Kanban and Scrum are two different strategies used for an agile development or project management system. Both terms are being used by various organizations and companies to strWhen to Use Kanban?eamline projects and increase their efficiency. And have proven to deliver great results, but still, they come with numerous differences and similarities.
Kanban methodologies are more fluid and continuous whereas if we talk about Scrum, you can see it is based on short and structured work sprints. To understand the similarities and key differences of both methodologies, let’s take a moment to discuss more about a detailed comparison of Kanban vs Scrum and find out which one is best to choose
What is Kanban?
Kanban is actually a method of visual management that allows you to visualize the process of completing a task. Kanban has a goal to avoid holding inventory and producing waste to reduce the cost with the assurance of continuous improvement of the process. Kanban’s method works in drawn feeds, which means it is the need or consumer that triggers the production of goods.
You can produce on-demand, save money, and have limited inventory. Kanban designs the form which is attached to the part container of an assembly line and detects its progress. In any case, if the form gets back to the beginning of the assembly line, it shows that it is essential to produce the part.
In project management, it is a form that represents a task and moves in a chart as per the status. The main motive of the Kanban method is to reduce the number of tasks in progress in order to improve the focus and performance of the team.
Kanban is based on are five foundation based principles that you should know about:
Five Foundation Principles of Kanban
1. Visualize Your Work
Kanban should be applied directly to the current workflow. Any changes needed can occur gradually over the team’s time. The idea here is that the more visible work is, the more improved estimates can be in terms of the time it takes to complete the job or the resources that will be needed to complete each piece of work.
2. Limit Work in Progress
Limit work progress is all about ensuring the team has a mindset of finishing work that has already started before new ones are initiated. You can set a word limit on how much work can be in progress at one time in each column. Or you can also say how many cards can be in each column at a given time.
3. Do The Top Priority Work First
Now, this is another essential Kanban principle that says prioritizing crucial tasks. Your TO-DO work column must be filled with the top priority work from your product backlog. You need to make a list of your full priority work and fill the space in the TO-DO work column with the user story when you have a room.
4. Focus on Flow
This principle involves ensuring that work moves as expediently as possible. Process review efforts should enhance the workflow to identify and remove hurdles. Your career needs to flow smoothly via the Kanban system. You need to make sure that you keep a lookout for any interruptions inflow and use these opportunities for improvement.
5. Continuous Improvement
The last principle of Kanban is continuous improvement. Even after implementation, the work is never finished truly. A part of the Kanban method is always continuously enhancing your process. When you start implementing Kanban and lean manufacturing principles within your operations, you always need to adjust to improve.
What is Scrum?
Scrum is one of the most renowned and widely used agile methods that provide a framework for structuring the work of teams in short cycles which last 1 or 4 weeks. In that way, the project can be improved towards progress. The agile methods of Scrum are mainly based on three pillars which are transparency, inspection, and adaption.
1. Transparency
For transparency, all parties involved speak the same language to have a good and effective understanding of the project.
2. Inspection
Inspection means regularly taking stock of the process of the project along with the process used to verify that everything is going well as planned and nothing is hindering this.
3. Adaptation
Adaption is all about the results of the inspection. The best thing about Scrum is you can learn and improve things via interactions.
The Core Values of Scrum
1. Commitment
Scrum relies on the personal commitment of every team member to complete every project. It helps assume a relatively flat authority structure and does not expect managers to convince or coerce team members to complete tasks. Scrum teams work together as a unit which means scrum and agile teams trust each other.
2. Courage
Courage is crucial for an agile teams’ success as it helps team members to have the courage to do the right thing and work on challenging problems. Scrum values each contribution of the team members in certain circumstances. The scrum team should feel safe and secure enough to say no, ask for help, and try new things.
3. Focus
The value of focus is one of the best skills a scrum team can develop as it allows the scrum team to be agile. On the Scrum team, focus means that each individual sets aside pet projects at the time of spring and resists the temptation to work hard or go back to touch up the other tasks, whatever the scrum team starts-they finish.
4. Openness
Every project comes with different challenges. Scrum always values honest and open communication to all stakeholders without fear. This means telling a team member honestly if something needs to be re-done on priority. That kind of communication graciously, trusting that everyone is working on the same goal.
5. Allows Respect
Scrum generally consists of self-organizing and collaborative teams, but each member is independent because no one is constantly doing their work. Every scrum member demonstrates respect to one another and each other’s ideas, stakeholders, product owners, and the scrum masters.
What are the Similarities Kanban & Scrum Shares?
There are many similarities between both methods (Kanban and Scrum)because they both follow agile principles.
Sub-Tasks Creation
Both methods help you to reduce the complexity of a project by breaking down the complex and essential tasks into sub-tasks that are easy to manage and execute.
Steady Improvement
Kanban and Scrum both are based on steady improvement processes, which enables great efficiency and offers better results.
Limitation of Number of Tasks
Both methods help you to limit the number of tasks in progress, which majorly helps to avoid multitasking and helps the team to focus on the tasks which need to be completed first. This helps the team to be more productive and efficient.
Visual Management
It is another common point between Kanban and Scrum agile methods. Visual management allows you to better visualize the progress of a project and identify the possible blocking points, and enhance the fluidity of the process.
What Are The Differences Between Kanban and Scrum?
1. Pace
Compared to Kanban, Scrum has a faster pace. Working in sprints is like a short iteration that lasts no more than two weeks, the team works towards achieving a specific goal. On the other hand, Kanban continuous work in a flow without interaction. And you can give deliveries as often as you need.
2. Roles and Responsibilities
Scrum comes with three specific roles i.e: Scrum Master, Product Owner, and the Development team. Each role has its responsibilities. But that is not with Kanban, because in Kanban roles are not defined strictly even if everyone is assigned responsibilities.
3. Change
With Scrum, no other changes can be made at the time of the sprint. Change requests get noted and then integrated into the next sprint. However, Kanban is very flexible with this and you can make changes to the account at any time.
4. Meetings
The scrum method is well structured and has four types of meetings during each interaction such as daily scrum, sprint planning, sprint retrospective, and spring overview. With Kanban, there are no predefined meetings that do not prevent the team from meeting regularly.
5. Delivery
With Scrum, you will get results at the end of each iteration but there is nothing like this in Kanban as goods are delivered as soon as they are ready.
When it comes to Kanban vs Scrum, which should I choose?
When to Use Kanban?
Kanban helps visualize your work, limit work-in-progress and quickly move position from to-do to done. Kanban is great for teams with many incoming requests that vary in size and priority. Kanban can easily fit in with existing processes, including Scrum. If you do not favour overhauling your entire work process but want to benefit from an agile approach, Kanban can be an excellent way to initiate.
When to Use Scrum?
Scrum can be used by anyone who needs to produce an end product, such as a web page, a software program, or even a construction project. Scrum has been linked to faster delivery, higher quality, lower cost, and higher productivity. Many quality managers also use Scrum as an effective method to tackle complex projects or projects that might see frequent change.
Bottom Line
Kanban and Scrum are two amazing and valuable tools that help you effectively manage and organize your projects. You can make up your mind to pilot your project by choosing one of the other of these methods. However, it is quite possible to combine them as they are complementary to each other. Indeed, you can choose Kanban for its chart and a limited number of tasks while working on short interactions of the Scrum method. By, at last, it is completely up to you.