Lean / Kanban: Eliminating Waste and Managing Flow

Lean / Kanban: Eliminating Waste and Managing Flow is the sixth chapter of a nine-chapter book entitled Head First Agile. I have completed reading and reviewing this chapter.

Lean / Kanban: Eliminating Waste and Managing Flow


“In Head First Agile, you’ll learn all about the ideas behind agile and the straightforward practices that drive it. You’ll take deep dives into Scrum, XP, Lean, and Kanban, the most common real-world agile approaches today. … This book also has everything you need to get certified, with 100% coverage of the PMI-ACP® exam.”

Lean / Kanban

Eliminating Waste and Managing Flow

“Agile teams know that they can always improve the way they work. They use the Lean mindset to find out where they are spending time on things that aren’t helping them deliver value. Then they get rid of the waste that’s slowing them down. Many teams with a lean mindset use Kanban to set work in progress limits and create pull systems to make sure that people are not getting sidetracked by work that doesn’t amount to much. Get ready to learn how to seeing your software development process as a whole system can help you build better software.”

Topics covered in Chapter 6: Lean / Kanban: Eliminating Waste and Managing Flow include the following:

  • Trouble with Audience Analyzer 2.5
  • Lean is a mindset (not a methodology)
  • Lean principles help you see things differently
  • More Lean principles
  • Some thinking tools you haven’t seen before
  • More Lean thinking tools
  • Categorizing waste can help you see it better
  • Value stream maps help you see waste
  • Trying to do too many things at once
  • Anatomy of an Option
  • Systems thinking helps Lean teams see the whole
  • Some “improvements” didn’t work out
  • Lean teams use pull systems to make sure they’re always working on the most valuable tasks
  • Questions Clinic: Least worst option
  • Kanban uses a pull system to make your process better
  • Use Kanban boards to visualize the workflow
  • How to use Kanban to improve your process
  • The team creates a workflow
  • The team is delivering faster
  • Cumulative flow diagrams help you manage flow
  • Kanban teams talk about their policies
  • Feedback loops show you how it’s working
  • Now the whole team is collaborating on finding better ways to work!
  • Exam Questions

Boston PHP

Boston PHP is the largest education-focused Meetup in New England with more than 3,700 members. Our mission is to engage members in continuing education efforts. As a result, we offer services beyond in-person meetups. A cornerstone of our member engagement strategy is this virtual self-study group initiative called Web Apprentices.

If you would like to learn agile methodologies as part of a group of like-minded web developers, join Boston PHP Meetup and sign up for the next Agile Appetizer self-study group.


Gene Babon

Gene Babon is a team leader, project manager and web developer who is actively seeking next management-level opportunity. Learn more at Pick a lane. Keep driving.


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