Why developers benefit from a Kanban board

By Barnaby Golden, 30 April, 2019

Kanban board

A Kanban board helps developers synchronise their work.

  • Sue glanced up at the Kanban board to see if there were any new items waiting for her to code.
  • Mark had noticed that the review stage on the Kanban board had hit the work in progress limit and so decided his next task should be to review something.
  • Karen had just heard that the deadline had changed and so pushed one ticket right to the top of the Kanban board. The developers noticed and started a conversation about what to do next.

Of course the less items the team has to deal with, the less significant synchronisation becomes. I can imagine a situation where the effort required to update the board is not offset by the value gained. However, that is pretty rare.

It is also worth noting that management being able to track work on the Kanban board is very important to developers as it stops them being constantly bothered for updates.

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