Kanban 2 January 3rd 2018

On January 3rd, the TalentMAP team met to perform a retrospective based on the temporarily adopted Kanban style. Kanban style was adopted due to the sporadic team availability over the holidays (Roughly from Nov 15th – Jan 3rd). Kanban differs from our current approach in that, rather than rigid sets of tasks for a sprint, the technical team would pull items from the backlog as they complete tasks. These are generally pulled off the backlog in priority order, unless there is a blocker or other exception. This is an efficient method to take care of a lot of low level of effort tasks (such as technical debt or small bugs) as well as tasks the require a lot of co-ordination between frontend and backend. New stories can be added to the backlog and prioritized at any time, meaning backlog grooming becomes a pseudo-sprint planning. (Although the product team should feel free to add/groom/prioritize at any time)

By temporarily switching to this methodology for the holiday season, we would remove procedural blockers for the technical team and allow for a higher throughput with the fragmented working times. We would keep the daily status calls, but would shift to a mid- and post- season demo of new functionality.

I liked...

• See data connections (API/Web SVC's/ to static/stable data sets like: skill code, post location, etc.)
• FSI testing (cadence ... every other week?)
• Continued user research
• Autocomplete
• Search bar autocomplete
• Prioritize redesign of pages (home, position, compare)
• TalentMAP design system

What if ...

• Dept. unable to screen share CDO view
• Complexity of connecting API to Web services and ADFS
• Integration testing
• Lack of permissions for other tests
• DOS access to product management tools
• GH projects did not work
• Upcoming user research
• User research tasks
• Bureau interviews

How was the Kanban?

• Yes (4)
• No