Discovery Kanban Helps You Manage Risks and Options In Your Product Roadmap

I came across this presentation from LLKD13 (#LLKD13  / storify) by Patrick Steyaert (@PatrickSteyaert) of Okaloa on Discovery Kanban after following some links off a Kanban discussion group last year.

Discovery Kanban Helps You Manage Risks and Options In Your Product Roadmap

Slides

Video

It’s a complex and challenging presentation that connects a number of different concepts–including fitness landscape models, the Cynefin framework  and its concept of probes, the OODA loop, optionality–into a coherent synthesis: Kanban models can be used not only for managing execution or delivery flow by minimizing the amount of work in progress, but also for managing the discovery process of curating a portfolio of risks and options.

At a high level an execution focus yields a prioritized network of interdependent tasks; exploration yields a portfolio of risks and options.

I had the good fortune to meet Arlette Vercammen of Okaloa at the Lean Startup Conference 2013 and we had a conversation that has sparked an ongoing collaboration around helping Okaloa evolve their Discovery Kanban model both for startups and change agents in larger firms.

Patrick will be providing an updated version of the presentation June 16 in Leuven, Belgium:  “More Agility and Predictability with Visual Management and Kanban.”

Related blog posts and articles

• Patrick Steyaert “Discovery and the Whole Systems Kanban“
• Patrick Steyaert “Using Cynefin to Make Sense of Projects“
• Patrick Steyaert “Cynefin, Panarchy, PCDA, OODA, and Value Creation Curves“
• David Anderson “Understanding Process Knowledge Discovery“
• David Snowden and Mary Boone (HBR / registration required) “Cynefin: A Leader’s Framework for Decision Making“
• David Snowden and Cynthia Kurtz: “Strategy and Sensemaking in a Complex and Complicated World” [PDF]