Story Points

Biological Parallel

Ant colonies estimate task size using relative difficulty, not absolute time—moving a cricket carcass is 'large' (requires 20 ants), a seed is 'small' (1-2 ants), regardless of how long it takes in minutes. This relative sizing handles uncertainty: a seed buried in sand might take longer than expected, but it's still a 'small' task relative to the cricket. Story points mirror this logic: estimating in relative complexity (fibonacci: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8) rather than hours accommodates variability and avoids false precision. Both systems recognize that effort estimation is comparative pattern-matching, not stopwatch prediction.