Lean from the Trenches

Chapter 15Why We Use Only Physical Kanban Boards

So, why do we use this big, messy, icky, analog thing with tape and sticky notes and handwritten text when we have plenty of slick electronic tools to choose from? Most of those electronic tools can automagically generate all kinds of detailed statistics, be backed up, be accessed from outside the building, have different views, and so on. Why don’t we use something like that instead?

One of the main reasons is evolution.

Our board has changed structure many times. It took a couple of months before it started stabilizing. Only then did we start using black tape to mark the columns—before that we used hand-drawn lines because they changed so often. But we can still move the tape if we need ...