📩 Why You Need a Kanban Board: Improving Workflow and Productivity
Kanban is a scheduling system for lean and just-in-time manufacturing that was developed by Taiichi Ohno, an industrial engineer at Toyota, to improve manufacturing efficiency.
The Kanban goal is to ensure that each part of the product or project is built and prioritized with the same level of care at every step, and it focuses on status rather than due dates. A Kanban board is used to organize and prioritize the flow or queue with transparency and accountability. Each task moves through different stages, such as TO DO, DOING, and DONE.
Having a Kanban board allows the team to track what is in progress easily and check the next backlog item or impediments or blockers. By creating a visual model of the team’s workflow, the board increases transparency, collaboration, and communication. Work in progress (WIP) limits are agreed upon by the development team before a project begins and are enforced by the team’s facilitator to prevent bottlenecks in software development.
Kanban also promotes focus, inspection, and failing. By focusing on one task or iteration at a time, the iteration is finished exactly when it is most needed. Inspection helps track flow, velocity, and quality. Failing fast and validating learnings is essential for continuous improvement.
To start with Kanban, you need to choose a physical or electronic board, prepare sticky notes or cards, a backlog list, a pen, and a person or team responsible for each deliverable. Electronic Kanban boards offer several software options to choose from, and there are some free Kanban board software available. Check the entire article to learn more!
Why do You Need a Kanban Board?
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Thaisa Fernandes
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