The classic, simplest Kanban board has three columns: This is fine to get started, particularly when the board doesn’t have many items on it. However, keeping the pure 3 column layout can mean you have many tasks sitting in the “In progress” column, and it’ll be harder to find out why. Splitting “In progress” into more columns can help to understand where things are. … [Read more...] about Why you shouldn’t have a Blocked column
Why sprint goals matter
To keep a team interested and motivated in their work, you need to give them something to care about. If your backlog has enough stories to fill 10 sprints, it can be tempting to queue up all the work and ask the team to get started. But that’s treating the team like a feature factory. They may feel the only important thing is getting the job done, and it doesn’t matter … [Read more...] about Why sprint goals matter
Why teams should focus on the right side of the Kanban board
Every task should deliver value. But until the task is Done, that value is only potential. Think of a feature that is partly built and not finished, or awaiting code review, or that has merge conflicts. At the sprint review, stakeholders ask about the feature. “Well, it’s nearly done.” For stakeholders - or indeed any user of your product - until it’s done, they … [Read more...] about Why teams should focus on the right side of the Kanban board
How contextual help benefits your product
Sometimes, users of your product are going to get stuck. Whether they’re a new user, there’s a feature they’ve not used yet, or the user simply doesn’t know where to start to do what they want to do, being able to get help is important. Providing help docs is a good first step, but they’re only useful if users can find what they need. Providing a hierarchy of topics that … [Read more...] about How contextual help benefits your product
Tips for building a good navigation bar
The three-click rule is a usability heuristic that suggests that users should be able to find what they are looking for on a website within three clicks, or three taps on a touchscreen. The origin of this rule does not appear to be backed up by data, so it’s arguable whether it is actually valid. Blindly following the three-click rule could lead to surfacing huge numbers … [Read more...] about Tips for building a good navigation bar