Kanban's 3 Agendas (London Lean Kanban Day)

dja@leankanban.com @lkuceo LLKD 2014, Copyright Lean Kanban Inc.
Presenter
David J. Anderson
CEO, Lean Kanban Inc.
London Lean Kanban Day
London
February 2014
Release 1.0
Kanban’s 3 Agendas
Sustainability, Service-orientation,
Survivability

Daniel Kahneman has given us a simple
model for how we process information
Daniel Kahneman
System 1
Sensory Perception
Pattern Matching
System 2
Logical Inference
Engine
Learning by
Experience
Learning
from theory
FAST
But slow to learn
SLOW
But fast to learn

How we process change…
Daniel Kahneman
Silicon-based
life form
Carbon-based
life form
I logically evaluate
change using System 2
I adapt quickly
I feel change emotionally
using System 1
I adapt slowly

Adopting new processes challenges people
psychologically & sociologically
• New roles attack identity
• New responsibilities using new
techniques & practices threaten
self-esteem & social status
• Most people resist most change
because individually they have
more to lose than gain
• It is safer to be conservative and
stick to current practices and
avoid shaking up the current
social hierarchy
• Only the brave, the reckless
or the desperate will pursue
grand changes

The Kanban Method…
• Rejects the traditional
approach to change
• Believes, it is better to avoid
resistance than to push
harder against it
• Don’t install new processes
• Don’t reorganize
• Is designed for carbon-based
life forms
• Evolutionary change that is
humane

The Kanban Method…
• Catalyzes improvement
through use of kanban
systems and visual boards*
• Takes its name from the use
of kanban but it is just a name
• Anyone who thinks Kanban is
just about kanban (boards &
systems) is truly mistaken
*also known as "kanban" in Chinese and in Japanese when written with Chinese characters

The Kanban Method is a new approach to
improvement
Kanban is a
method
without
methodology

Water flows around the rock
“be like water”
the rock represents resistance

Kanban should be like water*
In change
management,
resistance is from
the people involved
and it is always
emotional (system 1)
To flow around the
rock, we must learn
how to avoid
emotional resistance
* http://joecampbell.wordpress.com/2009/05/13/be-like-water/

Principles behind the Kanban Method
• Start with what you do now
• Agree to pursue evolutionary change
• Initially, respect roles, responsibilities and job
titles
• Encourage acts of leadership at all levels
The first 3 principles were specifically chosen to
address System 1 objections, to flow around the
rock of emotional resistance in humans

6 Practices Enable Process Evolution
The Kanban Method
Visualize
Limit Work-in-progress
Manage Flow
Make Policies Explicit
Implement Feedback Loops
Improve Collaboratively, Evolve Experimentally
(using models & the scientific method)

Motivation for Managers
• Senior Level
• Make promises they can keep
• Lead the business (strategy, positioning)
• Mid-level
• Up-managing – answer the hard questions with
confidence
• Down-managing – make difficult decisions with
confidence
• Line-level & Individual Contributors
• Relief from abusive environment
Survivability
Agenda
Service-Oriented
Agenda
Sustainability
Agenda

Survivability Agenda

Start with what you do now
• The Kanban Method evolved with the principle
that it “should be like water” - enable change
while avoiding sources of resistance
• With Kanban you start with what you do now,
and "kanbanize" it, catalyzing the evolutionary
process into action. Changes to processes in
use will occur
• Evaluating whether a change is truly an
improvement is done using fitness criteria
that evaluate an external outcome

Fitness criteria are metrics that measure
observable external outcomes
• Fitness criteria are metrics
that measure things
customers or other external
stakeholders value
• Delivery time
• Quality
• Predictability
• Safety (conformance to
regulatory requirements)
• or metrics that value actual
outcomes such as
• customer satisfaction
• employee satisfaction

Evolutionary change has no defined end
point
Evolving
Process
Roll
forward
Roll
back
Initial
Process
Future process is
emergent
Evaluate
Fitness
Evaluate
Fitness
Evaluate
Fitness
Evaluate
Fitness
Evalua
Fitnes
We don’t know the
end-point but we do
know our emergent
process is fitter!

Validate Fitness Criteria with real
customers
• It is necessary to keep checking that the fitness
criteria we are measuring do indeed matter to
customers
• Variation in what matters to different customers
provides the opportunity to segment demand
and offer different classes of service within your
kanban system
• e.g. Will you pay extra to have your pizza delivered
faster?

Which system is fitter?
We don’t know!
System B is faster but without understanding
customer expectations, both may be fit enough
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Lead Time (Days)
System A
Frequency
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
5 10 15 20 25 30 More
Lead Time in Days
System B
Frequency
Mean 17 days Mean 12 days

Measuring delivery against expectation
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
Lead Time (Days)
System A
Frequency
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
Lead Time Expectation Spread (Days)
System A
Frequency
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
5 10 15 20 25 30 More
Lead Time in Days
System B
Frequency
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 20 More
Lead Time Expectation Spread (Days)
System B
Frequency
Mean 17 days Mean 12 days
System B is clearly fitter!
System B delivers 5/7 within expectations
System A only delivers 3/7 within expectations

Business Risks, Fitness Criteria & Classes
of Service should all align
• If your kanban system is designed properly the
classes of service you are offering should align
with the true business risks in the domain
• And the metrics being used to evaluate system
capability, should be fitness criteria that are
derived from the business risk being managed
• For example, cost of delay requires us to
measure lead time

Institutionalize feedback systems to enable
evolutionary change
Operations
Review
Service
Delivery
Review
Standup
Meeting
manager to subordinate(s)
(both 1-1 and 1-team)

Organizational Improvements Emerge

Disintermediate!
Risks, fitness criteria & classes of service
should be explicit & transparent
Operations
Review
Service
Delivery
Review
Standup
Meeting
manager to subordinate(s)
(both 1-1 and 1-team)
Expose risk, classes
of service & fitness
criteria at all 3 levels
of feedback
Lead time
Quality
Predictability
Lead time
Quality
Predictability
Lead time
Quality
Predictability

Know why you are using a metric!
• Is your metric a fitness criteria that assesses
system capability and indicates fitness for
purpose and likelihood of surviving and thriving
by satisfying customers?
• Or, is your metric evaluating and guiding a
specific change to improve fitness of the
system?
• If neither, you don’t need it!
• Metrics guiding improvements should be
temporary & discarded when no longer needed

Benefits of an Adaptive Capability
Benefits
Risk from changes
greatly reduced
Sensitive to Changing
External Environment
Capability to Change
Quickly & Continually
Improved Customer
Satisfaction

The Service-Oriented Agenda

F
F
O
M
N
K
J
I
Pull
Kanban systems are pull systems
Ideas
D
I
Dev
Ready
G
5
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done
3 3
Test
Ready
5
F
B
CPull
Pull
*
There is capacity here
UAT
Release
Ready
∞ ∞
Pulling work from
development will create
capacity here too –
the pull signals move
upstream!
Now we have capacity
to replenish our ready
buffer

Commitment is deferred
E
I
D
Commitment point
F
F
FF
F
F F
Pull
Wish to avoid aborting after commitment
Ideas
Dev
Ready
5
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done
3 3
Test
Ready
5
UAT
Release
Ready
∞ ∞
We are committing to getting
started. We are certain we want
to take delivery.
Ideas remain optional and
unprioritized
G

Test
Ready
F
F
FF
F
F F
Defining Kanban System Lead Time
E
I
G
D
Pull
System Lead Time
Discarded
I
Ideas
Dev
Ready
5
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done
3 35
UAT
Release
Ready
∞ ∞
The clock starts ticking when we
accept the customers order, not
when it is placed!
Until then customer orders are
merely available options
Kanban
system lead
time ends
when the
item reaches
the first ∞
queue

Delivery Rate
(from the kanban system)
System Lead Time
WIP
=
Avg. Lead Time
Avg. Delivery RateWIP
Backlog Ready
To
Deploy
Little’s Law

The Kanban lens
Learn to view what you do now as a set of services
(that can be improved):
• What to look for…
• Creative work is service-oriented
• Service delivery involves workflow
• Workflow involves a series of knowledge discovery
activities
• What to do…
• Map the knowledge discovery workflow
• Identify service requests for new work
• Track work flowing through the service

What Service Do You Provide?
1. Who are your customers? (or other
stakeholders you must serve such as a
regulatory authority)
2. What do they ask you for?
3. What do you do to those requests?
4. Where does the finished work go?

Column WIP
Limit = 5
Testing is a
shared service
across 5 dev
teams
In this example,
testing was off-
shore in Chennai,
India

(some of the)
orange tickets are
avatars for people
from shared
services such as
enterprise
architecture and
user experience
design

5 lanes each with
a dev team
providing a
software
development
service to the
project

Column WIP
Limits
Clinical Validation
Testing,
Deployment,
P.O. Acceptance
All are shared
service across 3
dev teams

Multiple Types of Work
Capacity is allocated across lanes
5 4 4 5 2 = 20 total
Change Req
12
Maintenance
2
Production Defect
6
Allocation
Total = 20
Input
Queue In Prog Done
Build
Ready Test
Release
ReadyDoneIn Prog
DevelopmentAnalysis
Released

Multiple classes of service
Allocate capacity with kanban limit per color
5 4 4 5 2= 20 total
Allocation
10 = 50%
...
+1 = +5%
4 = 20%
6 = 30%
Input
Queue In Prog DoneDoneIn Prog
DevelopmentAnalysis Build
Ready Test
Release
Ready

Benefits of service-oriented
single kanban system
Benefits
Predictability
Shorter Lead Times
Increased Delivery Rate
Improved trust with
business stakeholders
Eliminated Disruptions
Measurable Benefits

The Sustainability Agenda

Traditional Managed Change Initiative
A Big J Curve
Patience!
Fitness
for
purpose

Sustainable Evolutionary Change with
many small J’s
Increasing “fitness”
Increasing capability
for change

Economically balance
capability against demand
Goals for using Kanban

Available options
, disruptive
& speculative
demand
Capacity Allocation
Policies
Motivate change through
visibility of explicit work
types, use policy to
constrain & contain,
probabilistic forecasting
WIP Limits, Flow, Flow
Efficiency, Focus on
sources of delay

3 Forms of Proto Kanban
Proto-kanban is a de-generate form of Kanban where
a visual board exists but a pull system is still emerging.
Proto-Kanban is so called because it tends to precede
the emergence of a full (virtual) kanban system.
Three forms have been observed…
• Aggregated Personal Kanban (in the office)
• Includes personal kanban for small teams of up to 3 or 4
individuals
• Per person WIP limit
• Often implemented with avatars
• Infinite “done” queues

Aggregated Personal Kanban
Backlog
F
E
Team
Member
G
D
Next Done
3
In-progress
3
Joe
Peter
Steven
Joann
per person∞ ∞per person

Proto-Kanban – infinite queues
Done
Pool
of
Ideas
F
E
I
Next
Deploy-
ment
Ready
G
D
GY
PB
DE MN
5 ∞
P1
AB
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done Ongoing Done
3 3
I am a buffer!
The clue is in my name – “…
Ready”
I am buffering non-instant
availability or activity with a
cyclical cadence
Infinite limits on done columns
means that there really isn’t a
kanban pull system present.
This style of proto-kanban
controls multi-tasking but
doesn’t limit workflow WIP
∞ ∞

Another Proto-Kanban
(per person WIP limit)

Benefits of proto-Kanban implementation
Benefits
Transparency
Engage people
emotionally
Collaboration
Greater empathy
Reduced multitasking
(improved quality)

Kanban - Compelling at Every Level
• Senior Level
• Make promises they can keep
• Lead the business (strategy, positioning)
• Mid-level
• Up-managing – answer the hard questions with
confidence
• Down-managing – make difficult decisions with
confidence
• Line-level & Individual Contributors
• Relief from abusive environment
Survivability
Agenda
Service-Oriented
Agenda
Sustainability
Agenda

Thank you!

Upcoming Training in Scandinavia
3-day Kanban Coaching Professional Masterclass
Stockholm 20-22 November
http://djaa.com/david-anderson-6
2-day Advanced Practitioner
Oslo 10-11 February, 2014
Copenhagen 12-13 February, 2014
(email me for details)

About
David Anderson is a thought
leader in managing effective
software teams. He leads a
training, consulting, publishing
and event planning business
dedicated to developing,
promoting and implementing
sustainable evolutionary…
He has 30 years experience in the high technology industry
starting with computer games in the early 1980’s. He has
led software teams delivering superior productivity and
quality using innovative agile methods at large companies
such as Sprint and Motorola.
David is the pioneer of the Kanban Method an agile and
evolutionary approach to change. His latest book, published in
June 2012, is, Lessons in Agile Management – On the Road
to Kanban.
David is the leader of Lean Kanban Inc., a management
training business dedicated to offering high quality
management training for creative knowledge worker
industries throughout the world.

Kanban’s “hidden agendas” were first promoted by Kurt Hausler who argued
that teaching Kanban coaches to hold a neutral stance on improvement from
what you do now was wrong.
Kanban’s 3 Agendas has been a collaboration with Mike Burrows with input
from Kurt Hausler, Markus Andrezak & Andy Carmichael
The succinct summary of Kanban’s approach to scaling is borrowed from Andy
Carmichael’s “Shortest Possible Definition of Kanban”
Acknowledgements

Kanban's 3 Agendas (London Lean Kanban Day)

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