How do you add Kanban to Scrum?

How do you add Kanban to Scrum? Here’s a few suggest steps to take.

Update the Team Working Agreement

Your team’s working agreement should reflect adding the kanban into your process. The entire team should be onboard with the idea of establishing a kanban and consistently using it. The working agreement should outline who can add cards, remove cards, establish workflow stage ownership, and how conflicts are to be resolved.

Figure Out the Typical Process

Next determine the typical or most likely process for a card from the beginning of the sprint to the end. As an example let’s say your team has User Design, Development, Testing and Release Management that is typically performed on every card. Each of these areas would have a column or workflow stage. You can simply use To-Do, Doing, and Done as workflow stages. Establish an owner for each workflow stage to manage card status.

Build the Kanban Board

Establish a Kanban Board with the workflow steps the team feels will work best. Determine a workflow owner for each workflow or assign a Kanban master who is responsible for managing and moving the cards on the board.

Moving Cards

Cards are moved either in the scrum by the person working on the card or the Scrum Master. Another approach is to have a deadline where all cards are moved by the team prior to the start of the scrum. The team verified the status of the cards. When workflow owners are not in agreement, the conversation about the card in question is taken offline.

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What’s the Difference Between a Functional Team and a Capability or Feature Team?

There are several types of development teams. For this question, we will focus in on Functional teams versus Capability teams.

Functional Team Definition

A functional team is center around a specific toolset, database, system, or process that is shared by multiple products. This these type of teams have significant in depth knowledge. Typically these teams don’t have much knowledge or experience with other systems in the organization. An example would be a database team. Although the team works with multiple products and teams, they are focused solely on the development and operation of the database platform.

Capability Team Definition

A capability or feature team is product based. Team members are broadly skilled in many different systems with in depth knowledge in certain areas. The focus of these teams is a “jack of all trades” approach that allows team members the flexibility to move between multiple systems. An example would be a team dedicated to the search feature of an application. The search team relies on database performance, indexing, user interfaces, and algorithms to display the best results. 

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How does an Agile Project Start?

Here are a few basic steps to starting an Agile project.

1. Establish management buy-in and engagement. Is a product road map or story map needed to show when capabilities are expected? How will status be reported? What process will be used when issues are escalated? How are cards prioritized for development and release?

2. Establish a working agreement. The team should establish its own working agreement of how they will operate. This isn’t handed down form management, but rather entirely developed by the team and covers Definition of Done, Definition of Ready, Ceremonies and Events, and anything else that helps the team operate effectively.

3. Start with a prioritized story map or road map. The team should have a clear picture of the direction the product is going in with priorities established for all cards. Fill your backlog and groom it based on these priorities.

4. Educate the team. Team members should fully understand the Scrum process you are following with clear roles before the sprint starts. Don’t assume everyone sees the roles on an Agile team the same way.

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