Adiyta Deshpande gave a session on Deep Dive : Kanban at ATA Pune 16th Meetup held on 9th December, 2017 at Fujitsu, India. Aditya is a QA Lead at FIS SunGard. All the rights of the presentation lies with the author

1. Deep Dive : Kanban
By - Aditya Deshpande | QA Lead, FIS-SunGard
Team Kanban Practitioner | ISTQB Test Manager | CSM |CSF

2. Agenda
 Starting with Kanban
 Understanding Kanban practices in deep
 Kanban Cadences
 Scrum vs Kanban
 Summary

3. Meaning of Kanban
 Kanban written in Kanji (Chinese characters) 看板 means “sign” or “large visual
board”
 Kanban written in Japanese alphabet ひらがな , hiragana means “signal cards”.
 In Chinese, Kanban literally means “looking at the board” inspired by the signal card
system used in Japan.
 In manufacturing Kanban is a visual signed communicating that an order needs to be
placed or filled.
 The Kanban Method refers both to visual signal that capacity is available, to a “slot”
or “bin” indicating capacity, and to a whole system of balancing for work with
capacity to deliver work.

4. The Kanban Method
 KANBAN PRINCIPLES:
 Start with what you do now
 Evolutionary change
 Respect current roles, processes, titles
 Encourage leadership
 CORE KANBAN PROPERTIES:
 Visualize the work with the help of Kanban board
 Limit work in progress
 Manage flows
 Make policies explicit
 Implement feedback loops
 Improve collaboratively and evolve!

5. Visualization
 Build a visual model of the work
 Model what you do NOW
 Your board must be unique
 Show added details like blockers, dependencies, people

6. Kanban ticket design
 Ticket should have a ‘Title’
 It should refer to the corresponding item in an online tool
 It should have JIRA / Support reference number
 Start Date should be specified
 Due Date should be specified
 End Date should be specified
 It should highlight technical dependencies
 It should visualize size or priority

7. Visualization
New Feature
Deadline date
Story
Defect
Blocker
Requirement clarification

8. A Kanban visual board

9. Limiting work in progress
 Understanding Flow vs Batch
 Video
 Lead Time
 Throughput Time

10. Limiting work in progress
 Limits help to avoid taking more work than you can handle
 Limiting work-in-progress reveals the bottlenecks so you can address them.
 Limits help to recognize problems earlier (stop-the-line)
 WIP can be per column or team or individual level
 When a work item progresses, a slot opens and a new work item can flow
into workflow
 Stop STARTING, Start FINISHING!
WIP = ? WIP=4

11. WIP limit benefits
 Signal that capacity is available
 Can be by person, by workflow, by work item type, or by total number of
items in progress
 Promote finishing & quality
 Provoke important discussions

12. WIP limit benefits

13. Flow : Movement of work
 Thumb Rule : The flow of the ticket should always be from LEFT to RIGHT.
 The ticket cannot go to previous state from the forward
state.
 Example : Ticket cannot come back in “In Progress” queue
from “Done” queue

14. Define explicit policies
 State processes for how we work
 Policies should be developed collaboratively
 Policies should be visible to all the team members
 Policies about :
 How does the board work?
 Define pull criteria
 Define Prioritization criteria
 Define WIP Limits
 What is written on ticket?
 What goes on the board?
 Who can modify?
 Cadence

15. Define explicit policies

16. Risk dimensions
 A set of policies that apply to a type of work.
 Determining cost of delay, what happens when you don’t finish the work on
time
 Indicate risks with colors, shapes, stickers etc.
 Types of Risks:
 Standard
 Fixed Date – Delivery type having fixed date (5.X releases)
 Expedited – Priority delivery, Hot fixes
 Intangible – Solution not yet resolved, difficult to prioritize

17. Kanban Cadences
Daily Meeting :
 Walk board RIGHT to LEFT
 Focus on blockers, defects and risk dimensions
 Discuss priorities and team member assignments
 Focus team on delivery
 What is achieved ?
 Disciplined conduct and acts of leadership
 Problem solving & improvement discussions are taken immediately after daily
meeting
 Spontaneous quality circles and frequent Kaizen events

18. Kanban Cadences
Commitment Meeting / Replenishment Meeting :
 Purpose of commitment meeting is to decide what to pull next and to
replenish the input buffer for Kanban system
 Team members must be present at replenishment meetings
 Typically held once a week
 Review about the work delivered in the past week

19. Why to adopt Kanban?
 Senior Level:
 Make promises they can keep
 Lead the business
 Mid-level
 Up-managing –answer the hard questions
 Down-managing-make difficult decisions
 Reliable, predictable, fast service delivery
 Individual contributors
 Relief from overburdening
 Produce better quality
 Management of work is simpler

20. Scrum vs Kanban?

21. Summary
 Kanban Method uses…
 Visualize invisible work
 Workflows
 Business risks
 Limit work in progress
 Kanban Method delivers…
 Faster
 More predictable
 Responds changes from customer demand quickly

22. Cumulative Report

23. Thank You
Stop STARTING…
Start FINISHING!