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I’ll be at the Boston Lean Party #LSSC12

I’ve just been putting together my personal program for LSSC12. This is the main US Conference put together by the Lean Software and Systems Consortium, which will be in Boston from May 13-18. Its definitely my favourite conference of the year and always gives me new insights and new ideas by bringing together a really diverse set of people from …

Linking Flow, Value and Capability

I wrote recently that I have come to think about Flow, Value and Capability as the primary impacts I hope a Kanban System will have. Flow, Value and Capability are not independent entities, however, with Capability being the link between Flow and Value. We can think of Flow as “doing the thing right”, where good flow is the result of …

What is Capability?

I recently gave talk at the London Scrum User Group (LSUG) describing Kanban Thinking and had a very interesting conversation about what I mean by the impact on capability. I realised I needed to think it through in a bit more detail, and this is an attempt to articulate it better. Defining Capability In his book Rethink: A Business Manifesto …

Impact, Outcome and Output

As I alluded to in the previous post, one of the changes in thinking, and in particular language, for me recently is the idea of impact. Specifically that impact is different from outcome which is itself different from output. I’ve differentiated outcome from output for some time, as have others, but I believe impact is a further step in understanding …

Three Cynefin Ahas

Over the last year I’ve been increasingly influenced by ideas from Cynefin, created by Dave Snowden of Cognitive Edge. If you want a good introduction, Liz Keogh recently blogged a good explanation. I’ve realised that there are 3 key changes in my thinking, some completely new, and some reinforced by a better understanding of cognitive complexity. None of these are …

The Science of Kanban – Conclusions

This is the final part of a write-up of a talk I gave at a number of conferences last year. The previous post was about the science of economics Scientific Management Revisited Is scientific management still relevant for product development then? As I have already said, I believe it is, with the following clarifications. I am making a distinction between …

The Science of Kanban – Economics

This is the fourth part of a write-up of a talk I gave at a number of conferences last year. The previous post was about the science of process Having a good understanding of how creative people can have an efficient process still isn’t enough however. As Russell Ackoff is often quoted as saying, “It’s better to do the right …

The Science of Kanban – Process

This is the third part of a write-up of a talk I gave at a number of conferences last year. The previous post was about the science of people. Even though a kanban system describes knowledge work, we can still apply formal sciences such as mathematics. Rather than applying them at a detailed, micro level, we can take a system …

The Science of Kanban – People

This is the second part of a write-up of a talk I gave at a number of conferences last year. The previous post was the Introduction. Software and systems development is acknowledged to be knowledge work, performed by people with skills and expertise. This is the basis for the Software Craftsmanship movement, who are focussing on improving competence, “raising the …

The Science of Kanban – Introduction

This is a write-up of a talk I gave at a number of conferences last year. I have split it into 5 parts. Abstract Science is the building and organising of knowledge into testable explanations and predictions about the world. Kanban is an approach which leverages many scientific discoveries to enable improved flow, value and capability. This article will explore …