video

Getting started with Kanban.

Published on
Written by Martin Hinshelwood
4 minute read
LinkedIn WhatsApp Twitter Facebook Email

Getting Started with Kanban: A Guide to Initiating Your First Kanban Pilot

Introduction

Kanban is a powerful strategy for improving workflow and enhancing productivity across various industries. Whether you’re in software development, marketing, or any other field, implementing Kanban can help streamline your processes and boost efficiency. This blog post will guide you through the steps to initiate your first Kanban pilot, emphasizing the importance of metrics and collaboration.

Why Kanban?

Kanban’s flexibility and focus on continuous improvement make it an excellent choice for teams looking to optimize their workflows without major disruptions. Here’s why you should consider starting a Kanban pilot:

  • Flexibility: Kanban adapts to your existing workflow, making it less disruptive compared to other methodologies.

  • Continuous Improvement: It promotes ongoing enhancements based on real data and team feedback.

  • Visibility: By visualizing your work, Kanban helps identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement.

Getting Started with Kanban

Starting a Kanban pilot is simpler than you might think. Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you get started:

  1. Pick a Team:

    • Start Small: Select a team that is open to change and willing to experiment with new processes.

    • Engage Stakeholders: Ensure you have the support of key stakeholders who can champion the pilot.

  2. Define Your Workflow:

    • Document Current Processes: Run a workshop to create a definition of workflow. This involves writing down how work currently flows through your system.

    • Agree on Terms: Ensure everyone understands and agrees on the terminology and processes.

  3. Visualize the Workflow:

    • Create a Board: Use tools like JIRA or Azure DevOps to create a digital Kanban board. This board should represent your workflow stages.

    • Set WIP Limits: Establish work-in-progress (WIP) limits for each stage to prevent bottlenecks.

  4. Monitor and Analyze Metrics:

    • Collect Data: Start recording metrics such as cycle time and throughput. Use data analytics tools available in JIRA and Azure DevOps.

    • Identify Outliers: Use cycle time scatterplots to spot anomalies and areas that need improvement.

Using Metrics to Drive Improvement

Metrics are a crucial component of Kanban. They provide insights into how work flows through your system and help identify areas for improvement. Here’s how to leverage metrics effectively:

  • Cycle Time: Measure how long it takes for work to move through your system. This helps identify delays and inefficiencies.

  • Throughput: Track the number of work items completed over a period. This metric indicates your team’s productivity.

  • Scatterplots: Use scatterplots to visualize cycle times and identify outliers. Ask questions during retrospectives about why certain tasks took longer than expected.

Fostering a Culture of Continuous Improvement

Kanban is not just about setting up a board and moving cards. It’s about fostering a culture of continuous improvement:

  • Run Regular Workshops: Regularly revisit and update your definition of workflow. Encourage open discussions and continuous feedback.

  • Ask More Interesting Questions: Use data to drive conversations during team meetings and retrospectives. For example, discuss why certain tasks took longer and what can be done to improve.

  • Encourage Participation: Involve all team members in the process. Their insights and feedback are crucial for refining workflows and making meaningful improvements.

Overcoming Resistance

Implementing Kanban can sometimes meet resistance, especially if team members are accustomed to traditional methods. Here are some tips to overcome this:

  • Start with Metrics: Begin by introducing metrics and using data to highlight areas for improvement. This can help build credibility and demonstrate the value of Kanban.

  • Pilot Approach: Emphasize that it’s a pilot and encourage a mindset of experimentation and learning.

  • Continuous Communication: Keep the lines of communication open. Regularly update the team on progress and celebrate small wins to maintain momentum.

Conclusion

Implementing a Kanban pilot in your organization is easier than you might think. By starting small, defining your workflow, and leveraging metrics, you can initiate a process of continuous improvement that enhances productivity and efficiency. If your current system of work is failing you, now is the time to create and apply a Kanban strategy.

Thanks for reading! If you found this post helpful, please like, follow, and subscribe. I always reply to comments, and if you want to chat about Kanban, agile, or DevOps, feel free to book a coffee with me through Naked Agility.

Recommended Resources:

  • Kanban Training: Check out our Pro Kanban training programs.

  • Consulting Services: Need help implementing Kanban? Our experts are here to guide you.

  • Further Reading: Explore more about Kanban and agile methodologies on our blog.

So how easy is it to get started with Caman? To have a pilot, to try something, it’s super easy. Pick a team, apply a Caman strategy. It’s really that easy. Sometimes it’s difficult to convince people. People behave how they’re measured, so normally it’s the traditional metrics and measures within the organisation that prevent you from doing some of these things. But there are tools out there that can help. Most folks today are probably using either JIRA or Azure DevOps to manage their work, since most of us work from home quite a lot of the time, right? So we don’t have the boards on the wall anymore; we don’t have the opportunity for that.

Using JIRA and Azure DevOps, get access to some of the data analytics, look at some of the data, look at the Caman data, look at the graphs, and see what’s going on in your current system. That’s see what’s going on, and then get together and run a workshop. Run a workshop on defining your definition of workflow, defining how the way it is you work just now. Start to have those conversations, but don’t think—absolutely do not think—you can have a two-hour workshop and then you’re done. That two-hour workshop is just a start for starting people thinking about how they work because most people don’t really understand how they work. They don’t understand how they work because they just do it. They just do it the way they do it. They’ve never had to write it down; they’ve never had to discuss it with each other.

You start having very interesting conversations with the team. That arc of conversations kind of needs to play out, right, in order to get to consensus of this is the way we agree how we work. Once you’ve got that agreement, you’re doing Caman. But you can just start with the metrics, right? Sometimes using metrics to kind of drive people’s behaviours can be super valuable. So if you started recording the cycle time from when work starts to when it finishes in the system and just start looking at that data—how long does work take on average to go through the system? How long does an individual item take to go through the system?

Then you can look at something like a cycle time scatter plot and look for outliers. This is something that you actually don’t need any buy-in from anybody in the team or anybody in the organisation to do. Load the current data from Azure DevOps or JIRA into a tool that lets you visualise the Caman metrics and look at what’s going on. Start asking more interesting questions during your meetings and events that you have with the team. When you see those outliers, that piece of work that took, you know, we do two-week sprints, and there’s a piece of work that took 430 days to complete, right? Ask that question at the retro: why did this take 430 days? What could we have done differently?

That’s asking more and using the data to ask more interesting questions. As you start asking those more interesting questions, hopefully somebody on your team or in your group or a leader will ask, “How do you know? How did you see this? How did you spot these things?” You can start introducing little pieces of Caman, saying, “I’m using this cycle time scatter plot. It’s showing that all of these items are above the 95th percentile; these are the outliers. So I’m asking questions about these and why are they like that, and how do they go together?”

Oh, that’s really cool! Is there any more data like that? Well, yes, there is. You can start having those conversations. So I think it’s very easy to start using Caman in the organisation. All it takes is any individual on the team to start analysing the data and looking and suggesting optimisations for the team, trying to build some credibility so that you can start having discussions about the definition of workflow. You can do it ninja, right? You can say, “Well, how do we pick?” You know, doing the retrospective, “I’m interested in how we all pick the next piece of work we’re going to do.”

Oh, well, I do this, and I do that, and I do the other thing. Start pulling on those threads. Just start pulling on the threads. So ultimately, how easy is it to create a Caman pilot in your organisation? Super easy. Just do it. It just needs one person to start looking at the data, one person to start asking more interesting questions. If your current system of work is failing you, then you would benefit from creating and applying a Caman strategy. Our professional Caman trainers and consultants are ready to help. Don’t wait; the sooner you start, the sooner you’ll improve. Get in touch below.

video Kanban Kanban method Kanban training Kanban coaching Kanban consulting Kanban approach Agile Agile framework Agility Business Agility Agile project management Agile product development
LinkedIn WhatsApp Twitter Facebook Email

Connect with Martin Hinshelwood

If you've made it this far, it's worth connecting with our principal consultant and coach, Martin Hinshelwood, for a 30-minute 'ask me anything' call.

Our Happy Clients​

We partner with businesses across diverse industries, including finance, insurance, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, technology, engineering, transportation, hospitality, entertainment, legal, government, and military sectors.​

Kongsberg Maritime Logo
Alignment Healthcare Logo
Capita Secure Information Solutions Ltd Logo
Emerson Process Management Logo

CR2

Bistech Logo
Epic Games Logo
Philips Logo
Higher Education Statistics Agency Logo
Qualco Logo
Akaditi Logo
Schlumberger Logo
Trayport Logo
Xceptor - Process and Data Automation Logo
Ericson Logo
Flowmaster (a Mentor Graphics Company) Logo
Jack Links Logo
Teleplan Logo
Department of Work and Pensions (UK) Logo
Ghana Police Service Logo
Royal Air Force Logo
New Hampshire Supreme Court Logo
Washington Department of Enterprise Services Logo
Nottingham County Council Logo
Higher Education Statistics Agency Logo
Workday Logo
Hubtel Ghana Logo
Alignment Healthcare Logo
Cognizant Microsoft Business Group (MBG) Logo
Boxit Document Solutions Logo