Dot voting is usually considered a decision-making tool, not an agile estimation technique. For example Dot Voting is preferred to select the most important 2-3 items during sprint retrospective. It’s a simple and effective way to prioritize or indicate the value of several small items quickly. When there is a relatively small set of items and you don’t want any complex techniques, In this method each team member gets a small number of dots in the form of stickers and uses them as votes to indicate the size and importance of an item. The more votes an item gets, the bigger its size, and the higher its priority.

1. Planning Poker – Agile Estimation Method
2. Bucket System – Agile Estimation Method
3. Affinity Estimation – Agile Estimation Method
4. Dot Voting – Agile Estimation Method
5. White Elephant Sizing – Agile Estimation Method

Dot Voting Steps

• All user stories are put on a wall, virtual or real by the Product Owner.
• Every team member is given 4-5 votes; these can be small round sticky notes.
• Every team member is asked to give their votes on the stories they think are bigger.
• Team member puts/pastes the round red sticky notes on the stories they think are big in size.
• Every team member performs this process until their all 4-5 votes are exhausted/used. At the end of this process, the story with higher votes is termed as biggest and that with low number of votes are smallest.
• Product owner then orders the story from higher votes to lower votes.
• One person can vote more than once for one story.
• Same technique is used to decide priority as well. More votes means higher priority item.

Sometimes It might be the case where the order is difficult to decide or stakeholders are not happy about the order. In this case, the user stories are divided in 3 groups after the discussions: high priority, low priority, and medium priority. High priority user stories are posted on the wall to receive the votes. This is done until the final order is achieved with the agreement of all stakeholders.

Reasons for Effectiveness

1. Since participants do not need to deliver a comparative judgment of each option, this method is quick and effective.
2. Out of the long litany of options available in the table, Dot Voting methodology leverages the collective wisdom of the team to ensure an increased focus on the most crucial issues of the project.

Summary

Dot Voting is a good alternative to Planning Poker or Bucket System as it’s a simple and effective way to prioritize or indicate the value of several small items quickly.