PRODUCTIVITY
3 Things a Kanban Board Does to Boost Your Productivity
All you need to get started are some sticky notes, a pen and 5 minutes to read this article
There are hundreds of online tools to help you get work done. The problem many of us face is finding a system that works.
It’s easy to get lost choosing how to plan your work, how to schedule when you’ll work, and how to track your progress over time. While doing all that, you end up diverting resources away from actually working!
Enter Kanban, a work scheduling system once designed for automotive manufacturing in Japan that has since been widely adopted in software development.
I started using it during my tech internship. When I began writing on Medium, I decided to start using Kanban as well.
Unlike at work, I didn’t want to use a fancy online project management platform. Instead, I grabbed a pen, dug up some sticky notes, and found an empty wall.
Since then, Kanban has helped me:
- Organize my ideas
- Keep track of my work over time
- Foster a “just do it” attitude
- Motivate me to keep working
Before we dive into how that happened, let’s take a quick look at Kanban.
An Overview of Kanban
A very simple board would look like this:
Kanban boards are like dynamic to-do lists.
Each yellow card represents a task. As you move through the stages of coming up with an idea, working on it, and finishing it, so too does the card move through the columns. Movement from left to right demonstrates how much work is being done over time.
As someone wanting to use Kanban for their personal projects, you may not need an online system to get started. Many development teams still use physical boards because they are easy to use.
I chose to use a physical board. Here’s how pasting sticky notes onto my wall helped me.
How a Kanban Board Helps With Productivity
1. You get a BIG visual reminder of the things you need to do
With a physical Kanban board, everything you need to do is organized in one place and it’s right in your face.
Like anyone living in the 21st century, you probably have an immense amount of stuff on your computer and phone. Putting the things you need to do on a wall separates your “productive stuff” from everything else.
This brings a different kind of emphasis on your work, simply because it occupies a unique place in your physical world. I have my Kanban board set up right next to my desk. I’ve found it helpful because I literally can’t forget about the work I need to do when it’s staring me in the face every day.
2. Moving sticky notes helps you get ideas from start to finish
Interacting with a physical board just feels very different from using a digital to-do list. For reference, here’s my current set up:
My “Backlog” is a space for all the ideas I come up with. At the start of every week, I’ll move the ideas I want to work on from “Backlog” to “Selected for Development”. For my pieces on Medium, when I start writing a first draft, I’ll move a task to “In Progress”. It stays there throughout editing and submitting to publications.
After publishing a piece, there’s something about the act of getting up from my chair, walking over to my board and moving the sticky note from “In Progress” to “Done” that brings about a great deal of satisfaction.
That physical interaction signals to me that:
- I did something
- I’m ready to move on to the next thing
3. Setting up work in progress (WIP) limits helps you maximize your weekly output
WIP limits are used with Kanban to foster an attitude of “get things done”.
A WIP limit is a rule that each column can only have a fixed number of cards.
I have a WIP limit of two tasks for my “In Progress” column. This means that at any given time, I can be working on at most two different tasks. I cannot add any other tasks from “Selected for Development” to “In Progress” until I finish a task I’m currently working on.
Implementing this rule means you won’t get stuck in the trap of starting six seemingly fun side-projects and not finishing any of them. Instead, you work on a few tasks to completion before moving on to your next set of tasks.
Wanting to have a “get things done” attitude is one thing. Having a WIP limit system that you stick to is a way to make that attitude an integral part of your workflow. It will help you increase the number of tasks you finish every week.
4. Having a “Done” archive of completed tasks makes you feel good
Just as having a visual indicator helps with understanding what you need to do, it also showcases what you’ve already done.
My goal is to fill up one of my doors with completed sticky notes. So far, I’ve only got a handful of notes on the door. Looking at it makes me both happy that I’ve finally started and eager to keep going.
I also need visual proof of my completed tasks to feel like I’ve been productive. Being able to look at a door with all the work I’ve finished signals to my brain that I’ve done more than just think about what I want to do. The sticky notes are tangible proof that I actually did something.
The Recommendation
If you’re looking for a basic way to organize your personal work, using a simple Kanban board is the way to go. It’s a simple system that holds you accountable for your work and motivates you to keep going.
Visual indicators are powerful because they are present in a way that online tools aren’t.
If you have a pen, some sticky notes, and a wall, you can get started right away.