Kanban system designs tend to focus on addressing the problem of starting too much work (rather than first finishing work). Less attention is given to the opposite problem of not having enough work to start (aka starvation).
In practice, starvation occurs when an upstream process is not providing enough, or the right type of options for downstream processes to work on. Before work can be pulled into a downstream process, several things must be done: ideas and requests need to be captured; a common understanding must be reached and conflicts about requests need to be resolved; ideas or requests must be further analyzed and documented; etc. The upstream process is also often a process of triage - selecting between different options.
Upstream Kanban systems are Kanban systems that have the purpose to ensure minimal options for the downstream process to choose from. Upstream Kanban supports collaboration between those that need to define what must be executed/built and the just-in-time definition of work items for the downstream process to work on.
This session will focus on upstream in relation to downstream Kanban systems; why upstream Kanban systems are important, how they are different but similar to downstream Kanban and how to smoothen the end-to-end flow (upstream+downstream). We will discuss examples and how to set minimum option limits as a function of downstream delivery rate and upstream lead time.
Lean Coffee format discussion.
