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KMP practice questions

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Question 1Kanban System Design

In Kanban Method practice, what does it mean to 'visualize the workflow'?

  1. Recording only the work that has already been completed this sprint
  2. Posting the team's velocity chart in a public area for managers to review
  3. Listing every employee's job description beside their workstation
  4. Mapping the distinct stages work passes through and showing where each item currently sits Correct answer.

Explanation

Visualizing the workflow means making the actual sequence of value-adding and non-value-adding steps explicit, then showing each work item's position in that sequence. It is about the flow of work, not about people, past results, or performance charts.

Question 2Kanban System Design

A team's board has columns To Do, In Progress, and Done, with no limits. Which change best implements the core Kanban practice of limiting work in progress?

  1. Adding more people to the In Progress stage
  2. Adding a numeric WIP limit to the In Progress column and enforcing it Correct answer.
  3. Moving items back to To Do whenever a deadline slips
  4. Renaming Done to Released

Explanation

A WIP limit is a numeric cap on how many items may occupy a stage at once, and the team must actually enforce it. Adding staff or renaming columns changes nothing about the number of concurrent items.

Question 3Kanban System Design

What is the primary purpose of making policies explicit on a Kanban board?

  1. To fix each team member's daily task assignments
  2. To prevent the team from ever changing its process
  3. To satisfy auditors who require documented procedures
  4. To let anyone see and apply the same rules for when work moves between stages Correct answer.

Explanation

Explicit policies state the agreed criteria for moving work, handling blocked items, and prioritizing, so decisions are shared rather than tacit. Kanban expects policies to be visible and revisable, not frozen or used for task assignment.

Question 4Kanban System Design

Which statement correctly describes the Kanban practice of 'manage flow'?

  1. Increase batch sizes so fewer handoffs occur
  2. Measure flow only by counting completed items per quarter
  3. Focus on smooth movement of work through the system rather than on maximizing individual utilization Correct answer.
  4. Keep every team member busy at all times

Explanation

Managing flow means optimizing how work moves end to end, watching queues, blockers, and variability. High individual utilization often creates queues and slows overall delivery.

Question 5Kanban System Design

A Kanban board uses 'blocked' flags. What is the main reason to make blocked items visible?

  1. To surface impediments quickly so the team can act before flow degrades Correct answer.
  2. To record which person caused the blockage
  3. To justify skipping the daily standup
  4. To calculate each member's bonus

Explanation

Blocked flags make impediments explicit and visible so the team can swarm or escalate promptly. They are diagnostic signals about the work, not tools for attributing blame or rewarding individuals.

Question 6Kanban System Design

In Kanban system design, what does a 'pull system' mean?

  1. Managers push as much work as possible into the system each morning
  2. Downstream stages signal capacity and upstream work is pulled only when that capacity exists Correct answer.
  3. Customers pull finished products from a warehouse on demand
  4. The team pulls overtime whenever a deadline approaches

Explanation

A pull system ties entry of new work to available downstream capacity, usually through WIP limits and replenishment signals. Work is not pushed in regardless of capacity, which is what causes overload.

Question 7Kanban System Design

Which item is a genuine Kanban cadence meeting rather than a planning artifact?

  1. A one-time project kickoff workshop
  2. A quarterly budget review with finance
  3. A replenishment meeting that decides which items enter the ready queue Correct answer.
  4. An annual performance appraisal

Explanation

Kanban defines recurring cadences such as replenishment, service delivery review, and operations review. Replenishment is the cadence that selects new work for the input queue at a set rhythm.

Question 8Kanban System Design

What does the Kanban practice 'implement feedback loops' primarily aim to achieve?

  1. Continuous surveillance of individual keystrokes
  2. Elimination of all meetings from the calendar
  3. Regular, scheduled inspection points that let the team adjust the system based on evidence Correct answer.
  4. A single end-of-project retrospective

Explanation

Feedback loops are recurring reviews at different horizons, from daily flow checks to service delivery reviews, so the team can steer the system with data. They are planned and recurring, not a single closing event.

Question 9Kanban System Design

A board shows a 'Ready' column with a WIP limit of 5 that is currently at 5. A new high-priority request arrives. What does correct Kanban system design suggest?

  1. The team must first free a slot in Ready before the new item can enter Correct answer.
  2. The limit is raised to 6 permanently to accommodate demand
  3. The new item is pushed into Ready because priority overrides the limit
  4. The request is rejected without any discussion

Explanation

WIP limits only work if they are respected; entry requires available capacity. The team frees a slot by completing or moving an item, or explicitly renegotiates the limit as a deliberate policy change.

Question 10Kanban System Design

A team measures lead time from the moment an item is committed at the replenishment meeting to the moment it is delivered. A stakeholder asks why the clock does not start when the idea was first mentioned. What is the best justification?

  1. Starting at commitment hides the queue before the team
  2. The team controls the clock only from commitment, so that is the interval it can manage and improve Correct answer.
  3. Lead time must always equal the entire product lifecycle
  4. Ideas mentioned early are never worth measuring

Explanation

Lead time should be defined over the portion of the workflow the team governs, which is typically from commitment to delivery. Measuring from first mention mixes in upstream waiting the team cannot control.

Question 11Kanban System Design

A Kanban system uses classes of service. Which pairing of class and policy is most consistent with Kanban design?

  1. Fixed-date items are exempt from all policies
  2. Standard items get unlimited WIP so they never wait
  3. Intangible items are never visualized on the board
  4. Expedite items get a dedicated lane with an explicit cap and a defined pull rule Correct answer.

Explanation

Classes of service differentiate policies for handling work, and expedite is typically given its own lane with a strict cap so it cannot swamp normal flow. Every class still needs explicit, bounded policies.

Question 12Kanban System Design

A team's board has a 'Ready' queue feeding 'Development'. The Ready queue keeps growing while Development stays at its WIP limit. What does this pattern most likely indicate?

  1. A bottleneck downstream, with the queue absorbing the mismatch between arrival and capacity Correct answer.
  2. That the WIP limit on Development is too high
  3. That the replenishment cadence is too frequent
  4. That the team is overstaffed in Development

Explanation

A growing queue in front of a capped stage is the classic signature of a bottleneck: arrivals exceed the downstream throughput. The queue is a buffer that signals where to focus improvement.

Question 13Kanban System Design

A team wants to design a board that reflects its actual work rather than a generic template. What should the team do first?

  1. Set all WIP limits to the number of team members
  2. Map the real steps and handoffs work goes through, including waiting states Correct answer.
  3. Copy a board from a popular tool's default template
  4. Decide the color scheme for each card type

Explanation

Kanban system design starts with modeling the actual workflow, including queues and handoffs, because limits and policies must fit real stages. Templates and cosmetics come later, if at all.

Question 14Kanban System Design

Why does Kanban system design recommend distinguishing 'waiting' states from 'active' states on the board?

  1. Waiting work does not need to be tracked
  2. Only active states can be blocked
  3. Active states should always outnumber waiting states
  4. Waiting states are where delay accumulates, so they need their own visibility and limits Correct answer.

Explanation

Much of lead time is spent waiting, so queues and handoffs need explicit columns and limits to be managed. Hiding waiting inside a broad 'in progress' column obscures where delay occurs.

Question 15Kanban System Design

A team introduces WIP limits but throughput does not improve and lead time worsens. Which diagnosis is most plausible?

  1. Limits were set too low and caused starvation
  2. Limits were set far above actual capacity, so they never constrained the system Correct answer.
  3. The team measured lead time in days instead of hours
  4. The team stopped using a board entirely

Explanation

A limit that is never reached does not change behavior; work still piles up and flow stays poor. Limits must be low enough to expose capacity constraints and force finishing before starting.

Question 16Kanban System Design

What is the purpose of a 'definition of ready' policy in a Kanban system?

  1. To replace the need for WIP limits
  2. To state the criteria an item must meet before it may be pulled into the workflow Correct answer.
  3. To describe how finished work will be archived
  4. To guarantee that no item is ever reworked

Explanation

A definition of ready is an explicit entry policy specifying what 'ready' means so items enter flow with enough clarity to be worked. It complements, rather than replaces, WIP limits.

Question 17Kanban System Design

A service delivery review in Kanban is best described as which of the following?

  1. A one-off audit by an external consultancy
  2. A meeting to assign individual performance ratings
  3. A recurring review of flow metrics and customer-facing service performance to decide improvements Correct answer.
  4. A daily standup where each person reports tasks

Explanation

The service delivery review examines metrics such as lead time, throughput, and due-date performance against service expectations, and selects improvements. It operates at a longer cadence than the daily flow check.

Question 18Kanban System Design

A team's cumulative flow diagram shows the band for 'In Progress' widening steadily over several weeks. What does this most directly suggest?

  1. Work is accumulating in that stage faster than it leaves, indicating a growing queue or constraint Correct answer.
  2. The team has too few items in the backlog
  3. Throughput has increased across the whole system
  4. Lead time is shrinking

Explanation

A widening band in a cumulative flow diagram means arrivals to that stage exceed departures, so WIP grows there. That pattern points to a constraint or insufficient capacity at that stage.

Question 19Kanban System Design

Which design choice best supports the Kanban principle of improving collaboratively and evolving experimentally?

  1. Mandating a single process from day one and forbidding change
  2. Running small, time-boxed experiments on policies and keeping changes that improve flow metrics Correct answer.
  3. Requiring leadership approval for every card movement
  4. Replacing the board whenever a metric dips

Explanation

Kanban treats the process as an experiment: make a small change, observe the effect on flow, and keep or revert based on evidence. Rigid mandates and approval bottlenecks block that learning cycle.

Question 20Kanban System Design

A team sets a WIP limit of 4 on a stage staffed by 3 people, where each item typically requires one person at a time and items frequently wait on a shared specialist. What risk should the team watch for?

  1. The specialist should be given unlimited parallel work
  2. Specialist contention may make the limit behave like a hidden bottleneck despite available general capacity Correct answer.
  3. The limit is guaranteed to eliminate all waiting
  4. Three people can never handle four items

Explanation

A numeric limit counts items, not the skills needed to move them, so a shared specialist can throttle the stage even when general capacity exists. The team should watch for skill-based constraints and consider cross-training or a dedicated lane.

Question 21Kanban System Design

A team uses a 'fixed date' class of service for regulatory submissions and an 'expedite' class for production outages. Both are at their caps simultaneously. What is the soundest design response?

  1. Let both classes exceed their caps until the pressure passes
  2. Silently reclassify the regulatory work as standard
  3. Apply the explicit policy for cap breaches, such as escalating the conflict for a decision on which class yields Correct answer.
  4. Remove caps from both classes to avoid conflict

Explanation

When two bounded classes conflict, the system needs a pre-agreed escalation or trade-off rule so the team does not improvise under pressure. Caps exist to force that explicit decision rather than letting work flood in.

Question 22Kanban System Design

A cumulative flow diagram shows the 'Done' band rising at a steady slope while the 'In Progress' band's slope approaches the same value. What is the most accurate interpretation?

  1. Lead time is increasing without bound
  2. The team has exceeded its WIP limit
  3. Arrival and departure rates at that stage are roughly balanced, so WIP is stable Correct answer.
  4. The system has stopped delivering work

Explanation

When the vertical thickness of a band stays constant, the slopes of its upper and lower boundaries are equal, meaning inflow matches outflow and WIP is steady. A constant band thickness says nothing about limit breaches or unbounded lead time.

Question 23Kanban System Design

A team's lead time distribution is strongly right-skewed with a long tail, while the average is well below the service-level expectation. What does Kanban system design suggest about reporting?

  1. Report only the average, since it summarizes the data
  2. Report percentiles such as the 85th or 95th alongside the average, because the tail drives customer experience Correct answer.
  3. Report only the fastest items to show best performance
  4. Discard the slowest items as outliers

Explanation

Right-skewed lead times mean a small share of items take much longer, and customers feel that tail. Percentile reporting captures the experience of most items and supports realistic service-level expectations.

Question 24Kanban System Design

A organization wants to apply Kanban across several interdependent teams with a shared board. Which design consideration is most important for the shared board to remain useful?

  1. Track only completed items across teams
  2. Define explicit handoff policies and limits at team boundaries so cross-team queues stay visible and bounded Correct answer.
  3. Give each team unlimited WIP so no team is ever blocked
  4. Merge all teams into one column to simplify reporting

Explanation

At scale, the risk shifts to queues at handoffs between teams, so boundary policies and limits must be explicit. Without them, the shared board shows activity but not the accumulating cross-team delays.

Question 25Kanban System Design

A team claims to practice Kanban but its board shows only three columns and no policies, limits, or metrics. Which assessment is most accurate?

  1. It has adopted a visual board but has not yet implemented the core practices that make it a Kanban system Correct answer.
  2. It is practicing Scrum without sprints
  3. It is a fully mature Kanban system because a board exists
  4. It cannot be evaluated without knowing the team size

Explanation

A board alone is a visualization aid; Kanban system design also requires explicit policies, WIP limits, flow management, and feedback loops. Missing those elements means the method is only partially adopted.

Question 26Kanban System Design

In Kanban system design, what is the primary purpose of making work visible on a board?

  1. To replace daily stand-up meetings entirely
  2. To give managers a status report for performance reviews
  3. To expose flow problems and support collaborative improvement Correct answer.
  4. To assign individual blame when items are late

Explanation

Visualizing work is the first Kanban practice because hidden work cannot be managed or improved. A board makes queues, blockers, and overload visible so the team can act on them collaboratively. Reporting and blame are not the intent of visualization.

Question 27Kanban System Design

Which element distinguishes a Kanban board from a simple task list of columns?

  1. Weekly status emails summarizing progress
  2. Explicit policies governing how items move between stages Correct answer.
  3. A colorful layout with swimlanes for each person
  4. A mandatory backlog ordered by the product owner

Explanation

Kanban system design requires explicit policies that define when work is ready to enter and exit each stage. Columns alone do not constitute a Kanban system. Policies make the process transparent and repeatable.

Question 28Kanban System Design

What is the role of a WIP limit in a Kanban system?

  1. To record the maximum lead time a customer will tolerate
  2. To cap the number of items allowed in a stage at one time Correct answer.
  3. To define the total number of items the team must finish each sprint
  4. To set the maximum number of team members allowed on a board

Explanation

A WIP limit constrains how many items may occupy a stage or workflow simultaneously. This constraint exposes bottlenecks and encourages finishing work before starting more. It is not a headcount or a deadline.

Question 29Kanban System Design

Which statement best captures the Kanban principle of 'start with what you do now'?

  1. Wait until the team is fully trained before visualizing any work
  2. Begin with the existing workflow and evolve it through incremental change Correct answer.
  3. Adopt Kanban only after all legacy processes are retired
  4. Replace the current process with a prescribed Kanban template before starting

Explanation

Kanban is designed to be adopted on top of the current process rather than requiring a disruptive replacement. The team visualizes its existing workflow and improves it iteratively. This lowers resistance and preserves what already works.

Question 30Kanban System Design

In Kanban design, what does a 'blocked' flag or marker on a work item indicate?

  1. The item cannot progress and needs intervention to resume flow Correct answer.
  2. The item is waiting for a customer to pay an invoice
  3. The item has been deprioritized until the next planning cycle
  4. The item has exceeded its class-of-service entitlement

Explanation

A blocked marker signals that an item is impeded and cannot move forward without action. Making blockers visible is part of visualizing work and managing flow. Teams then swarm or escalate to unblock the item.

Question 31Kanban System Design

What is the purpose of defining workflow stages on a Kanban board?

  1. To create a fixed number of columns for all value streams
  2. To mirror the organizational chart of the department
  3. To ensure every team uses the same standard column names
  4. To represent the actual sequence of activities work passes through Correct answer.

Explanation

Workflow stages should reflect how work actually moves through the team's process. Designing stages around real activities makes policies and limits meaningful. Copying a generic template or org chart undermines that purpose.

Question 32Kanban System Design

Which metric pair is most commonly used in Kanban to describe how quickly work items move through the system?

  1. Budget variance and cost per item
  2. Velocity and story points completed
  3. Lead time and cycle time Correct answer.
  4. Defect density and code coverage

Explanation

Lead time and cycle time are the core flow metrics in Kanban. Lead time measures from commitment to delivery, while cycle time measures from start of active work to completion. Together they reveal responsiveness and predictability.

Question 33Kanban System Design

What does the Kanban practice of 'limit work in progress' directly encourage a team to do?

  1. Increase batch size to keep everyone busy
  2. Reduce the number of policies documented for each stage
  3. Add more columns to the board when queues grow
  4. Finish existing items before pulling new ones into a stage Correct answer.

Explanation

Limiting WIP shifts focus toward completing work already in the system. This reduces multitasking and queue growth. Larger batches and extra columns tend to worsen flow rather than improve it.

Question 34Kanban System Design

A team maps its workflow and discovers that items often sit for days in a 'Waiting for approval' stage. How should the team reflect this in board design?

  1. Make the waiting state explicit with its own column and policy Correct answer.
  2. Remove the approval step from the documented workflow
  3. Merge the waiting stage into 'Done' to simplify the board
  4. Assign the approval stage to the fastest team member

Explanation

Kanban design separates waiting states from active work so that queues and delays are visible. An explicit column with a policy clarifies entry and exit criteria. Hiding or removing the step would obscure a real constraint.

Question 35Kanban System Design

A team's 'In Progress' column has a WIP limit of 3, but the board shows 5 items. What is the most appropriate Kanban response?

  1. Raise the limit to 5 so the board matches reality
  2. Stop pulling new work and swarm to finish existing items Correct answer.
  3. Move two items back to the backlog without discussion
  4. Leave the limit unchanged and ignore the breach

Explanation

A WIP limit breach is a signal that the system is overloaded and needs attention. The team should stop starting new work and focus on finishing items to restore flow. Silently adjusting the limit or ignoring the breach removes the benefit of the constraint.

Question 36Kanban System Design

A service class called 'expedite' is defined on a Kanban board. Which design rule should accompany it?

  1. Expedite items are limited in number and follow a defined policy Correct answer.
  2. Expedite items bypass all WIP limits and policies
  3. Expedite items are assigned to the newest team member
  4. Expedite items are tracked only after they are completed

Explanation

Classes of service such as expedite need explicit policies that constrain their use, often allowing them to exceed limits but only in limited numbers. Without such a policy, expedite becomes a routine bypass that destabilizes flow. The policy keeps prioritization transparent.

Question 37Kanban System Design

A team wants to design a board for work that must pass a mandatory regulatory review before release. Where should the review appear?

  1. As an explicit stage with entry and exit policies Correct answer.
  2. As a note in the team's meeting minutes only
  3. As a separate spreadsheet outside the board
  4. As an implicit expectation understood by senior staff

Explanation

Mandatory steps in the workflow should be visible stages with clear policies, so their queue and duration can be managed. Making the review explicit supports flow metrics and transparency. Keeping it implicit or off-board hides a real constraint.

Question 38Kanban System Design

A team applies a 'definition of ready' policy at the entry of its development stage. What does this policy primarily control?

  1. Which team member is allowed to pull the item
  2. The criteria an item must meet before entering the stage Correct answer.
  3. The order in which customers receive invoices
  4. The maximum number of defects allowed at release

Explanation

A definition of ready specifies the conditions an item must satisfy before it may enter a stage. This prevents incomplete work from consuming capacity and creating rework downstream. It is an entry policy, not an assignment or billing rule.

Question 39Kanban System Design

A cumulative flow diagram shows the 'Testing' band growing wider over several weeks while 'Development' stays stable. What is the most likely interpretation?

  1. The team is delivering faster than it starts work
  2. Development capacity has increased significantly
  3. The board has too few columns for the workflow
  4. Testing has become a bottleneck accumulating work Correct answer.

Explanation

A widening band indicates that work is entering a stage faster than it leaves, so the queue accumulates there. This points to a constraint in testing. The response is to address testing capacity or limit upstream intake.

Question 40Kanban System Design

How should a Kanban team choose the initial WIP limits for a new board?

  1. Leave limits unset until the team has one year of data
  2. Set every limit to the number of team members
  3. Adopt the highest limit found in an online template
  4. Start from observed capacity and adjust experimentally Correct answer.

Explanation

Initial limits should be grounded in the team's current capacity and then tuned through experimentation. Kanban favors evolutionary change supported by data. Copying arbitrary template values or waiting indefinitely delays learning.

Question 41Kanban System Design

What distinguishes a Kanban 'cadence' from an arbitrary meeting schedule?

  1. It occurs at a regular, predictable interval tied to a specific purpose Correct answer.
  2. It is scheduled only when a manager requests it
  3. It replaces all other team communication
  4. It always lasts exactly fifteen minutes

Explanation

Cadences in Kanban are regular events with defined purposes, such as replenishment or service delivery review. Their predictability supports flow and decision-making. Duration and managerial request are not defining characteristics.

Question 42Kanban System Design

A team wants feedback loops that address both operational and strategic concerns. Which pairing best fits Kanban cadence design?

  1. Daily stand-up for strategic improvement and an annual audit for operational flow
  2. Daily stand-up for operational flow and a service delivery review for strategic improvement Correct answer.
  3. Weekly status email for operational flow and a quarterly budget review for strategic improvement
  4. Sprint review for operational flow and a retrospective for strategic improvement

Explanation

Kanban cadences distinguish operational events, such as the daily stand-up focused on flow and blockers, from strategic events, such as the service delivery review examining metrics and policies. This layering ensures both day-to-day and longer-term concerns are addressed.

Question 43Kanban System Design

A team's board includes a 'Ready' column with a limit of 4 and a 'Development' column with a limit of 2. What does this arrangement most directly support?

  1. Pulling work into Development only when capacity is available Correct answer.
  2. Pushing all ready items into Development to keep people busy
  3. Guaranteeing that lead time will decrease immediately
  4. Eliminating the need for a replenishment cadence

Explanation

A limited downstream stage combined with a limited upstream queue supports pull-based flow, where work enters Development only when capacity exists. This prevents overloading the active stage. It does not by itself guarantee faster delivery or remove the need for replenishment.

Question 44Kanban System Design

A team's lead time is highly variable, with a long tail of very slow items. Which design change most directly targets the tail?

  1. Increase batch size so fewer items are tracked
  2. Remove all classes of service from the board
  3. Identify and limit the causes of items aging in queues Correct answer.
  4. Measure lead time only for completed fast items

Explanation

Long tails usually come from items that age in queues or become blocked. Policies that surface aging work and limit queue growth address the cause. Larger batches and selective measurement would hide the problem.

Question 45Kanban System Design

What is the primary role of a replenishment meeting in Kanban system design?

  1. To select and commit the next items to pull into the workflow Correct answer.
  2. To review individual performance ratings
  3. To finalize the architecture of the software
  4. To approve the annual budget for the team

Explanation

Replenishment is a cadence where the team reviews candidate items and commits the next ones to enter the workflow. It keeps the input queue at a healthy size. It is not a performance, budgeting, or architecture forum.

Question 46Kanban System Design

A team designs swimlanes by class of service rather than by individual assignee. What is the main benefit of this choice?

  1. It makes individual workload and utilization visible
  2. It removes the need for WIP limits on the board
  3. It highlights prioritization and flow differences between work types Correct answer.
  4. It guarantees that expedite items never delay others

Explanation

Swimlanes organized by class of service show how different work types are prioritized and flow through the system. This supports policy design and transparency about trade-offs. It does not eliminate the need for limits or guarantee zero delay.

Question 47Kanban System Design

A team's board has no explicit policies, and members disagree about when an item is 'done'. Which redesign most directly addresses the disagreement?

  1. Increase the WIP limit on every stage
  2. Add more columns to the board
  3. Add a definition-of-done policy at the exit of the final stage Correct answer.
  4. Schedule an extra stand-up meeting each day

Explanation

Disagreement about completion signals a missing exit policy. Making the definition of done explicit at the final stage aligns the team and improves predictability. More columns, higher limits, or extra meetings do not resolve the ambiguity.

Question 48Kanban System Design

A team's cumulative flow diagram shows 'Done' rising at a steady slope, while the 'In Progress' band's slope is nearly flat and narrow. What does this pattern suggest?

  1. The team is accumulating a large testing backlog
  2. The board is missing a testing column
  3. The system is in balance with stable WIP and steady delivery Correct answer.
  4. The team is overloading the workflow with new items

Explanation

A steady Done slope with a narrow, flat In Progress band indicates stable WIP and consistent throughput. This is a healthy flow pattern. A widening band or growing queue would indicate imbalance instead.

Question 49Kanban System Design

Several interdependent teams share a Kanban board. Which design consideration is most important for managing their flow?

  1. Measuring only individual team velocity to rank performance
  2. Defining shared policies for handoffs and dependencies between teams Correct answer.
  3. Removing WIP limits to allow maximum parallelism across teams
  4. Assigning each team its own private board with no shared visibility

Explanation

Shared boards across interdependent teams require explicit policies for handoffs, dependencies, and prioritization so that flow is coordinated. Private boards and unlimited parallelism hide dependencies and increase queue growth. The goal is system-level flow, not ranking teams.

Question 50Kanban System Design

A team claims to practice Kanban, but its board has only three unlabeled columns and no policies or metrics. Which assessment is most accurate?

  1. The team should add more columns to complete the system
  2. The team has fully implemented Kanban because it has columns
  3. The team has visualized work but has not yet implemented a full Kanban system Correct answer.
  4. The team should abandon Kanban and adopt Scrum instead

Explanation

A Kanban system requires more than columns; it needs explicit policies, WIP limits, and flow metrics to manage and improve flow. Visualizing work is only the first practice. The team should evolve the board incrementally rather than abandon the approach.