Moving Post-it note project management online
Posted on 03 August 2011 by Pete Duncanson
Following a few Twitter conversations recently I was impressed at how many agencies still project manage using the humble Post It note. We're trying to move all that online.
Sharing a couple of tweets with the good folks at Forty agency
after reading their great
project management blog entry and how they (and many other
agencies) still make heavy use of the humble Post-it note for
managing a wide range of projects.
I thought it might be helpful to share a few notes on how we
work as we also used Post-it notes until about a year ago when we
updated to effectively use an online version combining a couple of
the management tools we use here.
Case lists and version control
As we already use the awesome FogBugz and Kiln [1, 2], we're pretty
efficiently set up in terms of logging tasks so instead of writing
on a Post-it, we simply log a new job online. You can even email it
into FogBugz if you wish.
It's pretty much a like for like exchange from paper to web for
us here but instead of the bit of paper that sometimes fell down
the back of the air conditioner in the corner, we get a full case
history in a click. There are a few systems that are similar tools
for achieving this sort of thing.
It's proved to be fine for managing huge projects such as our sitewide relaunch of Olympic
Holidays last year which we used a familiar "tree" structure
that mimics the well established Post-it style loved by all.
Moving the Post-it notes to a Kanban board
One of the nice features we make use of is that there is a
Kanban plugin [3] that ties in with
our case management and version control.
Our Kanban board is the bit where we traded bits of paper and
whiteboards for project cases and swim lanes. It took some getting
used to but if you're interested, I can't say enough good things
about Kanban by David J Anderson [4]
as it not only explains very well how to use the system, it also
covers how to explain it to your clients.
You can set it up however you want but we found our current
system is just about right for us and importantly our clients.
We drag and drop jobs through the swim lanes in Kanban in much
the same way as you would on your brown roll of paper or
whiteboard.
Always sharing with the client
The main reason we switched from the Post-it note system was
simply because this is an easier way to communicate progress and
project deliverables with the client because they have access to
the board.
It's why wherever possible I'm trying to move our process and
relevant files/assets into the cloud.
A quicker and more agile workflow
We only use the full force of Kanban with our main client
Olympic Holidays simply because that's where the bulk of our time,
resource and workload is.
Since moving to this workflow, we deliver more and develop along
with release new stuff on a much more regular (and agile) basis
with quicker progressing and prioritising of jobs because it's laid
out in a very easy to understand and follow visual manner that the
Post-it notes always did so well.
A large part of this is due to the fact the board (and "Post-it"
notes) is open to the client to monitor and feed back into as
well.
They don't just add new jobs on a whim, jobs aren't added
without agreement and discussion. Same as ever.
A recently discovered downside
Speaking with Pete recently I found that there are some
negatives to this system that might mean it's not perfect for
everyone (what system is though right?) and because the bulk
of our work is for one client, we've only used this system for them
and only just considered some possible downsides.
It appears at the moment that you can't easily manage several
public projects with FogBugz and the board because the principle of
Kanban dictates you only have one board.
It might be less than ideal for those agencies who currently
work with multiple project boards because you can only really have
one with this system.
The logic of that makes sense because the principle is that you
can only work through X number of tickets based on finite resource
so you can only add those tickets to the board no matter which
client it's for but I'm not sure how you'd fare if you're
definitely keen on the multiple board approach/metaphor.
It's also unclear at the moment how you'd manage user access to
the board so different clients can't see each others tickets (will
update this bit when I find out).
Smaller projects
Quite often for smaller projects, I simply use FogBugz to log
nested cases and sub cases as I did for the Olympic relaunch. That
works perfectly well but doesn't offer the quick visual guide that
Kanban (and a Post-it note board) does although it does retain all
the functionality and practical sharing with clients.
We actually use this to break projects into small design and
development jobs which we use to quote time and cost for clients so
again, it's replicating the easy notation you get with Post-it
notes but online.
Post-it notes are still great
As I mentioned, this is just a quick insight into our
workflow and efforts to try and become less reliant on bits of
paper and offer better sharing and transparency with our clients
who we can't always work face to face with. It's only a guide to
what we do so feel free to pick and choose any bits that might be
useful or by all means let us know your thoughts on how we could
improve too!
It works well for us and of course it goes without saying we're
still fans of the mighty Post-it note for some things.
Resources
- FogBugz
case management
- Kiln version
control
-
Kanban Board for FogBugz
-
Kanban by David J Anderson (A great overview on the principle
and system)
- Forty Agency who
inspired the post
-
Post-it note project schedules
-
The post it smiley image credit
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