This guide is for PMO and Delivery Operations leaders who need a clear, repeatable way to understand predictability, cross-team flow, and portfolio risk. It highlights the LinearB views that connect plans → actuals → delivery constraints, so you can run better planning cycles, reduce surprises, and support executive decisions with evidence.
Time required: 10–15 minutes to orient, 30–45 minutes to define a recurring cadence
Difficulty: Easy
TL;DR – What to use first
- Teams → Iterations (Current + Completed) to see planned vs. delivered, carryover, and unplanned work by team.
- Metrics → Delivery to understand where flow is slowing (coding, pickup, review, merge) and how that affects predictability.
- Project Delivery Trackers to track initiative / project health across teams and spot schedule risk early.
- Resource Allocation / Investment Strategy to confirm where FTE time is actually going vs. your portfolio plan.
- AI summaries & reports to turn trends into concise, repeatable updates for planning and business reviews.
Overview
Your job is to make sure the organization is building the right things, in a predictable way, with clear visibility from initiative down to iteration. LinearB helps by connecting:
- Project / initiative plans from your project management tool
- Git and PR activity from your repos
- Iteration patterns and flow metrics across teams
This guide helps you:
- See how plans, execution, and bottlenecks line up across teams.
- Identify where unplanned work and scope churn are eroding predictability.
- Track initiative-level progress and risk in one place.
- Validate whether allocation and investment match priorities (where enabled).
- Run a simple operating rhythm that feeds planning, QBRs, and roadmap updates.
What you likely care about
- Are we delivering what we committed to this sprint / iteration / increment?
- Which initiatives or projects are off track, and why?
- How much unplanned work is consuming capacity and putting roadmaps at risk?
- Where does the flow actually slow down (coding, review, merge)?
- Are we investing effort where the business expects (by product, initiative, or category)?
- How do we create a repeatable, evidence-based planning loop instead of anecdotal debates?
Where to spend time in LinearB
1. Teams → Iterations (Current & Completed)
Why: This is your planning quality and predictability view.
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Current Iteration
- See what was planned vs. what is actually moving.
- Spot scope creep, unplanned work, and likely carryover early.
- Use this in planning / standup forums with EMs and PMs to make explicit tradeoffs.
-
Completed Iterations
- Review planned vs. delivered, unplanned work, and carryover trends.
- Identify teams consistently over-committing or overloaded.
- Use patterns to adjust capacity assumptions and iteration / PI planning rules.
If AI Iteration Summary is enabled, use it to:
- Get a fast narrative of each iteration (wins, risks, patterns).
- Anchor retros and planning discussions on data plus summary, not memory alone.
2. Metrics → Delivery
Why: This is your flow and bottleneck view across teams.
- See Cycle Time broken down into stages (Coding, Pickup, Review, Deploy / Merge).
- Identify systemic bottlenecks (for example, review consistently slow across multiple teams).
- Compare teams and time periods to see where changes in flow are driving schedule risk.
- Use this to explain why commitments slipped (review queues, oversized PRs, long deploy times) and where to focus improvement.
3. Project Delivery Trackers
Why: This is your initiative / project-level health view.
- Track progress, scope, and risk for key projects and initiatives.
- See how much work is done, in progress, and at risk across contributing teams.
- Use status plus underlying metrics to prepare portfolio and steering-committee reviews:
- What changed since last review?
- Where is risk increasing?
- Which teams or stages are the constraint?
Pair this with Iterations and Delivery to answer:
“Is this project off track because of scope, capacity, or flow?”
4. Resource Allocation & Investment Strategy
Why: These views connect capacity and investment decisions to actual work.
-
Resource Allocation
- See where FTE time is actually going (projects, epics, initiatives, categories).
- Check whether actual effort matches your portfolio priorities.
- Spot over-investment or under-investment in specific streams.
-
Investment Strategy Report
- See category-level breakdown (for example, new feature vs. maintenance vs. infrastructure).
- Track strategic balance over time and align with finance / planning.
Use these views before and after planning cycles to validate that allocation decisions stuck, and where you need to rebalance.
5. DORA & reliability metrics (if configured)
Why: DORA metrics provide stability and reliability context for your portfolio.
- Use Deployment Frequency and Lead Time to see how quickly work reaches users.
- Use Change Failure Rate (CFR) and MTTR to ensure speed is not undermining reliability.
- Combine these signals with iteration and project views to explain why roadmap dates are safe or fragile.
Quick-start checklist – PMO / Delivery Ops
Your starter signal set:
- 1–2 key initiatives or programs you are responsible for.
- 2–4 teams that are critical to those initiatives.
- A recent timeframe (for example, last 2–3 iterations or last 30–60 days).
- Open Teams → Iterations (Completed) for the selected teams.
Note patterns in planned vs. delivered, carryover, and unplanned work. - Switch to Teams → Iterations (Current).
Identify early risk signals: rising unplanned work, scope creep, or likely carryover this cycle. - Open Metrics → Delivery for the same timeframe.
Identify 1–2 common bottleneck stages across those teams (for example, review, pickup). - If Project Delivery Trackers are enabled, open the trackers for your top initiatives.
Check status vs. plan, and see which teams or stages are driving risk. - If Resource Allocation / Investment Strategy is enabled, confirm whether FTE time distribution matches what you expect for these initiatives.
- Capture a one-slide summary:
- 1–2 key risks (for example, unplanned work, review bottleneck, misaligned allocation).
- 1 small improvement you will pilot next cycle (for example, commit rule, WIP limit, review focus).
This becomes the basis for your planning and portfolio conversations.
Metrics to prioritize
Focus on a small, durable set:
- Planned vs. delivered work per iteration (per team).
- Unplanned work and carryover trends (as surfaced in Iterations).
- Cycle Time with stage context (especially review and pickup).
- Work in progress and large-batch patterns that drive variability.
- FTE allocation by initiative / category (where enabled).
- DORA metrics (where configured) as stability and risk indicators.
Recommended PMO / Delivery Ops operating rhythm
Weekly / per iteration
- Review Teams → Iterations (Current) with EMs / PMs for critical teams:
- Flag scope creep, unplanned work, and likely carryover.
- Agree on mid-iteration tradeoffs to protect priorities.
- Check Metrics → Delivery for notable stage bottlenecks affecting current work.
End of sprint / iteration
- Use Teams → Iterations (Completed):
- Compare planned vs. delivered.
- Look at carryover and unplanned work sources.
- If AI Iteration Summary is enabled, use it to accelerate retro prep and document 1–2 system-level learnings per team.
Monthly
- Review Project Delivery Trackers for key initiatives:
- Adjust status, risk, and expectations based on actuals.
- Review Resource Allocation / Investment Strategy :
- Validate that effort is aligned with your portfolio.
- Use Metrics → Delivery to check whether recent process changes are improving flow.
Quarterly / per planning cycle
- Use Iterations, Delivery, and Allocation to:
- Inform capacity assumptions and load per team.
- Align initiative scope and dates with reality.
- Identify where platform or process investments are needed to support the next cycle.
Common pitfalls
- Treating LinearB as only an engineering dashboard instead of a planning feedback loop.
- Looking at one iteration in isolation instead of trends across cycles.
- Focusing only on “on time / late” labels without understanding flow bottlenecks.
- Ignoring unplanned work and intake discipline, then being surprised by missed commitments.
- Running planning and QBRs without closing the loop on actual allocation and flow.