Kanban

Kanban is a pull-based system for managing workflows. It rests on three core practices: visualize work, limit work in progress, and continuously improve flow. Unlike Scrum, Kanban does not work in fixed iterations but with a continuous flow where new work is pulled only when capacity becomes available.

A typical example is a support team whose tickets flow from New through In Progress to Done. The “In Progress” column has a WIP Limit of three: no more than three tickets may be worked on simultaneously. When one ticket is finished, the team member pulls the next from the queue. This Pull Principle prevents overload and shortens cycle times because less parallel work leads to faster completion. The primary metric Kanban teams track is Lead Time, the total time from when a ticket enters the system until it is resolved.

Kanban has its roots in the Toyota Production System of the 1940s and was adapted for knowledge work by David Anderson in 2007. It is particularly well suited for teams with heterogeneous tasks and unpredictable workloads.