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Kanban explained: what you´ve always wanted to know

• mikekchar 9y ago
  This is probably one of the worst explanations of Kanban I've seen. Kanban is simple. Imagine you have multiple workstations. Each workstation requires parts. You have a trolley for each kind of part that you require. When you go below a certain threshold for the part that you require, you send the trolley back to the upstream workstation. In the trolley you have a chalk board. The chalk board has a request naming the part that you need and the number of parts that you require. The trolley is then returned to you will all or some of the parts that you requested. The number that were sent back is written on the board. That's generally it. Normally as part of kanban, you also have a Q/A function that inspects the parts before you send them downstream. This ensures that only good parts make their way to the next workstation. The agile "kanban" systems only vaguely resemble manufacturing kanban systems. That's not to say that they don't have some good ideas, but it's important to understand that it really is only inspired by manufacturing.