How do we manage the Resource Capacity of an Agile team when they are also doing maintenance work?

All answers to this question.

You need to implement a "Capacity Split" during your sprint planning. Most high-performing teams reserve a percentage of their velocity—usually 20% to 30%—specifically for "Maintenance and Bugs." If no bugs appear, the team can pull in items from the top of the backlog. However, if a major issue hits, it’s already budgeted for in your capacity. This prevents the "Whack-a-Mole" effect where unplanned work constantly kills your sprint commitment. It also provides the business with a realistic view of how fast features will actually be delivered, as it acknowledges the reality of running live software.

   Answered 2025-12-05 by Angela Davis

Angela, what if the "Bugs" are so frequent that they take up 80% of the capacity? At that point, aren't we just a support team that occasionally does development?

   Answered 2025-12-10 by Michael Reed

• Michael, if your support load is that high, you have a "Technical Debt" problem, not a capacity problem. You need to stop the roadmap entirely for one or two sprints to focus on "Root Cause Analysis" and system stability. I’ve seen teams use a "Rotation" where one person is the designated "Firefighter" for the sprint while the others stay 100% focused on features. This protects the deep-work time for the rest of the team while ensuring that support issues still get the immediate attention they need to keep the customers happy.

     Commented 2025-12-15 by Charles Evans

Use a Kanban board for the maintenance work. It allows for a continuous flow of unplanned tasks while your Scrum team continues their time-boxed sprints for the bigger roadmap items.

   Answered 2025-12-20 by Nicole Young

• This hybrid "Scrumban" approach is very common now. It gives you the structure of Scrum for your projects and the flexibility of Kanban for your day-to-day support issues.

     Commented 2025-12-22 by Brandon Lee