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Milk Kanban
- bob1029 2y ago> In its original meaning, Kanban represented a visual signal. The thing that communicated, well, something. It might have been a need, option, availability, capacity, request, etc. > the system is self-explanatory I've always known of this as an "affordance" - An available & apparent interaction between an object and its user. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Design_of_Everyday_Things https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Design_of_Everyday_Things
- ricardobeat 2y agoThere is definitely a connection there, but affordance is a concept specific to interaction design and something having a physically self-evident purpose (handles, buttons, levers, knobs, etc).
- flail 2y agoThat's a great analogy! On the one hand, the context is different. An affordance, as you point out, signals how we should use an item. In a way, it suggests a meaning. A kanban's meaning is typically defined as the process (largely) is known. In the story about Milk Kanban, the index card is self-explanatory, but that's just an extra bit, to make the process more bullet-proof. On the other hand, if we generalize both examples, we land in a place where the design (of things, of processes) should communicate how to act. I either interact with an object or I do my action within a process. BTW: The Design of Everyday Things is another great reading recommendation in this thread.
- renewiltord 2y agoI like the trash bag bunches where the last three have a little tag on them that say “you’re running low”. Similar system. Very useful.
- uhoh-itsmaciek 2y agoOr thermal receipt tape with a stripe of color near the end.
- hbarka 2y agoEvent triggers.
- CityOfThrowaway 2y agoAnother thing I really like about Kasia's milk system is that it is a zero-emotional overhead communication. Just take the ticket and put it on her desk, and all will be handled.
- devenson 2y agoDepends how far away her desk is.
- woleium 2y agoYeah, I think i would make it “put this card in the reorder box”
- oniony 2y agoAnd then they have to poll the reorder box every day?
- mixmastamyk 2y agoYes, this is closer to subscribing to events, and more scalable.
- thorum 2y agoHm, you’re right. I’m thinking a nearby Raspberry Pi with a camera facing the box. It uses an LLM to identify the box contents and send update messages to Kasia each morning. I’m surprised they didn’t think of this already.
- mook 2y agoNFC tags are pretty cheap these days, so tape one on the back of the notice and drop it into a box with a sensor at the bottom? (This is probably overkill)
- akoboldfrying 2y ago
- thuanao 2y agoIn other words, issue tracker todo/doing/done lists have nothing to do with kanban.
- readthenotes1 2y agoThey do if your "doing" list has a line on it that prohibits/allows more tasks to start
- ramses0 2y agoThere's a field of study called "mechanism design" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanism_design https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanism_design ...you have to squint a bit, but I've taken it to mean influencing the behavior of unknown or mildly uncooperative participants. My main example of success was drawing a dotted line with a sharpie about 25% from the bottom of the water filter pitcher in the fridge (back with college roommates). Basically overnight, the probability of me finding the water pitcher empty in the fridge went from 50% to like 10%. The visual indicator (with only implied instructions) resulted in positive behavior changes. Related is "poke-yoke/kaizen" of "mistake proofing, continual improvement, and making problems visible". Being aware of these fields of study and their techniques can be applied to many areas in work and home.
- exitb 2y agoIt’s an interesting idea, but I’m not convinced it’s a good one. Office managers (or any kind of managers, really) are hired to remove a class of problems, so other people can focus on their job. This is outsourcing bits and pieces of your responsibilities to random coworkers. That being said, none of it is uncommon in modern corporate workplace.
- daveguy 2y agoKasia, the person who placed the note and requests its return, is the office manager. Giving someone an easy visual cue and task for keeping things running smoothly seems like great office manager work and organization rather than shirking any type of responsibility.
- mystifyingpoi 2y agoAgree. I dig the idea, really cool, but quoting the article: > it becomes a pain to check the cupboard with milk reserves every now and then If freaking glancing into the shelf once a day (or more like once a week, because this milk has months of shelf life) in scope of full time office manager job is "a pain", maybe that office manager should rethink their employment there.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- analog31 2y ago>>> maybe that office manager should rethink their employment there. A near-universal feature of office managers is that they are continually rethinking their employment.
- daveguy 2y agoOr maybe if putting a piece of paper on someone's desk for precise restocking is too much of "a pain" to the person who drank the milk, then they should rethink their employment there.
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- mystifyingpoi 2y agoWow, 3.2 and 2% milk available in the same office? Where do I apply?
- koolba 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- datadrivenangel 2y ago3.2% is just whole milk.
- meindnoch 2y agoCigarette rolling paper comes in a flat pack, from which you take the papers one by one, like a box of Kleenex. Towards the bottom of the pack, there's gonna be an odd-colored piece of paper, after which there still gonna be 10 pieces left in the box. The odd-colored paper tells you that it's time to buy a new pack, but you still have 10 cigarettes' worth. Edit: found a photo of this phenomenon on r/antiassholedesign https://www.reddit.com/r/antiassholedesign/comments/cfndfa/good_guy_rizla_notifies_me_how_many_rolling/ https://www.reddit.com/r/antiassholedesign/comments/cfndfa/g...
- dhosek 2y agoThe practice of having a slip that read “Five leaves left” was where Nick Drake got the title for his first album (somewhat eerily recorded five years before his death).
- locusofself 2y agoOne of the best albums ever IMO, just finished the excellent biography that came out a couple years ago by Richard Morton Jack
- y33t 2y agoI've begun to notice the number five a lot. I was reading Tammy Wynette's wiki page the other day and noticed that it appears quite a bit -- born May 5th (5/5), married five times, dead at 55. She also collaborated with the KLF, a pop group from the early 90's which also had an unusual number of fives to do with them (as well as 23's...2+3=5? Oddly, Tammy has a memorial highway in Missippi, MS23). Which brings me back around to Nick Drake. One of the members of the KLF now runs a small web store which mostly just sells his books to do with his post-KLF career, but they also sell other things as well, like overstock Nick Drake album tuck boxes...which are designed to hold all five of Nick Drake's albums. https://www.alimentation.cc/product/tuck-box/ https://www.alimentation.cc/product/tuck-box/ Not sure what any of this means. Edit: just noticed that I responded to your post five hours after you posted it.
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- 7bit 2y ago> The tricky part is that when you don’t drink milk yourself, it becomes a pain to check the cupboard with milk reserves every now and then to ensure we’re stocked. If checking the milk reserves once a day is too much of a pain for a person hired as an office manager, the person should self-reflect on his/her choice to take the job.
- ricardobeat 2y agoWhat if there are eight floors with two pantries each, four types of milk, five other drinks, plus seven different snacks that need replacing. They'd spend the entire day peeking at fridges and cupboards. This is why in places like I just described, you often have a shortage of particular items; the checks happen only every so often and usually by multiple cleaning employees. On the other hand, it's also exactly why Kanban came to existence, to solve a very similar problem in manufacturing. This particular example feels weird because your job is not to drink milk, but in theory it should work and allow you to have just-in-time replenished stock for everything.
- 7bit 2y agoTypically you combine that with other householding tasks. If you don't visit the kitchen or pantry daily as an office manager, you're doing something wrong. And walking through 8 floors with 2 pantries doesn't take that long either. I don't really think expanding o. The example makes a better case for the article...
- jrootabega 2y agoWhile this can be mitigated somewhat by keeping backups on hand, the card helps because it gives you a convenient record of needing to restock, which you can just drop somewhere you know it will be used. Even in personal life that might be a good idea. Dropping an empty box of pasta or dental floss on the ground also serves as a convenient reminder, but it's harder to do with a can of tuna.
- mariocesar 2y agoIt's a shame that some comments in the original post are so toxic and unwelcoming. There are plenty of empathetic people on HN. Well HN is welcome if at least when the topic isn't website standards or a page failing to load in some commenter obscure browser.
- jimnotgym 2y ago> When people say Kanban, they tend to think of a specific set of practices. Whiteboards & sticky notes (both almost universally virtual). When software developers say Kanban, they tend to think of whiteboards. For anyone who works in manufacturing they would have thought about replenishment first. It is completely ubiquitous anywhere where taking something from a location signals a need for replenishment.These days it is often virtually, where an ERP sees an order taking something below some level, triggering purchase or manufacture of a replacement. I understand the literal translation of Kanban is 'coloured badge' btw
- eikenberry 2y agoI've worked on multiple Kanban software dev teams and a whiteboard never came into play, vs. the scrum or extreme-agile teams which loved them. Kanban seems more about having tickets organized into a priority ordered queue of tasks.
- flail 2y agoThat is an interesting observation. The first two (and I would say key) practices of Kanban (as a method) are: - visualize work(flow) - limit work in progress So I wonder, how did these Kanban teams visualize work exactly? Now, I don't say the whiteboard (virtual or physical) is the only way to do it, yet it's almost ubiquitous.
- _betty_ 2y agoi've been dreaming of a way that visualises the user flows in the software (rather than cards on a board), think spider map showing possible user flows then colour coded circles based on what stage they're in. that way you can see what state an entire flow is in at a glance and being able to co-ordinate effort accordingly.
- Aurornis 2y ago> I've worked on multiple Kanban software dev teams and a whiteboard never came into play, Most teams don’t literally use a physical whiteboard, they use some software that represents the whiteboard. Do an image search for “Kanban board” and you’ll get a mix of physical whiteboards and software dashboards that imitate the same columnar style. Though one thing about software development practices is that names have become nearly meaningless as people have adopted different variations. I worked at one company recently that proudly bragged about their “agile methodology” but also demanded everything be planned 6-9 months in advance and made a big deal about tracking metrics for sprint accuracy and failure to complete tickets on time (including too early!).
- Kwpolska 2y agoThe system seems inefficient, as the sticky notes look the same. So Kasia has to go to the cupboard and check what to buy.
- jason_oster 2y agoSolution: The specific brand is written on the back of the card.
- pavon 2y agoThey probably want to check anyway to see if anything else is getting low (or ran out because a note wasn't delivered) to decrease the number of restocking orders placed. The notes just help indicate when an order needs to be placed earlier than expected.
- flail 2y agoThe order typically runs with not just milk but all the supplies. It's just the "going out of milk" trigger happens most frequently. And yes, using different kinds/colors of cards for different kinds of milk might have been an improvement to consider. It would, however, make the system more complicated. Was it me, I'd start with a simpler design and iterate only when I saw the need. It follows the rule of thumb: make it as simple as possible.
- greatgib 2y agoThe milk example looks very stupid in my opinion. Something more efficient would be something like this: - there is a closet in the kitchen with extra supplies: milk, sugar, ... - Kasia goes in the kitchen once per week to do the inventory of remaining supplies. If items <= 1, then she order new extra items for each low in quantity supplies...
- carreau 2y agoI feel like you are confusing "more efficient" with "more convenient for me when I use milk because I think the secretary is my maid".
- greatgib 2y agomore efficient and convenient for both in the end. Imagine the burden to have to put a postit on all products, to manage them on your desk, to stack them and remember to count them to reorder. Also because you will not pass your order item by item, like just ordering milk and then sugar 2 days later...
- carreau 2y agoI love how you are not even realising that behind the oatmilk ticket is written "last oatmilk", the behind the half and half one is written "only 3 half and half" behind the foo ticket "foo down to f(frequency of foo use)", and the person now now only need to go through the tickets at the end of the week (or if more than N tickets). I will let you ponder if you need to reticket all, or just the reordered product, wether a stack can have multiple ticket (a white one say 5 from the last and one red one two from the back know wether you need an urgent order) etc... And whether or miracle, if you don't receive any ticket a week that you don't need to reorder ! It's amazing how if that was expressed in term of resource allocation, reference counting, tagged pointers, scaling heuristic, garbage collect... that would click in people's mind, but many are incapable at abstracting because they feel they are beyond this.
- greatgib 2y ago
- galaxyLogic 2y agoIn the office I worked it was never an issue that we were out of milk. It was that people brought in their own milk cartoons and put them in the fridge, so others could have milk too. Nice. Thanks to whoever brought it! But then nobody removed that cartoon from fridge so it started to stink, and remained in the fridge still. Then no-one in particual was eager to tackle the bad smell, it definitely was not their job.
- ramses0 2y agoI implemented the "three sticker rule" at my office. Every Friday, put a neon dot sticker on _everything_ in the fridge. Instead of putting a fourth sticker on anything, throw it out. Because "anyone could do it", it usually ends up that "no one does it".
- galaxyLogic 2y agoSounds good, "THREE STRIKES AND YOU'RE OUT". But would it not mean that sometimes you had 3 weeks old milk in the fridge? :-)
- rsanek 2y agois 3 week old milk that old? usually when I buy milk the best by date is 2-3 weeks away
- flail 2y agoI generally trust the due dates printed on the items. But what would I know? Maybe it's a conspiracy to force us to drink old milk ;) On a more serious note, UHT milk can be stored for months, given it wasn't opened.
- latexr 2y agoThose dates assume unopened products. After being breaking the seal, they don’t last as long.
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- zopa 2y ago> And it’s a healthy wake-up call when someone who knows close to nothing about our fancy stuff designs a system that we would unlikely think of. I can't tell if the author asked Kasia how she came up with the idea? For all we know she's doing an MBA in the evenings and just wrote a paper on the history of just-in-time manufacturing in the Japanese auto industry.
- crusty 2y agoIs there even a Kasia, or did the author print out that note to establish her invented character just for the benefit of her blog's narrative? Does it really matter?
- flail 2y agoOh, there is a real Kasia. Although she's a person of many talents, I would be genuinely surprised if she spent evenings studying Japanese management methods. The solution she designed, however, is as if she already knew all of that part of the MBA program :) Which shows how significant parts of these methods have roots in basic awareness and perceptiveness to how the work gets done. Lean/Agile only codified some of these good practices. Unfortunately, they also petrified a lot of specific techniques. But that's another story.
- thih9 2y agoPerhaps Kasia should be offered a way to participate in core business projects, or a raise, or both. Seems only fair after such praise from colleagues and HN.
- flail 2y agoWe don't need to "offer" that. Anyone can do this. Literally, anyone can make any decision (in a structured manner), so joining a core business initiative is obviously on the list. Also, she already does participate in core activities. It would be much easier for us to deal with losing a couple of our best engineers than losing Kasia. Which is also a response to some voices in the discussion downplaying the value of the "office manager's" job. I partially blame common perceptions of this job being "just a secretary to everyone," which could be farther from what we have.
- kimlopez 2y ago[flagged]
- layer8 2y agoThis is a form of artifacts as reminders: https://pim.famnit.upr.si/wp/?p=288 https://pim.famnit.upr.si/wp/?p=288
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoI don’t know much about kanban but doesn’t this basically create work for others to bring the milk paper back? I can see how this works and is efficient in a way, but it removes the work for the person to monitor the milk stock.
- weaksauce 2y agosure it creates some work for someone that is invested in getting more milk for their coffee. hardly onerous and removes a lot of daily checking for the purchaser.
- flail 2y agoIf we look at it from the systemic perspective, the goal is to have enough milk at the office just in time. Balancing the tasks between different actors within the system is a different concern. If 30 seconds of my time saves someone else 10 minutes, it may be a good tradeoff, even if my time costs a few times more. On one of the most effective teams I worked on, there was a tech lead who would throw himself into a role based on the team's needs based on insight from a morning daily. Most of the time, he played his strongest suit (back-end). However, there were days when he was helping with the most menial front-end tasks (he wasn't super-effective at that) or testing (same). Was he efficient? If we look at him in isolation, then no. But because his work helped to remove bottlenecks and unblock the team, the whole team was more effective thanks to him. What is interesting in some of the discussion threads here is how people look at the process effectiveness in a completely reverse way. Sometimes, they focus on their individual efficiency as if they were able to deliver value singlehandedly. Individual efficiency doesn't mean much. A typical example would be a developer who's super efficient, but there's no one to do a code review (or test or whatever) just in time. By the time they get a list of issues to fix, they don't remember the context, they wrote so much more stuff relying on the things that they need to redo, etc. Their efficiency would mainly be regarding coding in isolation. While the effectiveness would be measured in what the team could release/deliver to the clients. As per Drucker's famous quote: "There is nothing quite so useless, as doing with great efficiency, something that should not be done at all."
- numpad0 2y ago> but it removes the work for the person to monitor the milk stock. Why is that supposed to be a problem? It's not like the person to monitor the milk stock belong to subhuman classes and doing work for them tarnishes your karma. In fact, in many tiny companies, it's more likely to be managers themselves doing non-scaling housewife like tasks. Less janitorial work for the boss and more time for executive tasks is good.
- smusamashah 2y ago> It should be as simple as possible (but not simpler) I have seen this phrase a number of times. What does it mean?
- askvictor 2y agoAny simpler and it would not be effective for it's intended purpose?
- smusamashah 2y agoOh! So 'any simpler and...' was the next statement being implied by 'but not simpler' in this phrase. I can make sense of it now.
- flail 2y agoThere is a level of oversimplification beyond which the solution stops serving its purpose. If this discussion board was just a shared doc in which everyone could write, that might be a "too simple" solution. Basic control over one's writing is what we expect in solutions such as this. With Milk Kanban, it might have been just asking people to tell Kasia when they take the last carton. Would it be a simpler solution? Yes. Would it work? Well, I guess there is a reason why we do have these index cards.
- Warwolt 2y agoIt's a quote that originated as a paraphrase of Einstein about applying Occam's razor to development of scientific theories. Things should be as simple as possible, with respect to your criteria. E.g. a scientific theory should posit as few objects as possible while still being able to explain all observed phenomenons.
- acyou 2y agoIf you carry enough inventory to stock out every 6-12 months, this might a good system. If you stock out every week it might become a pain, both for notification and for reordering. If it were me, I would have a service handle this, they bring in whatever you want and make sure it's topped up.
- gverrilla 2y agoI wouldn't be surprised if milk consumption on that office went down after this. Unless the table was very near, I just wouldn't take the last carton lmao.
- noisy_boy 2y ago> A simple index card taped to the last milk carton in a row stating, “Bring me to Kasia.” That’s it. A callback to indicate completion. Would have been better if the index card was taped to a carton towards the end, but still a few cartons remaining, to provide sufficient advance notice to restock.
- RobertRoberts 2y agoThis system was recommended to me from an old veteran manufacturing expert that was one of the consultants on an ERP implementation. The brilliance that this brought was anyone could easily pick up the inventory and restocking process. But the people that got in the way of this were people that thought it was "dumb". One person already knew all the bits and pieces and this was just extra work. (she was leaving the company in a few months...) The people that liked this idea were the new people that were replacing the older people, and people that only worked with the inventory periodically, so didn't have ingrained knowledge. (also, the part numbers were inconsistent and many other small issues that new people struggled with) But, the grumpy and the veterans won out, because they just didn't see the value in making a change like this. sigh
- hackburg 2y ago[dead]