The Top 5 Kanban Challenges Teams Face in Jira (and How to Solve Them!)

Jira’s Kanban boards help visualize and improve workflow by giving teams a structured framework to manage tasks and track work progress. They are especially useful for overseeing and managing tasks in different stages (To Do, In Progress, Done).

While simple in design, improper management of these Kanban boards (to help visualize and improve workflow) can cause their fair share of bottlenecks and frustration. Some of the common issues that users may potentially face include:

• Cluttered boards with unclear priorities
• Too many ongoing tasks (Work-In-Progress, WIP) in the pipeline
• Lack of visibility into who’s working on what
• Poorly structured Kanban boards that can lead to confusion or miscommunication
• Team members overlooking the board which can lead to outdated records and decreased visibility

These issues are not inherent flaws of the tool itself but are mostly a result of poor board management and practices. The good news? There are simple ways to address many of these challenges yourself without any fancy plugins or tools — which we will explore further down this article.

What Are The Top 5 Kanban Challenges (And Solutions)?

1. Poor Task Prioritization

A board that is overloaded with tasks (each of varying complexities) will cause difficulties in figuring out which tasks should be handled first. Tasks eventually pile up and high-priority work gets buried in the backlog.

Solutions:

• Use Swimlanes in Jira to categorize tasks based on priority.
• Implement a Definition of Ready (DoR) and evaluate work before your team starts on it.
• Project direction must be made clear by defining the order of tasks that must be worked on first.

2. Disregarding Work-In-Progress (WIP) Limits

Teams might ignore established WIP limits due to internal pressure to start new tasks instead of finishing existing ones. Having to accommodate a constantly growing workload will lead to extended cycle times, bottlenecks, and eventually, total burnout.

Solutions:

• Set realistic WIP limits to prevent overwhelming your team with too many tasks.
• Jira has built-in WIP limit settings to alert users when a column has exceeded its limit.
• Adopting a pull-based workflow whereby team members only take on new tasks once they have finished existing assignments or can handle additional responsibilities.
• Enforce adherence to WIP limits through stand-up meetings and continued monitoring.

3. Poor Backlog Management

Finding relevant tasks and tracking progress in a cluttered backlog can prove to be an arduous task. This normally happens when there are too many tickets with no differentiation between work types.

Solutions:

• Set your columns to display actual workflow stages. Examples you can use are: “Ready for Review” or “Blocked” stages.
• Configure your Swimlanes to separate different work types between “Urgent,” “Bug Fixes”, “Features”, etc.
• Apply filters to help team members easily locate and focus on their relevant tasks.
• Adding tasks to component Jira Kanban board helps in better task grouping and organization.

4. Poor Board Visibility

Aside from being an eyesore, a poorly structured board will pose a challenge for users to navigate around. A convoluted layout with too many columns and mixed work granularity might also put team members off from actively using the board.

Solutions:

• Colorize your labels to distinguish different task types. Colors serve as effective visual cues for users to identify these labels easily at a glance.
• Apply Quick Filters to allow team members to focus on their tasks.
• Ensure task descriptions and comments are regularly updated to provide clear context.

Read more here to learn how the simple use of colors can play a significant role in improving the overall visibility and organization of Kanban in Jira.

5. Unclear Roles and Responsibilities

Unassigned work sits idle when team members are unclear on who owns a task. Since no one is being held accountable for these idle tasks, they cannot be pushed out, and thus delays in task deliveries occur.

Solutions:

• Every task must have an owner (PIC) — enforce this rule internally.
• Use Jira’s “Assignee” and “Watcher” features to clarify responsibility.
• Component filters are available to auto-sort tasks into the right sections.
• Set up Automation Rules to notify PICs when tasks are assigned or overdue.

For a deeper dive into team collaboration and task-tracking strategies, check out this article. 

The Ultimate Solution: Kanban Combined WIP

A few simple tweaks can go a long way in refining the effectiveness of your Kanban board in Jira, to help visualize and improve workflow. But for those seeking something more in-depth, it is recommended to seek the help of advanced solutions to truly take your Kanban game to the next level.

Introducing Kanban Combined WIP — an advanced Kanban board management tool for Jira to help you visualize, manage, and easily enforce WIP limits across multiple columns and swimlanes within your Jira instance.

How Kanban Combined WIP Solves Common Challenges:

1. Poor Task Prioritization – Allows teams to set explicit column policies and ensure urgent tasks are prioritized.
2. Disregarding WIP Limits – Enables WIP limits for columns and swimlanes to minimize multitasking and bottlenecks.
3. Poor Backlog Management – Helps clean up boards by merging columns and configuring WIP limits.
4. Poor Board Visibility – Offers zoom and scroll functionalities for the best visibility across different devices with varying screen sizes. You can also distinguish your board with team or personal wallpapers!
5. Undefined Roles and Responsibilities – Features Instant-Info Cards for users to take a quick look into task ownership and status.

This article explores how enforcing proper WIP limits with Kanban Combined WIP can help you maintain better workflow efficiency.

Bottom Line – Improving Your Kanban Experience In Jira

Kanban boards in Jira have long been considered the de facto framework for managing workflows. While useful, inefficient practices can cause these boards to quickly become cluttered, confusing, and counterproductive.

Addressing these issues with the appropriate steps is the way forward in making your board a more cohesive and productive experience for not just yourself — but the rest of your team working on it.

If you’re looking to take things to the next level, apps like Kanban Combined WIP go beyond the basics by providing advanced functionalities to help with smoother task progression.

To learn more on how to elevate your Agile project management with Kanban in Jira, or about Kanban Combined WIP, take a look at our article here.