Cycle Time Scatterplot
Assess your performance. Analyze cycle time trends. Forecast task delivery times.
Assess your performance. Analyze cycle time trends. Forecast task delivery times.
In the Cycle Time Scatterplot, each data point corresponds to an individual completed task on your Kanban board. Thе chart tells you when tasks have been finished and how long they have taken to complete. The height of the dots represents their cycle times - the higher the dot, the longer it took for that task to be delivered.
By observing and analyzing your cycle times, you can evaluate how quickly you are delivering value to your customers. The goal is to reduce the delivery times to an optimal level for your team.
By clicking on each dot, you will be able to see more task details including the type of the task and a direct link to it on your management platform. You can also perform an analysis of the time that the task has spent in each process state.
Tasks with the same cycle time and delivery date will be clustered together. Click on the dot and expand the list of details to analyze them individually.
The Cycle Time Scatterplot uses the cycle times of all tasks completed within a specific time frame to give you a probabilistic task completion forecast. The dotted horizontal lines stretching across the graph are called percentile lines. We use percentiles to establish service level agreements and define the probability of different commitment points being met. A higher percentile means there's a greater chance of completing an assignment on time.
You can filter your data by task type or class of service. That way you can provide different SLAs for the different types of tasks you’re committing to.
By using the “Process Metrics” data table on the Cycle Time Scatterplot, you can assess your cycle times and the probabilities that come with each of them. This view represents your team performance.
You can evaluate the cycle times that come with each percentile for each process state to evaluate which step in your workflow has the biggest impact on your performance.
The dotted green line stretching across the graph is your cycle time trendline. It uses polynomial regression to plot how your cycle time trend has been moving over the selected time period.
If the trendline goes up, this means that your team is struggling to deliver results. To avoid tasks being forgotten or left idle, consider implementing explicit policies to swarm tasks if they pass certain percentile lines.
By using the ‘Percentiles’ widget on the Cycle Time Scatterplot, you can observe how your cycle times and their probabilities change over time. Ideally, the percentile lines should stay close to each other, while slightly going down. This means that your workflow is efficient and your team delivers value at a consistent pace.
If the lines go up, the first thing to look at is your work in progress. Apply WIP limits to your workflow steps and make sure everyone respects them!
The Cycle Time Scatterplot enables you to quickly identify and analyze single tasks that strike out on their own. These are often forgotten or neglected tasks in the process. Tasks that have significantly longer cycle times are good candidates for a closer examination to identify process impediments.
Look for patterns in your data! Gaps, high variability, clusters of dots or a progressively growing triangle shape are warning signs that there are bottlenecks on your workflow that need to be taken care of.