About the kanban board template
Leverage the power of visual management to maximize your personal and team productivity. This kanban board template is perfect for displaying the steps in your workflow, capturing the actual work that needs to get done, and understanding at-a-glance progress.
Kanban is especially popular with agile development teams who want a flexible work management system, but it can be applied to all types of work. Establish a pull system — only bringing work onto the board when the team has capacity to complete it. Set work-in-progress (WIP) limits to keep work flowing smoothly, highlighting bottlenecks and blockers that slow down your progress. This helps you stay nimble and finish work incrementally.
There is no right or wrong way to set up your board — customize it to fit the way you work. Add as many columns as you need to reflect the steps in your workflow. Then add cards to represent the actual work items. Keep the board up-to-date as work gets underway to drive visibility and collaboration. If you need more dynamic views that update in real time as work moves along, try the kanban boards in Aha! Roadmaps and Aha! Develop.
Best practices
Visualize your workflow and limit WIP to improve productivity.
Define your workflow Label the vertical columns to represent the steps in your workflow. Choose colors for the columns and work items that make it easy for the team to understand progress. Set WIP limits for how many cards can be in each status at any given time.
Capture your backlog Use sticky notes to represent the actual work items — such as epics, features, or user stories — and rank them in priority order. Pull work onto the board when the team has capacity, focusing on completion before starting something new.
Visualize progress Move cards between columns to reflect the current status of the work. It is important to indicate problems that prohibit work from moving forward. Include a visual indicator on roadblocked work to help encourage discussion and find solutions.
Increase efficiency Identify opportunities to improve. Seeing how work flows through system — and where it gets stuck — helps teams streamline collaboratively so you can deliver more value to your customers.
