Kanban Development Methodology

The Kanban Development Methodology - Used by Softjourn to manage multiple people working on  multiple projects at the same time.

What is Kanban?

Derived from the combination of two Japanese words, kan ("visual") and ban ("card" or "board"),  it literally means “signboard”. In Kanban the first step is to visualize your current process, just as it is, in order to see where the problems (bottlenecks) are.

The Kanban board is not a control system. But,  rather it is a scheduling system that shows you:

  • what is going on right now and who is doing what and why;
  • what we have done and what we will do next.

Techniques:

  • Set WIP (work in progress) limit for each stage, defining the number of tasks that may be in progress. You should only start new task if there is an empty space on your Kanban board for another “in progress” task. Achieving maximum throughput is the main goal by determining bottlenecks in the system and limiting the work in progress to reduce task context switching and ensure work is completed efficiently and quickly.
  • Provide definition for each column on the board.
  • Create pictures (e.g. magnet avatars) for team members and mark tasks with them.
  • Use multi-color sticky notes for different tasks (bugs, features, etc.)
  • Mark problem tasks with red bullets.

How does Kanban work?

  • Visual control management results in better decisions making.
  • Each task is written on a sticky note and put on the board. Named columns illustrate where each item is in the workflow.  As a result, bottlenecks become clearly visible in real-time so the project owner can always see if a task is stuck and a person needs assistance to sort the problem out.
  • Improves throughput.
  • Higher quality.
  • Daily meeting can be done with many people very quickly
    • Each day we all gather near Kanban board and have few minutes meeting to discuss how things are flowing and review WIP (work in progress). It minimizes reporting and promotes collaboration between team members
  • Not only development teams may use Kanban
    • At Softjourn we started following the Kanban practice with a few internal projects and now we have extended it to admin and marketing projects

Check out how Softjourn realizes Kanban principles in practice!