Set up your space

IN THIS ARTICLE

Step by step guide for setting up your new space

1. Take the welcome tour

Once you’ve created your space, you will be redirected into your first deal, and given the option to take a quick introductory tour.

Welcome tour
Welcome tour

This tour includes a walk-though of the built-in sample deal.

Sample deal
Sample deal

Once you have completed the tour, you can explore the sample deal, or navigate to the Pipeline to access additional guides and resources.

2. Setup your rate card

Before you can create a proper deal, you should define a rate card. To access your rate card, either start the Roles tour in the Getting Started panel, or navigate to Roles in the main navigation.

Rate cards contain all your resources (people), and their cost, price and margin.

The roles screen
The roles screen

Add a role

To add a role, click New role and enter the role name and cost per day (or other time period).

Adding a role
Adding a role

By default, Estii will automatically calculate the price and margin based on the margin and pricing rules defined on the rate card. You can override the calculated value by setting an explicit price on individual roles.

Settings

  • Normal margin is the default margin used to calculate the default price per role
  • Low and high margin are used to warn users if explicit price exceeds the target margin. They are also used to allow minor adjustments to the rate card within a deal.
Rate card margin
Rate card margin

Import existing roles

You can also import existing roles and rate cards from a csv file by clicking Import

Import roles dialog
Import roles dialog

3. Create a stream

Streams are groups of roles that work together on common activities or deliverables.

To access your streams navigate to Streams in the main navigation.

Streams allow you to define standard allocations or ratios of roles to use across deals. These can be used to create loaded resources or teams, or to define common deliverables or dependencies (like individual device types or platforms) .

Within a deal, Estii keeps track of all the estimates associated with a Stream, so that you can view their total value, and easily add or remove them from scope without breaking dependencies.

Empty streams page
Empty streams page

Click New stream to open the stream window, and enter a name

Creating a stream
Creating a stream

Allocate roles and their percentage to the stream. Estii will automatically calculate the overall price and margin.

Stream roles
Stream roles

You can also allocate other streams to abstract loaded resources, or create more complex dependencies

A stream containing another stream
A stream containing another stream

4. Create a product

Products are unit-based resources

To access your products navigate to Products in the main navigation.

Products
Products

5. Adjust estimation settings

There are a number of global estimation settings in Settings > Estimation

  • Default currency
  • Capacity (hours per day/week/year)
  • Contingency (loading per risk level)
  • Work unit (days or hours)

Contingency

Contingency is a percentage added to raw estimates to cover the cost of "known unknown" risk that would likely result in additional costs.

Contingency is defined as a range between low, normal, and high that is automatically added to features based on their risk profile (low, normal, high)

Contingency settings
Contingency settings

Capacity

Capacity is the number of hours to allocate per day, week and year. It impacts the the calculation of day rates and schedules.

Capacity settings
Capacity settings

Work unit

The preferred unit for estimation and rate cards (day or hour)

Work unit settings
Work unit settings

6. Invite members to your space

A Member is a user with access to your space.

To invite a member:

  1. Navigate to Settings > Members and enter their email
  2. Enter the invitees email address in the box
  3. Select a permission level
  4. Click Invite member
Adding a member
Adding a member

Congrats, you've finished setting up your space and are now ready to create some deals!