Kanban (Japanese: 看板, meaning signboard or billboard) is a lean method to manage and improve work across human systems. This approach aims to manage work by balancing demands with available capacity, and by improving the handling of system-level bottlenecks.
Work items are visualized to give participants a view of progress and process, from start to finish—usually via a kanban board. Work is pulled as capacity permits, rather than work being pushed into the process when requested.
In knowledge work and in software development, the aim is to provide a visual process management system which aids decision-making about what, when, and how much to produce. The underlying kanban method originated in lean manufacturing, which was inspired by the Toyota Production System. It has its origin in the late 1940s when the Toyota automotive company implemented a production system called just-in-time, which had the objective of producing according to customer demand and identifying possible material shortages within the production line. But it was a team at Corbis that realized how this method devised by Toyota could become a process applicable to any type of organizational process. Kanban is commonly used in software development in combination with methods and frameworks such as Scrum.
Kanban board
The diagram here shows a software development workflow on a kanban board.
Kanban boards, designed for the context in which they are used, vary considerably and may show work item types ("features" and "user stories" here), columns delineating workflow activities, explicit policies, and swimlanes (rows crossing several columns, used for grouping user stories by feature here). The aim is to make the general workflow and the progress of individual items clear to participants and stakeholders.
A Kanban Board represents the system's Definition of Workflow and requires the following minimum elements.
A definition of the individual units of value that are moving through the workflow. These units of value are referred to as work items (or items).
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Kanban (Japanese: 看板, meaning signboard or billboard) is a lean method to manage and improve work across human systems. This approach aims to manage work by balancing demands with available capacity, and by improving the handling of system-level bottlenecks. Work items are visualized to give participants a view of progress and process, from start to finish—usually via a kanban board. Work is pulled as capacity permits, rather than work being pushed into the process when requested.
Lean software development is a translation of lean manufacturing principles and practices to the software development domain. Adapted from the Toyota Production System, it is emerging with the support of a pro-lean subculture within the agile community. Lean offers a solid conceptual framework, values and principles, as well as good practices, derived from experience, that support agile organizations. The expression "lean software development" originated in a book by the same name, written by Mary Poppendieck and Tom Poppendieck in 2003.
Project management is the process of leading the work of a team to achieve all project goals within the given constraints. This information is usually described in project documentation, created at the beginning of the development process. The primary constraints are scope, time, and budget. The secondary challenge is to optimize the allocation of necessary inputs and apply them to meet pre-defined objectives. The objective of project management is to produce a complete project which complies with the client's objectives.
Production management deals with producing goods sustainably at the right time, quantity, and quality with the minimum cost. This course equips students with practical skills and tools for effectively