How to Interpret Data and Identify Opportunities to Optimize the Flow of Work

1. THE KANBAN RETROSEPCTIVE
HOW TO INTERPRET DATA &
IDENTIFY OPPORTUNITIES
to
Optimize the Flow of Work

2. Colleen Johnson
• Director, Adaptive Agile Practice at
ImagineX Consulting
• LeanKanban Accredited Kanban Trainer &
Kanban Coaching Professional
• Former Agile Denver Board of Directors
• Co-chair 2016 & 2017
Mile High Agile Conference
• Member Agile Uprising Board of Directors
• CEO & Founder of ScatterSpoke, a team
space for more effective retrospectives
• Mama to three amazing kiddos
@scrumhive

3. Retrospectives
An opportunity to:
• Look back at past events
• Reflect on outcomes
• Share perspectives
• Voice frustration
• Empower the team
• Identify improvements
• Optimize the process

4. Action Items
• “Set up a meeting to discuss branch process”
• “Clean up user stories as stuff changes mid-sprint”
• “Define more clear acceptance criteria in Jira”
• “Dedicate time for developers to study topics and new tech
related to their work”
• “Review sprint burnup chart as part of daily stand up”
• “Stop rotating the Scrum Master role”
• ”More liberal permission to view infrastructure setting so we
can resolve issues faster”
• ”Include QA folks in Sprint Planning”

5. Kanban
• A “Just-in-Time” management method focused on
visualization of work by balancing demand against
capacity, limiting work-in-progress, amplifying
bottlenecks, and focusing on completing work before
staring something new.
• AKA GSD.

6. Eliminating Waste
The three types of Waste in Lean Thinking:
• Muda: Waste Flow
• Mura: Inconsistency Predictability
• Muri: Overburden Quality

7. Kaizen
• The Japanese translation "The act of making bad points
better”
• New Oxford Dictionary definition is “a Japanese business
philosophy of continuous improvement of working
practices, personal efficiency, etc.”
• The more popular translation is “change for better”
• Kaizen is a culture of learning and improving, not a
practice or process

8. Service Delivery Review
• Externally focused
• Are customer expectations being met
• Compare capabilities vs fitness criteria metrics
• ie: performance v targets
• Balance demand with capability
• ie: arrivals v departures
• Evaluate risk and mitigations

9. What’s Different?
• We make targeted
improvements to our
system based on data
and metrics from our
current performance
• AKA, not guessing
• Blending internal process
and external delivery

10. Kanban Metrics
• Lead Time: the duration for a work item from beginning
to end, including process time and wait states.
• Cycle Time: the duration for a work item to move from
point A to point B.
• Through Put: the count of work items processed per a
specific amount of time.
• Work in Progress: the total amount of work you have
committed to but have not completed at any given time
• Flow Efficiency: the ratio between working time and the
cycle time (expressed as a percentage)

11. Create Visibility
• Transparency of work and priorities
• Representation of varied work items
• Clear ownership and status
• Distribution of work load
• Informed decision making

12. Self Managing Teams
• Agree on workflow policies
• Push towards cycle time targets
• Swarm on work to finish faster
• Create slack to respond to unplanned work
• Find a sustainable pace of work

13. Resolve Blockers Faster
• Focus standups on the work
• Bring attention to stuck items
• Make resolving blockers a top priority
• Elevate cross team impediments

14. Forecast with Accuracy
• Use existing data to forecast delivery dates
• Forecast without story pointing or estimating
• Forecast without full story definition
• Track real time delivery probability
• Give the team ownership of project tracking

15. Process that Fits
• Refined to fit the needs of the team
• Changes made based on data
• Measurable results and metrics
• Ownership of the agile process

16. Fit-for-Purpose
• Our process is never final,
it is always adapting to
fits the needs of the
business
• AKA, not one size-fits-all
• Identifying opportunity,
trying something
different, and iterating on
solutions

17. Action Item Hypothesis
• What impact do you expect this change to have?
• How will you measure it?
• When will you check back in?
• What will you change if your hypothesis is true?
• What will you change if your hypothesis is false?

18. Plan-Do-Check-Act
• PLAN: Plan your
improvements, including
setting goals.
• DO: Put in place the actions
required for improvement.
• CHECK: Measure your
success relative to your
baseline.
• ACT: Adjust or tweak your
changes
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

19. Measure, Rinse, Repeat
• There’s always ALWAYS room for improvement
• Adopt a Kaizen mindset
• Leverage data to make targeted improvements
• Experiment! Try something different and measure
• Never skip the retrospective

20. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

21. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

22. The Big Three
Cycle
Time
Through
Put
Actual
WIP

23. Sample Data
Screenshot from ActionableAgule

24. What’s it telling us?
• Are we delivering fast enough?
• Will we meet our deadlines?
• Are we working on too much/too little?
• Is our WIP consistent?

25. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Agree to follow the system WIP limit
• Increase/decrease our system WIP limit
• Revise workflow policies
• Create an expedited lane or policy

26. Addressing THE BIG 3
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

27. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

28. Piles
• Leverage a Cumulative Flow Diagram
• Work accumulating in one area of the workflow
• WIP may be consistent but one area is over-burdened
• Team mates are stressed or overloaded
• Team mates are idle or unable to pull new work

29. Sample Data
Screenshot from Kanbanize

30. What’s it telling us?
• Where is the most work in our system?
• Do we need more capacity?
• Do we need to throttle a different part of our workflow?
• Should we add/remove workflow policies?

31. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Increase/decrease our state WIP limit
• Hire more people to add capacity
• Address gaps in specializations
• Visualize aging work

32. Addressing PILES
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

33. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

34. Understand Outliers
• Use a cycle time scatter plot to review delivery
• 85% cycle time number
• Look at % of variance
• Discuss causes of outliers high & low
• Consider timelines and events

35. Sample Data
Screenshot fromJira

36. What’s it telling us?
• How much variability do we have in our flow?
• What is causing that variability?
• What could we do to reduce variability?
• Is work moving through that isn’t going through all the
states of the workflow?

37. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Revise workflow policies
• Revise workflow states
• Increase priority of aging items
• Pair to share knowledge & learn

38. Addressing OUTLIERS
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

39. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

40. Evaluate Blockers
• Leverage blocker clustering
• Separate Internal v External blockers
• Identify Risks, Likelihood, Impact
• Do root cause analysis

41. Sample Data
Screenshot from SwiftKanban

42. What’s it telling us?
• Where is work getting blocked?
• What are the most frequent blockers?
• Do we need to escalate or increase visibility?
• Is this a risk that we can mitigate?

43. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Don’t hide what is blocked
• Ensure all work is in one place
• Make external blockers visible to that group
• Revise workflow policies

44. Addressing BLOCKERS
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

45. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

46. Measure Unplanned Work
• Evaluate Planned v Unplanned Work
• Look at response times of unplanned
• Consider impact unplanned has on planned
• Look at System WIP

47. Sample Data
Screenshot from Focused Objectives

48. What’s it telling us?
• Should we throttle the entry point?
• Are we exceeding our capacity?
• Do we have enough slack in the system to respond
quickly?
• Do we need an allocation for different work types?
• What impact is this having on our wait times?

49. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Lower WIP on To Do column
• Create Allocation/WIP for Planned V Unplanned
• Revisit state WIP Limits
• Track Lead time v Cycle time

50. Addressing
UNPLANNED WORK
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

51. What to look for
1. The Big Three
2. Piles
3. Outliers
4. Blockers
5. Unplanned Work
6. All the Feels

52. All the feels
• Start with appreciations
• Use the Prime Directive
• Give everyone a change to be heard
• Listen for cues of exhaustion
• Acknowledge others emotions

53. Sample Data
Screenshot from ScatterSpoke

54. What’s it telling us?
• Is our pace unsustainable?
• Are parts of the team over burdened?
• Are our policies clear and agreed upon?
• Could we swarm on our work?
• Are we focused on delivering as a team?

55. What changes would you
make based on this?
• Create policies to encourage swarming
• Remove owners on work items
• Reduce WIP or Add capacity
• Celebrate what gets done
• Have a Kanban Retrospective!!

56. Addressing FEELINGS
1. What is the issue?
2. What is the
desired outcome?
3. What would you
change?
4. How would you
measure success?
Small Group Exercise
PLAN:
Identify
the Issue
DO: Fix
the
Problem
CHECK:
Measure
the Fix
ACT:
Adjust
the Fix

57. THANK YOU!
Stay in touch!
Email me at:
colleen@imgnx.co
@scrumhive