Kanban project management method has been implemented widely in the last decade. And majorly without the full understanding of what Kanban method actually prescribes.
Most users are just driven by the quick fix that it is highly visual task management and makes it easy to understand where tasks stand and how to close them fast.
Teams put a few status columns to represent their task flow and begin with “agile task management”.
Well, this is exactly what Kanban is not!
Kanban is all about the flow – the way your work or processes flow today.
As a first step you need to take a holistic view of how your work flows today, is it in align with the end goal i.e. meeting customer expectations.
Kanban is developed with a service oriented approach enabling teams to meet customer expectations timely and consistently.
Gone are those days, when project management tools & Kanban boards were specific to IT and manufacturing industries only.It has turned into a fundamental need of all organizations.Be it, Healthcare, Marketing, Construction, Product development, engineering or professional services; Project management software is integral to their overall operations.Charles Darwin once said -“The most important factor in survival is neither intelligence nor strength but adaptability.”Any species who can adapt itself according to the recent environmental changes can survive the longest.Similarly, an ideal project management tool should be industry agnostic that is; it should be flexible enough to adopt itself according to the workflow of any organization.Hence, project management software must offer Custom Workflowsfor increased adaptability and ease of use.Workflow refers to the series of steps that need to be taken to complete tasks, and how tasks move through these steps.With the Custom Task Status Workflow, you can create and track the logical life cycle of your tasks from start to end.
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While the board is divided to represent the different stages or the steps of the process, cards are used to write down the tasks.
The Kanban board helps project managers manage inefficiencies of a project by helping them make sure that there’s a limit to the number of tasks labeled under the in-progress column.
Applying these limits in turn helps ensure that the team is working at their maximum efficiency and are not multitasking in a way that may cripple their productivity.Kanban Board Template (Click on the template to edit it online)Kanban boards help project teams; Identify the different processes that must be completed to accomplish the final goal See the bottlenecks in the processes and find ways to resolve them early on Maintain transparency and align teams with organizational goals Track how work is progressing between different departments Streamline team meetings and communications with Kanban boards clearly displaying task statuses, due dates, and ownersFeatures of KanbanThe main features that help distinguish Kanban from other project management methodologies are as follows; There are no predefined roles in a team; rather team members are encouraged to help whenever another team member is falling behind their tasks.The product is delivered on an as-needed-basis and there is no set period of time as to when a feature should be completed.
While most agile project management approaches have visual boards included in their practice, Kanban puts visual techniques at the very core of everything in your organization.
Some of the online tools you can consider are,Creately Creately is a visual workspace for collaboration.
Once the board is created, specify these different process stages; To-do – contains the backlog of tasks to be worked on In-progress – consists of the tasks that are currently being worked onDone – tasks that are completed are moved to this columnWhile these are the most basic of states that can be added to your Kanban board, based on the nature of the project and your team and how it functions, you can include additional columns such as ‘in review’, ‘canceled’, or ‘rejected’.
