Definition:
Cycle Time or Flow time is the amount of time taken to get the work done. Specifically, in Agile Development Cycle time is the time taken to move one feature from ‘Next Ten Features’ to ‘Ready for Acceptance Test’. Cycle Time is very easy to measure.
Each feature is selected to be among the next ten features in the product along with the start date. When the feature reaches to the stage of ‘Ready for Acceptance Test”, the time taken to finish or the date, is noted down, against the elapsed days allotted for that feature in a spreadsheet. Similarly, the time taken is noted down for all the other features in a control chart, where each bar gives a visual representation of time taken to finish each feature. This bar graph is useful for predicting how long it takes to deliver a feature. It gives a great sense of horrified awe, when a company starts visualizing, because most of the times people don’t realize how long things really take!
Further Reading:
Book: Lean from the Trenches: Managing large scale projects with Kanban by Henrick Kniberg