The Phantom Sprint — Invisible Work That Steals Velocity Your sprint looks healthy — until a phantom dependency eats your finish line. Here’s how to find the invisible work before the demo. Detection & prevention tactics Dependency board : visible KANBAN lane for external asks with owners and ETA. Capacity buffer : protect 10–20% of sprint for unplanned but likely work. Pre-planning checkpoint : 5-min readout with ops/support to surface recurring interrupts. Risk register : short public list of items that can block sprint goals.
