About the Author
Hello, I am Ivo. As an agile coach and trainer, I support banks, Fintech, and IT companies in transforming to adaptive strategy and efficient workflow. A method that has proved to be effective in those journeys was Kanban. It is an evolutionary method that does not push immediate changes in the teams and management but facilitates smooth improvements within the administration and teams.
Most of the people I work with readily understand the core Kanban concepts, but they need time and additional efforts to see how those concepts would work in their teams and organizations. My colleague Via and I created realistic simulations in which the teams and managers experiment and learn how to use Kanban.
The simulations engage the participants and demonstrate how Kanban works in practice. They are what my customers say they value the most. Last but not least, I really enjoy facilitating simulations!
How Does the Simulation Work?
This simulation facilitates comprehensive and realistic experimental learning among a group of 4-12 participants. The participants are organized in a Project Management Office (PMO) and three functional teams producing and delivering features for multiple projects.
A typical simulation starts with Project Managers aiming to utilize the capacity of the teams as much as possible for completing their projects. Although the three Kanban teams are efficient and effective on a micro level, they do not always produce the most valuable (for the project) features, which results in bottlenecks and workflow inefficiencies on the organization level.
While discussing the workflow and KPIs on the system level, experienced facilitators guide the participants to introduce essential Kanban project management practices for the PMO. The participants practice using flow-related data to make decisions related to scheduling multiple project work to increase the business outcomes on the organizational (project portfolio) level. As a result, the PMO and Kanban teams focus on delivering outcomes on an organizational level that help them increase the delivered project results by 60% - 110%.
The Simulation in Action
The teams run the simulation on a fully operational software, the leading Kanban platform Kanbanize. As a result of the simulation, the participants discover how Kanban can support project and portfolio management, and they are curious to learn in-depth Kanban practices.