How can you use Kanban principles to streamline Product Engineering?

1 What is Kanban?

Kanban is a visual and agile method for managing work that originated from the Toyota Production System. It is based on four core principles: visualize your work, limit your work in progress, focus on flow, and implement feedback loops. Kanban uses a board with columns and cards to represent your work items and their status. Each card has a description, a priority, and an owner. Each column has a limit on how many cards it can contain at a time. This way, you can see the big picture of your work, identify bottlenecks, and optimize your throughput.

2 How to apply Kanban to product engineering?

To apply Kanban to product engineering, you need to first define your value stream, which is the sequence of steps that transform an idea into a product that delivers value to your customers. For example, your value stream might include stages such as backlog, analysis, design, development, testing, deployment, and release. Then, you need to map your value stream to your Kanban board, creating columns for each stage and setting work in progress limits for each column. Next, you need to populate your board with cards that represent your product features, user stories, bugs, or other work items. You can use different colors, shapes, or symbols to categorize your cards by type, priority, or complexity. Finally, you need to establish rules and policies for moving your cards across the board, such as how to prioritize them, how to assign them, how to review them, and how to mark them as done.

3 How to measure and improve your Kanban performance?

To measure and improve your Kanban performance, you need to track and analyze key metrics that reflect your efficiency, quality, and customer satisfaction. Some of the most common metrics are lead time, cycle time, throughput, work in progress, defect rate, and customer feedback. Lead time is the time it takes for a work item to move from the beginning to the end of your value stream. Cycle time is the time it takes for a work item to move from one stage to another. Throughput is the number of work items that are completed in a given period. Work in progress is the number of work items that are in progress at any point in time. Defect rate is the percentage of work items that have errors or require rework. Customer feedback is the measure of how satisfied your customers are with your product. By monitoring these metrics, you can identify areas of improvement, set goals, and implement changes.

4 How to use Kanban for collaboration and communication?

Kanban can also help you improve your collaboration and communication among your product engineering team and other stakeholders. By using a shared and transparent Kanban board, you can ensure that everyone is on the same page, has a clear view of the work status, and knows their roles and responsibilities. You can also use Kanban to facilitate regular meetings, such as daily stand-ups, weekly reviews, and monthly retrospectives. These meetings can help you align your expectations, share your progress, resolve your issues, and learn from your experiences. Moreover, you can use Kanban to communicate with your customers, by involving them in your backlog refinement, prioritization, validation, and feedback processes. This way, you can build trust, rapport, and loyalty with your customers, and deliver products that meet their needs and expectations.

5 How to adapt Kanban to your product engineering context?

Kanban is a flexible and adaptable method that can be customized to your product engineering context. You can adjust your Kanban board, your work items, your work in progress limits, your rules and policies, and your metrics according to your product scope, complexity, size, and maturity. You can also experiment with different Kanban practices, such as swimlanes, subtasks, checklists, triggers, blockers, buffers, and queues, to optimize your workflow and enhance your visibility. The key is to keep your Kanban system simple, relevant, and effective, and to continuously inspect and adapt it based on your feedback and data.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?