Kanban: Visual Flow Management
Kanban is an Agile framework focused on visualizing work, limiting work-in-progress (WIP), and improving the flow of tasks through a system. Originating from lean manufacturing, Kanban helps teams deliver value continuously by making bottlenecks visible and encouraging incremental, evolutionary change.
Core Principles
- Start with what you do now: Apply Kanban to existing processes without disruptive changes.
- Pursue incremental change: Evolve practices gradually and continuously.
- Respect current roles and responsibilities: Improve collaboratively without forced role changes.
- Encourage leadership at all levels: Everyone participates in continuous improvement.
Key Roles (Actors)
Kanban is role-agnostic compared to Scrum. However, certain responsibilities are common:
- Service Delivery Manager: Facilitates flow of work and monitors metrics.
- Team Members: Pull work, update the board, and collaborate to remove bottlenecks.
- Stakeholders / Customers: Provide input, requirements, and feedback on delivered value.
Core Components
- Kanban Board: Visualizes the workflow, typically with columns like To Do, In Progress, and Done.
- Work Items / Cards: Represent individual tasks or features moving through the board.
- Work-in-Progress (WIP) Limits: Caps on the number of tasks per column to maintain flow and avoid overload.
- Policies & Definition of Done: Explicit agreements on how work is pulled and completed.
- Metrics: Flow efficiency, lead time, cycle time, and throughput for continuous improvement.
Key Practices / Ceremonies
- Daily Kanban / Stand-up: Team reviews the board, identifies blockers, and plans to maintain flow.
- Replenishment / Commitment Meeting: Decide which items enter the board when capacity allows.
- Delivery Planning: Review upcoming releases and delivery expectations.
- Operations Review: Inspect performance metrics and agree on process improvements.
- Retrospectives: Optional but common to capture lessons and improvements.
By making work visible and managing flow, Kanban empowers teams to reduce cycle times, improve predictability, and steadily increase delivery performance.