A Leading Indicator–Element #4 of the Kanban
It seems we’re addicted to metrics. People believe that if you measure something over time, you’ll see patterns in the data and act on them. The problem is that most metrics are lagging indicators....
View ArticleThe Estimate Refinery–Element #5 of the Kanban
In our book Why Plans Fail, we discuss something called the Planning Fallacy and, as is pretty apparent by its name, how it mucks with our ability to plan. It turns out that we’re quite unskilled at...
View ArticleThe Options Engine-Element #6 of the Kanban
There is a tension in business between market forces and our freedom of choice. Customers (be they people who buy our products at work or be they people like our families) are people who have needs and...
View ArticleGrounding Object-Element #7 of the Kanban
We discussed the Planning Fallacy in Number Five, but that’s just the tip of the cognitive bias iceberg. The fact is that we are subject to well over a hundred named cognitive biases like: Fundamental...
View ArticleMetacognitive Tool: Element #8 of the Kanban
METACOGNITIVE TOOL is one nice chunk of jargon. Metacognition is “learning about learning.” When we have a tool for it, that tool teaches us about how we learn. When we have some understanding about...
View ArticleConversation Starter / Conversation Avoider: Element #9 of the Kanban
“What’s wrong with this picture?” “What are you going to do to get that completed?” “Would you like help?” “Are you blocked?” “Why did this happen this way?” “I totally didn’t expect that, did you?”...
View ArticleCollaborative Aid: Element #10 of the Kanban
“Hey Tonianne, I see you’ve pulled the ‘Strike sheet for Kaizen Camp’ ticket. I took some notes from our meeting the other day, they are in the ‘Kaizen Clean Up’ mind map. Just take a look at that, it...
View ArticleWork Flow Laboratory: Element #11 of the Kanban
The Personal Kanban shows us what is happening, how it is happening, by whom it is happening, and even why it is happening. Here we see a bottleneck between coding and QA. The cause of this is...
View ArticleGemba Symbolizer: Element #12 of the Kanban
In Lean the “Gemba” is where everything happens. It’s the crime scene, the shop floor, ground zero. In manufacturing, the Gemba is a physical location, filled with gear, that you can walk along and...
View ArticleCustomer Alert System: Element #13 of the Kanban
In 2006, my first kanban based project involved setting up a Personal Kanban for a team of 12 developers. Since we were just starting out with kanban, we had no idea what to expect. I did know a few...
View ArticleWhy Limit Your WIP: A PK Info Series
Throughout the last year, I have been surprised by the Swiss army knife that is limiting your work-in-progress. When I tell people: You can’t do more work than you can handle. Everyone gets that. C...
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