How to create a personal kanban board to boost productivity

When I mentor college students or early stage professionals, one of the tips I share with them is how to use a personal kanban system to manage their work.

The system is hugely helpful with staying focused, managing priorities, and, most importantly, showing your manager what you’re working on. 

A personal kanban system is pretty straightforward. In this article, I’ll explain how to get started and use a personal kanban to avoid getting overwhelmed early in your career.

To create your personal kanban system, you’ll need a few simple materials:

• 12” x 18” board made from cardstock or a similar material (You should be able to fold it in half for portability.)
• A Sharpie or thick marker
• Sticky notes

On the board, create four columns from left to right:

1. Backlog
2. To do
3. Doing
4. Done

In the Doing column, draw a horizontal line about 30% down and add a subsection called Waiting.

Once your board is set up, grab your marker and stack of sticky notes. Ideally, each sticky note represents a consistent unit of time (usually around one to four hours).

Before the start of each week, jot down each task you plan to accomplish on the sticky notes. Only write two or three words versus a full description. Use a thick marker to avoid overcomplicating your work board and make it easier to visually manage your tasks.

At this point, don’t think about priorities. Just get what’s in your head onto the sticky notes. Don’t you feel better already?

When you have 10 to 15 sticky notes, put them in the far left Backlog column. This is also referred to as a parking lot. These are unprioritized tasks that don’t necessarily need to be done right now.

Once you’ve created a backlog, it’s time to start prioritizing your week ahead! Pull some stickies from Backlog and create a prioritized list of your most important tasks, with most important at the top and least important at the bottom.

Move your top five items to the To-do column. It’s okay if some tasks remain in the Backlog—it’s a great space to get things out of your head without feeling the pressure of getting them done immediately.

The reality is that you’ll never know what the week holds no matter how well you plan. I recommend adding two blank sticky notes to the bottom of the To-do column with stars on them to account for unplanned work you might encounter during the course of the week. 

Over time, you’ll get a better sense of your capacity for the week. Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t move all of your items to Done.

Now you have a prioritized to-do list. When you’re ready to get to work, just take the top sticky from your To-do column and move it over to the Doing column.

This section is also often called your WIP or Work in Progress. It’s purposefully small—there should only ever be one task in this section. 

One of the biggest mistakes young professionals make is trying to get too many things done at the same time. Stay focused on one item until it’s complete. Avoid working on multiple items at once with only 10% completion for each.

Sometimes a task that you’re working on requires a dependency before it can be considered complete. If that’s the case, just move that task from Doing into the Waiting section below.

Then, since your To-do column is already prioritized, simply take the next task at the top of the To-do column and move it over to Doing.

Once the dependency for your task in Waiting is cleared, move that sticky note back up to your Doing block when it’s free.

Once you complete a task, simply move the sticky note to the far right Done column. At the end of each week, it’ll give you a great recap of your accomplishments and also instill a sense of pride.

I encourage you to set aside 15 minutes at the end of each week to create a ritual for your own personal retrospective. Review what you accomplished. Take note of how much work you got done and how much of that work was unplanned.

Over time, you might start to see patterns, like a consistent source of unplanned work. That’ll help you build in extra capacity for that work or holding a conversation with someone who continues to give you unexpected tasks.

At the end of each week, be sure to give yourself a pat on the back (for real). Then ball up all the Done stickies, tell yourself you’re awesome, and toss them in the waste bin. So satisfying.

One of the biggest benefits of a personal kanban is getting visibility into your work for yourself and others—often referred to as an “information radiator.”

Don’t be afraid to pull out your board and share your list of priorities with your manager during your regular check-ins. It’s a great way to make sure your priorities are aligned. It also gives your manager insight into the work that you’re doing.

Your manager might move some of the sticky notes around in the To-do column. They might even swap something between your To-do list and Backlog.

If this happens, don’t fret! You’d much rather be working on items that matter to your manager instead of delivering a bunch of low priority work at the end of the week. A personal kanban system is a great way to avoid those breakdowns and wasted efforts.

Learn more about increasing efficiency with a kanban system for you and your team.