Story points. Planning poker. Three-hour refinement sessions debating whether something is a 5 or an 8. Velocity charts that somehow never help you answer the only question anyone actually cares about: "When will it be done?"

It's estimation theater — and it's exhausting.

Here's the good news: you can stop. You can answer your boss's questions about delivery dates and scope without story points, without velocity, and without the endless debates. The secret is flow metrics and statistical forecasting.

In this session, we'll explore how throughput, cycle time, and work-in-progress data give you everything you need to forecast delivery — no estimation required. You'll learn how Monte Carlo simulations use your team's actual historical performance to answer "when will these 20 items be done?" and "how much can we deliver by March?" with real probability ranges, not gut feelings dressed up as math.

We'll walk through the concepts, the metrics, and the mechanics. You'll see how to pull the data from your existing tools, run the simulations, and present forecasts that leadership actually understands. No PhD required.

If you've ever wanted to skip the estimation rituals and still have confident answers about delivery, this talk is for you.

You will learn:

• How throughput and cycle time provide forecasting power without story point estimation
• How to apply Monte Carlo simulations to answer "when" and "how much" questions using historical team data
• How to present probabilistic forecasts to stakeholders in a way that builds confidence and manages expectations