What method helps improve the accuracy of task duration estimates?

• A. Always double the time by default.
• B. Ignore past data and rely on intuition.
• C. Pad estimates by 50%.
• D. Track past task durations and pad estimates by 10-20%.

Answer: (C)

Using past task durations to shape your guesses, with a small safety margin, makes estimates much more reliable. When you track how long similar tasks actually take, you build a realistic baseline that reflects typical time requirements and common slowdowns. Adding a modest padding of about 10–20% gives you a practical buffer for unforeseen hiccups without inflating the estimate too much.

Padding by a fixed large amount, like 50%, ignores whether recent tasks ran shorter or longer than that, and can lead to consistently inflated schedules. Ignoring data entirely and relying on intuition misses real patterns you’ve observed. By grounding estimates in actual history and a reasonable buffer, you create a feedback loop: compare estimates to outcomes, adjust the padding as you gather more data, and steadily improve accuracy over time.