What Is Kanban? A Friendly Guide
What Is Kanban? A Friendly Guide
If you’ve ever wondered “what is Kanban?” — you’re not alone. I stumbled onto Kanban while trying to stop my team from drowning in half-done work and sticky notes everywhere. It turned out to be simple, visual, and surprisingly powerful. In this guide I’ll walk you through what Kanban is, why teams use it, and how you can start using a Kanban board tomorrow.
Quick answer: What is Kanban?
Kanban is a visual workflow method that helps teams manage work by showing tasks as cards on a board and moving them across columns that represent stages of the process. It originated in manufacturing (Toyota), but today teams in software, marketing, HR, and even home projects use it to visualize work, limit work-in-progress (WIP), and improve flow.
Where did Kanban come from?
Kanban’s roots go back to the Toyota Production System and Lean manufacturing, where the emphasis is on reducing waste and matching production to demand. For an overview of Kanban’s history and variations, the Wikipedia page on Kanban is a good place to start. For practical, team-focused advice, I often point people to the Atlassian guide, which explains board setups and common policies.
Core concepts: What makes Kanban different?
- Visualize work — Put tasks on cards and place them in columns that match your process (e.g., Backlog, To Do, In Progress, Review, Done).
- Limit WIP — Set a maximum number of tasks allowed in a column to prevent multitasking and bottlenecks.
- Manage flow — Watch how cards move and address slow spots.
- Make policies explicit — Agree on rules like “what qualifies as Done” or “definition of Ready”.
- Continuous improvement — Inspect and adapt; small regular changes beat big sudden overhauls.
How a Kanban board works (real-world example)
Imagine planning dinner. You could set up a simple Kanban board: Ideas, To Shop, Prep, Cook, Serve. Each dish is a sticky note. You limit “Prep” to two dishes at a time — that forces prioritizing and finishing before starting something new. Simple, right? The same pattern works for a software sprint, a content calendar, or hiring pipelines.
Software team example
Our engineering team used columns: Backlog, Ready, In Progress, Code Review, QA, Done. We capped In Progress at 3 per developer. When Code Review piled up, we knew to pull reviewers or reduce new starts. That small WIP limit change cut cycle time by weeks.
Benefits of using Kanban
- Better visibility into work and bottlenecks
- Reduced multitasking and faster cycle times
- Easier prioritization — teams pull work when they have capacity
- Flexible planning — you don’t need strict sprints
- Continuous delivery mindset — smaller, more frequent completions
Getting started: A simple 5-step plan
- Map your workflow — Sketch the major steps work goes through.
- Create a board — Physical or digital (tools like Trello, Jira, or the Atlassian guide help).
- Make cards — Each card is a work item with a clear owner and acceptance criteria.
- Set WIP limits — Start small and adjust as you learn.
- Review regularly — Hold short standups and a retrospective every few weeks.
Common challenges and how to overcome them
People often resist change because they think Kanban means more rules. It doesn’t — it just makes existing rules visible so teams can improve them together. Another stumbling block is unclear policies: if “Done” means different things to different people, cards will get stuck. Fix that by writing explicit policies and reviewing them in retrospectives.
Metrics that actually help
Two metrics I use are cycle time (how long a card takes from start to finish) and throughput (how many cards finish in a period). Don’t obsess over complex dashboards at first — track cycle time trends and whether issues are clearing faster.
Digital vs physical boards
I love a physical board for co-located teams because it’s tactile and visible. But remote or distributed teams will likely prefer digital tools for integrations and history. If you’re online, try a tool recommended in the Atlassian guide or search for Kanban templates in your project tool of choice.
When not to use Kanban
Kanban isn’t a silver bullet. If your work is mostly one-off experiments without repeatable steps, it might bring limited value. Also, if you need strict timeboxed cycles for contractual reasons, a sprint-based approach like Scrum may be a better fit — although many teams combine Scrum and Kanban practices (Scrumban) to get the best of both worlds.
Final tips — from my experience
Start small and be kind to your team. Try one WIP limit change, observe for two weeks, and talk about it. Celebrate the small wins: a shorter cycle time, fewer urgent war rooms, or simply less stress at the end of the week. Kanban is a continuous journey — and once you see the flow, you’ll never want to go back to chaos.
If you want a concise history or further reading, check the Kanban article for context and the Atlassian guide for hands-on tips.
Got questions about setting up a board for your team? I’m happy to help — tell me what kind of work you do and we can sketch a starter board together.
