Backlog → In progress → Review → Done
Kanban and the Physics of Flow
WIP limits, cycle time and Little's Law — why limiting work in progress makes work finish faster.
On this page
Kanban has no sprints, no estimates and no fixed roles. It has one non-negotiable rule: limit work in progress.
The core practices
- Visualise the workflow — every column is a real state, including the queues between them.
- Limit WIP per column, and enforce it socially, not with tooling alone.
- Manage flow — track cycle time and ageing, not utilisation.
- Make policies explicit — write the pull criteria on the board.
- Improve collaboratively using flow metrics as evidence.
The most useful chart is the ageing work-in-progress chart: every item still in flight, plotted by how many days it has been open. Anything older than your 85th-percentile cycle time is a conversation, today.
Related PMI standards & templates
External resources on pmi.org — links open in a new tab. Some require PMI membership.
PMI standard templates for this topic
Editable Word and print-ready PDF downloads — no sign-up required.
- Sprint retrospective template →A PMI standard sprint retrospective template with a 90-minute facilitation script, the data to bring, five session formats, and an action log that limits you to three changes.
The PM Delivery Toolkit turns everything in this guide into fill-in templates — $25, one payment.
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Discussion
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