The Information Refrigerator
I'm currently working with a new team and introducing them to the wonderful and exciting world of Agile!
I was discussing the Kanban board - which is a giant felt board on the wall covered with index cards and string to mark swim lanes, with a few non IT people and they were a little surprised that being in IT we'd use such a basic technical way of working!
After my incredibly and somewhat unfathomably popular blog all about the amazing Information Radiator I don't think I need to bang on about just how brilliant a big board on the wall is!!! All I'll say is that visibility breeds trust and a big board breeds collaboration - but for those who haven't seen the article, here it is again
http://christianleemiles.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/the-information-radiator.html
A rather busy looking Kanban board!
Anyway, Back to my story! I was explaining all the wonderful benefits of having a board on the wall and explaining how software products that do the same, although
brilliant and very handy for distributed teams are often referred to as 'Information Refrigerators
' - one of the only things I love more than Agile is the terms we use!
So what is an Information
Refrigerator? Simple, it's any type of chart, graph, project plan which involves digging around for.... before you find the ketchup your actually looking for!
A board may look and feel a little fashioned, especially within a team that is promoting IT! but everybody in the building know's about my Kanban board... everybody who walks through the department stops and looks, project managers can check progress and view what the team is working on merely by glancing over!! I even caught the CEO having a peek... you don't get that with visibility with a software product!
Written by Christian Miles