I am often asked what software tools are available to support the use of kanban. Many lists of such kanban tools already exist (see the end of this article) and I do not intend to repeat the same information here. Instead, I would like to explain my view of the architecture of kanban tools and […]
Kanban
Using Sankey diagrams for kanban
A Sankey diagram is used to provide a visual analysis of flows. While it might be most commonly used to display the flow of materials through a distribution system, such as petroleum and its derived products, Sankey diagrams are well adapted to provide visual analysis of the flow of any type of work. Thus, they […]
Marey charts for analyzing the flow of work
The type of diagram called a Marey chart might be more than a century old, but it can be a useful new addition to the arsenal of tools at the disposal of lean and kanban practitioners. What is a Marey chart? A Marey chart is commonly used to analyze transportation systems. It displays the times […]
Managing People Resource Liquidity
What is resource liquidity? There is often a lack of depth in skills in a department. There may be only one person having the knowledge or skills required to perform a task, who thereby becomes a bottleneck. The immediate availability of a person to perform a task is the liquidity of the personnel in the […]
A Value Stream for Service Management
One of the main benefits of a lean/kanban approach to IT is the simplification of processes expressed in the value stream of each team. But IT teams are sometimes indoctrinated with process frameworks coming from approaches such as COBIT® or ITIL®. They may be at a loss to understand how a single value stream can […]
Priority, Cost of Delay and Kanban
Priority is a classic example of a proxy variable that leads to distortion of service management practices. What do I mean by “proxy variable”, why do I say that this hallowed service management concept leads to distortion and what might we do to remedy this issue?
Can we really not multi-task?
Can the human brain multi-task? The loss of efficiency and effectiveness due to context switching among various tasks is one of the underpinning tenets of why a Kanban approach helps organizations to reduce the lead times of their work. But is it really true that the human brain cannot multi-task?
Stopping the clock vs. waiting time
Stopping the clock is a pernicious practice There is a tradition among certain service providers to “stop the clock” when measuring process cycle time. They consider that any process activity under the responsibility of someone other than the service provider should not count against the agreed service level. There are two main cases: when the […]