The Kanban Guide

A short definition of Kanban as a strategy for optimising the flow of value through a system, maintained independently of any one training body. It defines the workflow a team makes explicit, the three practices of visualising the workflow, actively managing items in progress and improving the workflow, and the four flow measures of work in progress, throughput, work item age and cycle time. The guide stays deliberately silent on team structure, roles and cadence, which is what lets it sit alongside Scrum or any other way of working. The May 2025 version carries a Creative Commons Attribution licence, so you can quote it, translate it and build training on it. Read it before reading anything longer about Kanban.