13 Kanban Board Examples for Your Team
Looking for inspiration for your Kanban journey? Take a look at these Kanban board examples to service any team from sales and marketing to development and manufacturing.
Intro
Kanban board is a powerful tool that can help you visualize processes, understand the current state of your project, and optimize where needed. However, if it is your first time using this tool, there may be some uncertainty about what type of board you should choose. To help you understand the possibilities of Kanban and imagine what types of boards you can create, we gathered various Kanban board examples to get you inspired. Review all of the sample Kanban boards or choose the ones of interest in the menu below. We hope this comprehensive list of examples will help you in building the perfect Kanban board.
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All the examples are built using the most advanced Kanban board in the market – Teamhood. There are several reasons, why Teamhood can be considered the leading Kanban tool – adaptability and visualization of complexity among others.
1. Basic Kanban examples
Simple Kanban board example
No matter which industry you are from or what type of work you do, a basic Kanban board is always a good place to start. It allows you to visualize your tasks and immediately gain a better understanding of what is currently going on and where your team should be going. The most simple Kanban board example is composed of 3 sections – Backlog, Work in progress and Done. The Backlog holds all of the planned tasks, Work in progress holds tasks that are being worked on, and Done holds the completed tasks.
Interactive Kanban Board example
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Kanban board example with process tracking
Once all your tasks are visually sorted, you will most likely want some more clarity on their priorities and stages of completion. Here, additional sections of the Kanban board come into play. The backlog is enhanced with priority columns, holding tasks that are more important and should be completed first. And the In progress section is divided into clear process steps tasks must go through. For example, design- manufacturing – testing – shipped.
This Kanban board example is the most common base teams use to set up their process as it is easy to start with and improve on once you begin working.
2. Advanced Kanban board
For those running more complicated projects, just identifying all the process steps may not be enough to have clarity on the process. Here is where Advanced Kanban boards come into play. They add one more element to the In progress section and allow each process column to have a secondary workflow of its own.
In the Kanban board example above the Design phase has a completely separate workflow to track subtasks and to get more accuracy on progress. Such an addition is especially useful for stages like Design or Testing where several iterations of back and forth are required before a team can move forward. With an advanced Kanban process, you can see both – the big picture and the important details.
3. Kanban Project Management example
If you are looking for a kanban board example that will help you with project management, the main criteria are the visualization detail and depth. In the example above, you can see a board that provides various visualization levels all in one place. The Kanban swimlanes define separate teams working on the project. While columns are used to visualize the process of both – tasks and their subtasks. Thus, providing a deeper understanding of what is going on.
Lastly, each task card shows if it is blocking or waiting for another task to be finished. Providing an additional layer of valuable information.
4. Task management Kanban board example
Managing all of the team tasks and tracking their individual progress is often quite a big headache for project managers. With a Kanban board, teams can visualize all of their tasks in a single space, while organizing them in a way that is easy to read and understand. Each team can:
- Visualize and prioritize their process using the status columns.
- Expand any of the more complicated process steps with an additional process of its own and track subtasks separatelly.
- Categorize items using rows/swimlanes.
- Draw dependencies between tasks to know when each of them can be performed.
5. Kanban IT Support Example
A little different approach comes from this board used for Kanban IT support or issue tracking. To visualize the process and make it clear to all the team members, this board is combined like a matrix. The rows symbolize the priority of the issue ticket and the columns symbolize status. Making it easy to assess the situation and identify the most important work.
Using a system of columns, the team can sort new items into ones ready to be solved or blocked, track which issues are being resolved or just waiting for confirmation, and categorize closed issues as completed or not resolved.
It is a rather simple, but effective way to visualize work when it comes to issue tracking.
6. Kanban board for Software Development
One more example comes in the form of Kanban for software development teams. This sector has been the first to adopt Kanban in project management and has since found many ways to utilize it for their benefit. One example of such usage is this system of two connected boards.
The first board is dedicated solely to the Backlog and focuses on planning and prioritizing tasks. Software development teams often have to juggle and reprioritize many issues, thus having a separate board for planning is always a good idea. The second board in this example is the board for execution. Here the team can easily track the progress of tasks the team is currently working on, by creating as many process steps as needed. Such a system makes it easy to use Kanban for software development needs.
7. Kanban Product Management Example
Using a structure of several Kanban boards can be useful not only for the engineering teams but for all companies that want to set up a more transparent process. For this, you should utilize several boards, all dedicated to specific aspects of your process. Here is an example Kanban product management board that covers the full development cycle of a new product.
Kanban for setting the Roadmap
Any new product first starts with a plan. To make sure your company is a long-term player you will want to set up plans on what has to be achieved in the nearest future as well as in the later years. And there is no reason why your task tracking should not begin here as well.
For this you should choose some kind of a roadmap Kanban board example, maybe even the one seen above. By using such a board, it will be easy to register ideas, prioritize, analyze them, and then decide which ones to take on and which are not worth the effort. While setting up rows as year quarters will help you map out your plans in time.
Kanban for managing Backlog
Once you are ready to materialize ideas, they should be moved to the next board for grooming and prioritization. The Backlog Kanban board example above is great for this, allowing you to review the ideas and come up with clear actions for your team to take. You can see the whole quarter’s worth of tasks on this board and prioritize them based on importance and the order in which the team should complete them.
Kanban for Execution
As the priorities are set, it is time for the team to take over. Tasks are moved to the Execution board in chunks that the team can complete within an iteration. Here even more detail is introduced, as the team can see and follow subtasks through a separate process in the execution and testing phases. Allowing the team to see just what they need and focus on the work that has to be done.
Rows can be used to separate iterations and thus provide a more accurate plan for the team.
Release Kanban board example
Lastly, as the product is done and tested, the team should move the task to the release board dedicated to Kanban product management. Making it easy to track which features have been released with each version and track if the release is live or not.
8. Accounting Kanban board example
Using a Kanban for your accounting firm can be a great benefit as it allows you to understand the workload of your team and the effort put in for every client. In this example, Backlog does not have a traditional priority column but is equipped with a similar ‘Ready for distribution’ column which holds tasks that can be taken on by the team.
Since the process for accounting tasks vary and is known to the whole team, the In progress column is used to visualize different team members. Allowing you to see how many tasks each of the team members have taken on at the moment.
Lastly, process planning is incorporated into the board by using Kanban swimlanes to display separate weeks, thus visualizing what is coming next.
9. Marketing Kanban board examples
Social Media management board
Marketing teams and projects are known for including a lot of different efforts and variables. Thus, to ensure effective task tracking it is best to use a system of separate Kanban boards dedicated to different types of processes. This first Kanban example is set up to track social media marketing efforts.
Backlog gathers ideas and marks which tasks should move forward. Work In Progress shows what the team is currently working on. With the secondary process, you can quickly check at which stage – design, copywriting, or review the campaign is in. And the In Campaign column keeps track of all live promotions to keep you in control. Lastly, rows are used to distinguish weeks and thus allow to plan out the social media calendar right there on the board.
Campaign tracking Kanban board
For those working on larger campaigns, a little different Kanban board example may be more sufficient. Instead of using rows to visualize weeks, rows could be used to represent different campaigns, making it easy to sort tasks according to their main goals and track them on the board. Teams can also take advantage of predefined tags and sort the tasks within each campaign, e.g. – Display Ads, Direct Mailing, Events, PR, and others.
10. Sales Kanban board example
A sales Kanban board can be used to effectively track the client lifecycle. With the help of columns, sales teams can effectively visualize the client path from a lead to a customer. While Kanban swimlanes are used to differentiate the leads based on the channels they come from, the company size, or other factors.
11. Design or creative process Kanban board example
Design teams and creative individuals usually love visual solutions. Thus, a Kanban board can become a great way for tracking their work and ensuring everything is delivered on time. The most important aspect of such a process is a review. Often this is done not once, but 2 or 3 times before the final result is approved. Thus, it is important to create a Kanban board that visualizes this progress and lets outside parties understand how far along the process each task is.
In the Kanban board example above, you can see that the board is divided into two review stages. As a team member is working on the task, they can track the subtasks through individual process steps and then submit the whole task for the first review. Once that is done, they can either complete the task or move it into the second iteration and improve what’s needed. Then again they submit the task for review. This way, the whole team, and the external stakeholders always know the exact stage of each task.
12. HR Kanban board example
A similar process could be applied when using a Kanban board for the human resources team, especially in the hiring process. All of the prospective candidates would be visualized with different Kanban cards, while the columns represent the hiring process. Lastly, Kanban swimlanes would be used to define the position candidates are applying for. Such tracking makes it easy to see which candidates advanced through the steps, which did not, and at what step.
13. Engineering Kanban board examples
Engineering Design and Manufacturing Kanban board
Engineering projects are known for their complexity and difficulty to manage. Thus, to ensure everything is under control, it is best to use several Kanban boards. There are a few ways to divide work, the first one is dividing the project into separate stages. For example, Design and Manufacturing.
In the Design board requirements are gathered and prioritized. Then the team can mark the stage of completion and check the quality assurance. Once an item reaches the Output column, it is moved to the manufacturing Kanban board and a separate production process takes place. The percentage of completion in the design board lets the production team know when to be ready and using two separate Kanban boards makes tracking tasks and processes clearer.
Kanban system for Planning and Execution
For engineering companies with several projects or project groups going on at the same, a different approach to structuring the Kanban boards may be more effective. The approach here is to have one board for all the planning and separate boards for the execution of each project.
This way the planning is centralized and once the tasks are ready to be completed, teams can track their progress separately in their project-specific boards. For larger companies, this allows having control over what is being done while still keeping the autonomy of specific teams and tracking tasks with more detail and accuracy.
Structure to separate Project and Administrative tasks
If your engineering company needs to separate project tasks from administrative work, this task board set up will be your favorite. Here the company is using two Kanban boards for their task monitoring. The project board tracks the work being done in several rows dedicated to different projects. This board is more complicated and visualizes the whole process. As well as displaying secondary workflow for the subtasks.
While the Administrative board is dedicated to administrative tasks associated with the projects. Here only 3 stages are monitored – To do, Doing, and Done to see what is the status of each task. This way, the company can separate tasks based on their nature and have an effective tracking process for both.
Once you are ready to materialize ideas, they should be moved to the next board for grooming and prioritization. The Backlog Kanban board example above is great for this, allowing you to review the ideas and come up with clear actions for your team to take. You can see the whole quarter’s worth of tasks on this board and prioritize them based on importance and the order in which the team should complete them.
Summary
Kanban board is a powerful visualization tool that can be used by teams from various fields and backgrounds. If you are new to task visualization start with something simple and then improve the board as you get a sense of what your preferences are. If you already know what process works best and simply want to visualize it, pick one of the Kanban board examples, and visualize your efforts today.
Get even more Kanban board ideas with creative Kanban boards, get started with Teamhood Kanban templates, or compare Teamhood with other Kanban boards.
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Passionate content marketer looking to bring better solutions to the project management space.
2020 - Present Marketing specialist at Teamhood.
2014 - 2020 Marketing manager for Eylean.
