Impact on Velocity

[Daniel J. Pinter]

During our sprint planning I did the following:

1. The team discussed a story (Story-A) and determined that it belonged in the next sprint. I moved that story to the next sprint on the Backlog page.
2. Further discussion determined that the story wasn't needed. I rejected the story without erasing the value in the Sprint field. This removed Story-A from the sprint's section on the Backlog page and updated the upcoming sprint's total points.
3. The team finished discussing the remaining stories, so I kicked off the new sprint with a total point value of 86. This total did not include Story-A.

I then noticed that the Story-A was in the sprint's "Done" column on the sprint's team board.

What is the impact on velocity if I delete the value in the Sprint field on that story?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist- · Accepted solution]

That's quite an interesting one.  The basics of the story are that you've done exactly the right thing, and it should not affect your velocity.

There are, of course, two important points in a sprint - starting a sprint says "we are saying we will deliver these issues", and it gets stamped with the estimate of all the issues you have chosen to bring into it.  And ending it gives it the stamp of "what we actually delivered because it's in the done column".

Moving an issue to "done" in the board is the important bit.  But with your cancelled issue, you're doing it before the sprint starts.  Issues in the done column when a sprint starts won't count towards your commitment, they got finished outside a sprint (even if there's no effort expended, just a "nope").  

The commitment is measured on all not-done issues, you've just managed to include a done one in the sprint, which will be ignored because it is done when you start it!