Kanban Board Power-Ups
Stand-up Meeting
Board
Visualization
Post-It
Sticky
Want to make your Kanban board radiate information even brighter? Want to help the team view the board in a fresh light?
This practice is just what you need!
These ideas serve as great experiments, since they help visualize different aspects of your process. While you may end up not using all of them, trying them up for a sprint or two may lead to new insights about your flow and direction for improvement
Disclaimer: Most of these ideas are designed for a physical board, in case you have tips applicable for an electronic board - leave them as comments for the use of the community.
Prepare Colored Stickers
Unique colored stickers can be really useful, here is how you make some in seconds.
Avatar Magnets
To see clearly who is working on what and avoid individual overcommitment, use Avatar magnets. They personify your board, add color, and enhance the sense of ownership. In addition, they facilitate Kanban principles by making it harder for team members to overcommit and multitask.
Story Stickers
Is your board loaded? Is it visually clear what tasks belong to what story? When a ticket falls off the board, do you know where to put it back?
To see clearly the tasks of each story, you can use tiny colorful stickers that take seconds to produce.
Task-Progress Centipede
To trace the progress of a task, you can produce a sticker centipede. This will show clearly the history of each task and get your team members involved. It is also a great exercise to retrospect about the sprint dynamics.
Visualize Pending Tasks
Part of a task’s lifecycle is spent in pending states, such as waiting for review, waiting for validation. Some Kanban boards have columns for these pending states, which can take too much space. Some boards don’t, which creates ambiguity.
Here are some ideas to help you enjoy the best of both worlds:
Confidence Vote
Instead of measuring your team’s daily progress, why not measure their confidence level?
This fun daily practice is a great way to predict the success of the sprint… simply ask the team!
At the end of each standup: