Estimating how long work will take
For anyone asked 'how long will that take?': office, operations, finance, IT and support staff, coordinators and team members who plan their own or a small team's tasks. No prerequisites; basic arithmetic is enough. You'll break work into tasks small enough to estimate, including the checking, waiting and handover steps people forget; estimate from past actuals or similar jobs and write down the basis and assumptions; give a range instead of a single optimistic number; turn effort hours into a realistic finish date using your real available hours, working days and holidays; and track actuals so you re-estimate early. Grounded in the US Government Accountability Office's Schedule Assessment Guide, applied to everyday work. If you estimate customer projects and quotes, follow on with 'Estimating MSP projects: scope, assumptions and contingency'. Ends with a supervisor-graded planning exercise.
- Level
- Intermediate
- Length
- About 75 minutes
- Contents
- 5 lessons · final exam
- Status
- Published · updated 10 Oct 2026
Skills you'll practise
- Break a piece of work into tasks small enough to estimate, including checking, waiting and handover steps
- Estimate a task's effort from past actuals or a similar job, and write down the basis and assumptions
- Give an estimate as a range (best case, most likely, worst case) instead of a single optimistic number
- Calculate a realistic finish date from effort hours, your available hours per day, working days and holidays
- Track actual time against the estimate and re-estimate early when the remaining work changes
Course outline
- 1.Break a piece of work into tasks small enough to estimate, including checking, waiting and handover stepsLesson · 12 min
- 2.Estimate a task's effort from past actuals or a similar job, and write down the basis and assumptionsLesson · 13 min
- 3.Give an estimate as a range (best case, most likely, worst case) instead of a single optimistic numberLesson · 13 min
- 4.Calculate a realistic finish date from effort hours, your available hours per day, working days and holidaysLesson · 13 min
- 5.Track actual time against the estimate and re-estimate early when the remaining work changesLesson · 12 min
- 6.Estimating how long work will take: knowledge checkKnowledge check · 13 questions
- 7.Estimating how long work will take: practical exerciseKnowledge check · 1 question
- 8.Final exam10 questions · passing it completes the course, so people who already know the material can test out
Sources it draws on
The lessons and questions are written from these references, so learners can go back to the original.
See it with your own jobs and topics
Tell us about your team and we'll walk you through setup, from choosing jobs to your first skills check.