Lean from the Trenches

Kanban in a Nutshell

Kanban is a Lean approach to Agile software development.

Actually, Kanban means many things. Literally, Kanban is a Japanese word that means “visual card” (or sign). At Toyota, Kanban is the term used for the visual and physical signaling system that ties together the whole Lean production system.

In 2004, however, David Anderson pioneered a more direct implementation of Lean thinking and the Theory of Constraints^[12] to software development. Under the guidance of experts such as Don Reinertsen, this evolved into what David called a “Kanban system for software development” and which most people now simply refer to as “Kanban.”

So although Kanban as applied to software development is quite new, Kanban as used in Lean ...