December 2020
© 2019–2020 Orderly Disruption Limited, Daniel S. Vacanti, Inc.
Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

Purpose of the Kanban Guide

This guide aims to be a unifying reference for the community by setting a minimum set of rules for Kanban. It builds upon Kanban fundamentals to support the full spectrum of value delivery and organisational challenges.

In this document, “Kanban” refers to the holistic set of concepts defined herein.

Definition of Kanban

Kanban is a strategy for optimising the flow of value through a process using a visual, pull-based system. Value may be defined in various ways (e.g. customer, user, organisational, environmental needs).

Kanban includes three core practices:

• Defining and visualising a workflow
• Actively managing items in a workflow
• Improving a workflow

These practices make up a Kanban system, and those who participate are Kanban system members.

Why Use Kanban?

Kanban focuses on flow—the movement of potential value through a system. It aims to optimise effectiveness, efficiency, and predictability:

• Effective: Delivers what customers want, when they want it.
• Efficient: Uses economic resources optimally.
• Predictable: Can forecast delivery accurately within uncertainty.

Kanban prompts continuous improvement through asking better questions earlier. It is applicable to virtually any workflow or industry.

Kanban Theory

Kanban builds on established theories:

• Systems thinking
• Lean principles
• Queuing theory (e.g. batch and queue size)
• Variability and quality control

Kanban can complement other value-delivery frameworks and methodologies.

Kanban Practices

Defining and Visualising the Workflow

The shared understanding of flow is called the Definition of Workflow (DoW). It must include:

• Work item definitions
• Start and finish definitions
• States from start to finish (WIP)
• WIP control mechanisms
• Explicit flow policies
• Service Level Expectation (SLE)

The Kanban board visualises the DoW. There are no prescribed visual formats—transparency is key.

Actively Managing Items in a Workflow

Includes practices like:

• Controlling WIP
• Avoiding item pile-ups
• Preventing unnecessary ageing
• Unblocking work

Regular (but not necessarily formal) reviews are encouraged.

Controlling Work in Progress

WIP must be explicitly controlled, often using WIP Limits (numbers or tokens). This creates a pull system—items are pulled when capacity is available.

Exceptions must be made explicit in the DoW.

Service Level Expectation (SLE)

SLE = time period + probability (e.g. “85% of work items finish in 8 days”).
Use historical cycle time to calculate it and visualise it on the board. Use estimates if no data exists.

Improving the Workflow

Teams continuously improve the workflow to better balance effectiveness, efficiency, and predictability.

Improvements may be incremental or large, and should be made as needed—not only at set cadences.

Kanban Measures

Four minimum flow measures:

• WIP: Work started but not finished
• Throughput: Work items finished per time unit
• Work Item Age: Time since item started
• Cycle Time: Time from start to finish

Visualise these measures using any useful charts. Teams may use additional context-specific metrics.

Endnote

Kanban’s practices and measures are immutable. Partial implementation is not Kanban. Other techniques may be added, but the minimum practices, metrics, and the ethos of value optimisation must remain.

History of Kanban

Kanban stems from the Toyota Production System and pioneers like Taiichi Ohno and W. Edwards Deming. Modern knowledge-work Kanban started in 2006 at Corbis and has evolved through global collaboration.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to:

• Yuval Yeret & Steve Porter – foundational concepts
• Emily Coleman – value definition inspiration
• Ryan Ripley & Todd Miller – supporting materials
• Julia Wester, Colleen Johnson, Jose Casal, Jean-Paul Bayley – reviewers
• Dave West & Eric Naiburg – publishing feedback
• Deborah Zanke – editing

License

Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License .