Viral Joy – Watching the Spread of Personal Kanban

It has been fascinating to watch the personal kanban meme spread through use and not through pontification.  When people see a personal kanban in action, it just makes sense to them.

Parents start with their own kanban and soon their kids have them and then the family shares them. Peter has one, then his girlfriend wants one as well.

There are stories coming in from people who have used personal kanban or something rather like it over the last several years. Educators and therapists have been giving me excellent feedback insofar as why it works for kids. Why it works for adults. And why it has such an instant appeal.

Hearing from practitioners in all sorts of fields is showing me that a visual flow-based self management system is simply how we are wired.  That everyone can benefit from it has been shown time and again.

The fact that kanban can move seemlessly from the shop floor to children to development teams to all everyone surely must be telling us something.  People aren’t just starting to use a kanban because it’s an alternative to the to-do list.  They are using it because it is expressive, fun and makes life easier.

Comments

[topsurf]

Newest Kanban use for me: using it with my sister all the way on the other side of the United States for some personal research we are doing.

[Jim Benson]

When you and your sister are doing work in that project - watch for opportunities for the kanban cards to capture value. Let them communicate as much as possible while you and your sister do your important work. The cards themselves can communicate more than done or not done.

You can also build your workflow to hold things in a state that has more meaning. Such as: you can have a flow like this:

Backlog | Investigating | Further Investigation | Investigating 2 | Selected | Done

So things you are initially investigating are pulled from the backlog, then you or she researches them quickly. If something is just not going to work - note why on the kanban card itself and move it to done. If something might work - move it to further investigation and discuss it with your sister. Then you or she can investigate it more deeply in "Investigating 2".

Your goal in a situation like this is to go through as many options as you can quickly. Both you and she are filters for each other. Unhelpful ideas are quickly discarded. Potential good ideas can then be discussed and researched further.