Scrum vs. Kanban: Understanding the Key Differences
improve productivity and efficiency, but they do so in different ways. Understanding the key differences between Scrum and Kanban can help you choose the right approach for your team.
Additionally, there has one hybrid project management method that combines Scrum & Kanban ideas, and we call it Scrumban. We will dig insight everything following advantages & disadvantages.
What is Scrum?
Scrum is an Agile framework that focuses on delivering value in short, iterative cycles called sprints. Each sprint typically lasts 2-4 weeks and includes planning, execution, review, and retrospective phases. It means Scrum follows a timebox or time boundary. Scrum teams have defined roles, such as the Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Development Team. There have some defined activities like defined roles, for example – Daily standup meeting, standup meeting duration should be 15 mins, there will be some questions to ask in daily standup meeting etc.
Key Features of Scrum:
– Sprints: Time-boxed iterations for delivering increments of work.
– Roles: Defined roles including Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Development Team.
– Ceremonies: Regular meetings like Sprint Planning, Daily Stand-ups, Sprint Reviews, and Retrospectives.
– Artifacts: Key artifacts include the Product Backlog, Sprint Backlog, and Increment.
– Transparency, inspection and adaptation: This supports the concept of working iteratively.
What is Kanban?
Kanban is a well-known Agile management methodology. To use the Kanban framework, project team will implement a philosophy of continuous improvement, where work items are “pulled” from a product backlog into a steady flow of work. The Kanban framework comes to life via Kanban boards, a form of visual project management that helps your team visualize work moving through stages.
Key Features of Kanban:
– Visual Board: A Kanban board to visualize work items and their status.
– Work In Progress (WIP) Limits: Limits on the number of work items in progress to prevent bottlenecks.
– Continuous Flow: Emphasis on continuous delivery rather than fixed iterations.
– Flexibility: No prescribed roles or ceremonies, allowing for more flexibility.
– Maximize efficiency: There will be a good visual understanding on availability of each team members.
– Structure workload: There will be conditions & policies for every stage of a work which will be set by team members.
Key Differences Between Scrum and Kanban
When to Use Scrum vs. Kanban
Use Scrum if:
– Your project requires a structured approach with defined roles and time-boxed iterations.
– You need regular feedback and review cycles to adapt and improve.
Use Kanban if:
– Your team prefers a flexible approach with continuous delivery.
– You want to focus on visualizing and optimizing workflow without the constraints of fixed iterations.
What is Scrumban?
The Scrumban methodology is part of an agile framework, a hybrid of scrum and kanban. It was created as a way to transition from scrum to kanban. The hybrid combines the best features of both agile project management methodologies and is well-suited for product and agile development projects.
What the scrumban method does is take the prescriptive nature of scrum, which resides in an agile framework, and uses the process of continuous improvement that is key to kanban. This gives teams the power to continually optimize their processes.
Teams that initially adopted scrumban wanted to stop executing their work in agile sprints, and are naturally attracted to scrum boards because of their pull-based system. Thus, this hybrid of scrum and kanban was born. By extracting the best of both agile methodologies, scrumban teams are more flexible in their ability to adapt to changes as they arise.
Scrumban Methodology: How Scrumban Combines Scrum and Kanban
The essence of scrumban is its combination of the defined structure of scrum with the fluid workflows of kanban. We’ll outline which elements of each exist in a typical scrumban environment.
Scrumban vs Scrum
Scrumban takes from scrum such decision-making as figuring out how much work can be done in a sprint and prioritizing what is the most important task to work on next.
But this work is not done until the necessary analysis is completed, which falls under the scrum definition of ready. This ready list is used as a bridge to organize tasks between the product backlog and the doing stage.
Scrumban vs Kanban
Kanban comes into scrumban to improve the project management process and visualize the workflow. First, scrumban uses kanban boards, which are often referred to as scrumban boards when used in a scrumban methodology.
Scrumban teams also use kanban processes, such as the pull system, which provides a continuous workflow. That is, tasks are pulled into the doing column when the team is ready to execute.
The Kanban method also helps scrumban by limiting how many items are in progress at any time, which increases focus on specific tasks and helps productivity. Unlike scrum, in kanban individual roles are not clearly defined, so this adds some flexibility, too.
Just-in-time analysis is inherited from kanban, which creates shorter lead times, instead of batch-processing for iteration planning estimates, which is used in scrum. Additionally, weaknesses in processes can be exposed through the use of process buffers and flow diagrams. Those scrumban tools help identify areas that can be improved and reduce bottlenecks.
Bottlenecks are the bane of projects. They slow down work, mess with schedules and waste time and money. A scrumban board is a great way to find those bottlenecks in workflow and resolve them before they become a problem. Like kanban boards, a scrumban board allows project managers to see where the most tasks are and address the slowdown early and effectively.
Everyone is on the same page in scrumban. Again, because of the transparency of kanban boards, all team members can see where they and the project is in terms of workflow. They update their statuses and everyone sees it.
Scrumban is a simple hybrid project management process that can be easily adopted. There’s no need for a scrum master or product owner. It’s a visual agile methodology and there’s only one planning meeting. The scrumban method rules are straightforward, so the learning curve is relatively flat.
This allows teams to have more of an equal footing, which helps to reduce stress in a project. Project management teams have the autonomy to choose tasks using the pull principle (a lean manufacturing technique that controls the flow of work by only moving on when the last task has been completed). Tasks are not assigned by a project manager or scrum master, and there’s no daily reporting to a project manager, which keeps teams on task.
Though there are many advantages, there are also some deficits to using scrumban that need addressing. For one, the scrumban methodology is so new that there are no best practices to guide it. This can open the door for teams to invent their own, which may or may not be a benefit to the project.
Because teams have the freedom to choose what task they work on it can be difficult to track the effort and contribution of individual team members on the scrumban board. There are no scrum daily meetings to give project managers a snapshot of the progress. This can create a project management nightmare.
Needless to add, the one who loses control in this situation is the project manager. A project manager has control over a longer-term process, such as what to pick from a three-month bucket and the tasks to schedule for on-demand planning and their priority. But after that, it’s up to the team to decide how to handle and implement them.
Both Scrum and Kanban offer unique advantages and can be highly effective in different scenarios. Even Scrumban is highly effective in few scenarios. The choice between them depends on your team’s needs, project requirements, and workflow preferences. By understanding the key differences, you can make an informed decision and implement the framework that best suits your project.