WSJF Prioritization

Use this skill to run WSJF Prioritization as a practical consulting method, not as a generic framework explanation.

Method Notes

• WSJF means Weighted Shortest Job First.
• Core formula: WSJF = Cost of Delay / Job Size.
• Cost of Delay is commonly estimated as three additive components: Cost of Delay = User/Business Value + Time Criticality + (Risk Reduction or Opportunity Enablement). The last component is one combined term, not division.
• Use relative scoring for comparison. Do not pretend the numbers are precise financial forecasts unless real financial data is available.
• Revisit WSJF when market timing, risk, dependency, or job size changes.
• Job Size must be strictly positive and use the same sizing basis across jobs. Leave jobs with Job Size <= 0 unscored and request corrected estimates. Do not substitute epsilon or another artificial denominator.
• Identify mandatory requirements, deadlines and dependency feasibility before sequencing; apply WSJF within a feasible sequence. Mandatory does not mean universally first: respect prerequisite order and report infeasible deadlines instead of presenting an impossible sequence.
• Preserve source status: describe something as approved or validated only for the specific object explicitly established by the source. Approval of relative scoring anchors does not approve job identifiers, the recommended sequence, or execution. Label provided jobs and scores as supplied unless their source establishes more; calculate with supplied comparable values and do not add an approval prerequisite for calculation.

Required Inputs

Collect or infer these inputs before execution:

• candidate jobs or backlog items
• user/business value estimate
• time criticality estimate
• risk reduction or opportunity enablement estimate
• job size estimate

If an input is missing, do not block automatically. Mark it as missing, state the assumption used, and add a validation action.

When Not To Use

Do not use WSJF when options are too vague to size, when the work is purely exploratory with no meaningful delay cost, or when a hard dependency makes sequencing mathematically irrelevant. Use effort-impact-matrix first if the items are still broad themes.

Step-by-Step Execution

Output Template

### 1. Method Frame
- Decision / question:
- Scope:
- Scoring scale:
- Evidence used:
- Key assumptions:

### 2. WSJF Scoring Table
| Job | User / business value | Time criticality | Risk reduction / opportunity enablement | Cost of Delay | Job Size | WSJF | Confidence | Notes |
|---|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---|---|
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |

### 3. Recommended Sequence
1.
2.
3.

### 4. Caveats
- Dependency constraints:
- Low-confidence estimates:
- What would change the ranking:

### 5. Next Action
- First job to start:
- Owner:
- Validation signal:

Quality Gate

• Every job must be normalized before scoring.
• Cost of Delay must include time sensitivity, not only generic importance.
• Job Size must reflect delivery effort or duration, not business value.
• Do not let sunk cost influence the score.
• If two jobs have similar WSJF scores, prefer the one with higher confidence, fewer blocking dependencies, or faster learning value.
• Keep wording professional and plain enough that a smart non-specialist can use it without translation.