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I also don't fully understand what "doing Kanban" means - like you, I see Kanban as a type of board rather than a method of going through said board (maybe beca

I also don't fully understand what "doing Kanban" means - like you, I see Kanban as a type of board rather than a method of going through said board (maybe because of a lack of understanding of process & an over-indulgence in Trello's marketing). That being said, I would say that having a Kanban board without any sprint structure (or any attached micromeetings) would skyrocket my productivity. The two-week sprint thing is meaningless to me - in my org tickets overflow from one sprint to the next all the time, tickets get added mid-sprint, it's an utterly meaningless distinction.

baby 3y ago
Kanban is about organizing the work to be done and periodically revisiting the board to understand the work done and what’s next (which involves reprioritizing, pivoting, etc.) Some people might debate on how active a kanban board should be.
- beoberha 3y ago
  This goes back to my original post. Is this “doing Kanban” or is this just another process using a Kanban board?
- IshKebab 3y ago
  That sounds identical to how companies I've worked for "do agile". A kanban board. Every two weeks you revisit the board, see what got done, prioritise what to do next (usually by dragging it from the "backlog" to "todo" column).
  - baby 3y ago
    Could be much worse in practice. You could have retrospects every two weeks, daily standups, messages every day from your nontechnical manager asking you for estimate markers on each of the tasks, breaking down tasks further, renaming tasks they don’t understand but other engineers do, etc.
beoberha 3y ago
I’ve fortunately never had to do Scrum other than an internship where I had no idea what was actually going on. We do almost exactly what you describe. We just take tasks off the board and we don’t have sprints.
OJFord 3y ago
This is exactly how I feel. Then we talk about 'complexity points', explicitly not time, but then say only X of them fit into a two week fixed time window. So then overflow them (or pull new work in) as required as you say anyway, it's pointless? Whatever the management benefit supposedly is, seems like it could be achieved with declaring current (not 'sprint'^) goals, and a filter for tickets done/progressed in a given date range? (^Even the language is depressing: sprint, ticket, points, standup, sit down, keep moving, ...)
theshrike79 3y ago
> in my org tickets overflow from one sprint to the next all the time, tickets get added mid-sprint That's not Scrum then. You don't add stuff mid-sprint, that's the whole point. Unless the world is literally on fire, you don't touch the sprint content. What's your scrum master doing when you get stuff added? It's their job to prevent it. And if work overflows, you need to spend time grooming the tasks to manageable chunks and adjust the team velocity. You can always pick up more tasks if you run out of stuff to do.
- ResearchCode 3y ago
  Why do you need a "scrum master" to prevent that? Linux kernel seems to be doing just fine without them. The real solution is of course not to have any "sprints" at all. A manageable chunk of work is a 3 to 6 month project. Non-tech enterprise treat software engineers as children and create bad software. FAANG and adjacent companies treat software engineers more as professionals and create better software.
  - theshrike79 3y ago
    Linux kernel is more like Kanban than an Agile project, you can't really compare it to a project with an actual client who pays money to receive features in a timeframe. Stuff gets done when it's done and the BFDLs decide when the feature gets into the actual kernel. Waterfall-style projects had 3 to 6 month timeframes of delivery and we all know how that goes. The result is always either out of date due to changing requirements or not what the customer wanted because there is no way to change course after the project specification was locked. ...or you spend so much time doing an exact specification that the Agile team has already delivered 3 incremental versions.
    - ResearchCode 3y ago
      I don't see what use a "scrum master" is. That sounds like a small task for the software engineer or their real manager. There is nothing showing that heavy agile actually leads to features being developed earlier. In my experience it's the opposite as you build up heavy tech debt by micro-managing and optimizing for a 2 week return instead of the long term. Waterfall were 1 to 2 year projects with heavy up-front administration. 3 to 6 months is well-balanced and that's what the "elite" companies and research groups tend to use. Two weeks is the current fad at non-tech enterprise.
liveoneggs 3y ago
That's the whole trick with "doing Kanban". You don't need special magic methods to do your work- just pick up a ticket and do the work, repeat forever.

baby 3y ago

Kanban is about organizing the work to be done and periodically revisiting the board to understand the work done and what’s next (which involves reprioritizing, pivoting, etc.) Some people might debate on how active a kanban board should be.

beoberha 3y ago
This goes back to my original post. Is this “doing Kanban” or is this just another process using a Kanban board?
IshKebab 3y ago
That sounds identical to how companies I've worked for "do agile". A kanban board. Every two weeks you revisit the board, see what got done, prioritise what to do next (usually by dragging it from the "backlog" to "todo" column).
- baby 3y ago
  Could be much worse in practice. You could have retrospects every two weeks, daily standups, messages every day from your nontechnical manager asking you for estimate markers on each of the tasks, breaking down tasks further, renaming tasks they don’t understand but other engineers do, etc.

beoberha 3y ago

I’ve fortunately never had to do Scrum other than an internship where I had no idea what was actually going on. We do almost exactly what you describe. We just take tasks off the board and we don’t have sprints.

OJFord 3y ago

This is exactly how I feel. Then we talk about 'complexity points', explicitly not time, but then say only X of them fit into a two week fixed time window. So then overflow them (or pull new work in) as required as you say anyway, it's pointless? Whatever the management benefit supposedly is, seems like it could be achieved with declaring current (not 'sprint'^) goals, and a filter for tickets done/progressed in a given date range? (^Even the language is depressing: sprint, ticket, points, standup, sit down, keep moving, ...)

theshrike79 3y ago

> in my org tickets overflow from one sprint to the next all the time, tickets get added mid-sprint That's not Scrum then. You don't add stuff mid-sprint, that's the whole point. Unless the world is literally on fire, you don't touch the sprint content. What's your scrum master doing when you get stuff added? It's their job to prevent it. And if work overflows, you need to spend time grooming the tasks to manageable chunks and adjust the team velocity. You can always pick up more tasks if you run out of stuff to do.

ResearchCode 3y ago
Why do you need a "scrum master" to prevent that? Linux kernel seems to be doing just fine without them. The real solution is of course not to have any "sprints" at all. A manageable chunk of work is a 3 to 6 month project. Non-tech enterprise treat software engineers as children and create bad software. FAANG and adjacent companies treat software engineers more as professionals and create better software.
- theshrike79 3y ago
  Linux kernel is more like Kanban than an Agile project, you can't really compare it to a project with an actual client who pays money to receive features in a timeframe. Stuff gets done when it's done and the BFDLs decide when the feature gets into the actual kernel. Waterfall-style projects had 3 to 6 month timeframes of delivery and we all know how that goes. The result is always either out of date due to changing requirements or not what the customer wanted because there is no way to change course after the project specification was locked. ...or you spend so much time doing an exact specification that the Agile team has already delivered 3 incremental versions.
  - ResearchCode 3y ago
    I don't see what use a "scrum master" is. That sounds like a small task for the software engineer or their real manager. There is nothing showing that heavy agile actually leads to features being developed earlier. In my experience it's the opposite as you build up heavy tech debt by micro-managing and optimizing for a 2 week return instead of the long term. Waterfall were 1 to 2 year projects with heavy up-front administration. 3 to 6 months is well-balanced and that's what the "elite" companies and research groups tend to use. Two weeks is the current fad at non-tech enterprise.

liveoneggs 3y ago

That's the whole trick with "doing Kanban". You don't need special magic methods to do your work- just pick up a ticket and do the work, repeat forever.