A Kanban board maps tasks across columns representing different stages of work, usually on cards. They are then moved along a track, typically something like “To Do,” “In Progress,” and “Done.”
One of the strengths is the weaving this provides because it’s transparent who is doing what in what phase. It’s also transparent how many tasks are currently in progress and who is working on how many things.
“Doing”, and “done” might be reductionist terms – the person working on them would have a deeper story to tell than that. But as we know, a useful dose of reductionism helps us manage our bandwidth, and too many details about too many projects just overwhelm everyone, making it impossible to stay coherent or even just informed.
In addition, it’s common to define rules about how many tasks can be in the “in progress” stage. If it’s too many, we’re likely fraying the context, meaning we don’t complete quality work. That way, we can calibrate when, according to our experience, the context gets too thin – is it with 10 concurrent tasks? 5? 15? We get to decide, and then we have a simple rule to make sure we don’t have to track the workload in every moment.
Kanban also holds space for feedback. A blocked card is not a problem – it’s a signal. Something’s stuck, and the system can now respond. Instead of waiting for a crisis or assigning blame, the team learns to notice small signs early. This is a shift from firefighting or scapegoating to sensemaking and active context stewardship.
Obeya (Thanks to Olaf Lewitz for pointing that out) takes a bigger perspective by visualizing more aspects of value creation.
Wiser organizations 