committed work. What should the project manager recommend?

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. AAdding people mid-stream usually slows a team down at first.
    2. BLonger iterations let more work pile up; they do not fix overcommitment.
    3. CCorrect: Commit to what demonstrated velocity says the team can deliver, which builds predictability; capacity can grow once delivery is reliable.
    4. DOvertime breaks sustainable pace and leads to burnout and lower quality.
  9. WP 09A sponsor looks at the release burndown, sees remaining work barely moving for four sprints, and concludes that the team has stalled. Based on the data in the exhibit, which conclusion is correct?

    Exhibit for WP 09

    SprintCompleted (cumulative points)Total scope (points)
    130240
    258262
    387290
    4115316

    Debrief answer to open the notes

    1. ACumulative completion rises by 30, 28, 29 and 28 points a sprint, so velocity is steady; the flat line comes from scope growth, not a stall.
    2. BCorrect: velocity holds near 29 points while total scope grows by 22, 28 and 26 points; a burnup chart would show both lines rising.
    3. CMeasuring against the original 240 points hides 76 points of added scope, which is exactly what the sponsor needs to see and decide on.
    4. DTotal scope grew from 240 to 316 points; the estimates are not what keeps the burndown flat.

Open a row to answer. Keys: 1–4 or A–D answer, N opens the next row.

05Agile estimating, briefly

Should velocity rise every sprint?

A stable velocity is the useful kind, because it makes forecasts trustworthy. A sudden jump usually means the team re-sized its points, and a target for velocity tends to produce exactly that.

What separates a sprint burndown from a release burndown?

Scope and time scale. A sprint burndown covers the work committed for one iteration and resets every sprint. A release burndown tracks the release backlog across sprints.

Do kanban teams use story points?

Often they do not. Many forecast from throughput, the number of items finished per week, and track cycle time, how long one item takes from start to done. WIP limits keep that flow steady enough to forecast.