Why Physical Task Boards Still Matter

If your Agile teams aren’t using a physical task board, this means you don’t have all the context

That’s the theory I put forth to you today. My theory is based on the June 2014 Journal of Psychological Studies article entitled “The Pen is Mightier Than the Keyboard – Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking.”

The debate of pen & notepad vs. keyboard & laptop is not a new one. Past studies have been done on the effects of multi-tasking (and the lure thereof) with laptops. There have also long been theories, based on understanding of brain science, that the human brain stores electronic data differently than it does written data and that the written data is stored in a way that is easier to access again.

A Dr. Mueller and Oppenheimer’s study specifically tested the results of using offline laptops, specifically to just take notes, against longhand written notes. I’m not going to rehash all the data here. For a good article outlining how the study was conducted go to Fast Company and you can download the entire paper at Academia.edu.

The key points are:

• When it is important to form a deeper understanding of the material, take written notes.
• When you have the full type written data to study, you will do worse on tests both on factual and contextual data.
• This applies to tasks as well, as Mueller states in the Fast Company article.

Connecting this to Agile

Based on this study and my own years of reflection on this (I stopped using laptops for notes back in 2010) I believe this explains why teams who use both  physical task boards and electronic ones (Rally, VersionOne, AgileCraft, etc.) do better than those who just use the online tool.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying get rid of the online tool. I absolutely believe an online tool is useful when dealing with anything more than the smallest Agile programs.

What I’m saying is, while counterintuitive and seeming to cause more work, having a physical task board in addition to your online tool can be a big boost on your way to becoming a high performing Agile team.

It is not unlike the seeming disconnect of pair programing being more efficient than parallel programing. The added work of keeping two boards is minimal compared to the benefits of making your team more effective and delivering better final product.

How to Gather Info for Your Physical Task Boards

When doing your release and sprint planning, do it all with old-fashioned cards, blue tape and pens. When you’re done, someone takes all that and puts it into the online tool and then it gets up on the physical task board.

During the daily standups, keep the laptops closed and move stories and tasks on the physical board. At the end of the meeting someone (cough… Scrum Master) can update the online tool. The benefits will be worth the little extra work.

• Technology doesn’t get in the way: No one is hiding behind a computer during planning. No worries about connections, projectors and so on.
• The act of writing and collaborating together will create a greater joint understanding.
• A week into the sprint, when you look at the User Story, you will remember the whole context and that while the PO forgot to update the acceptance criteria, you remember he wanted this story to work on Android and iOS not just iOS.
• There is nothing more satisfying than physically grabbing a story card and moving it from Doing to Done. Celebrate the moment!

Real World Application

Having been in the longhand vs. laptop note taking debates for years I know it can be a hard concept to grasp that written notes are more effective. On this count I can speak only from first hand experience.

When I review written notes I can visualize the meeting. I can remember who was sitting where, who was giving who sidelong glances and more.

When it comes to teams and physical boards, I’ve also seen it work. In one instance we had three Scrum teams who were struggling with their transition. After suggesting physical boards on top of their online tool, two of the three teams saw a marked increase in effectiveness and decrease in churn around acceptance and quality. The third team didn’t put in a physical board and while they had a lot of contributing factors, the lack of the board is one of the reasons I believe they failed.

Here is Another Example

In another experience our general manager was very hands on with the division. He was also a very classic “too busy” executive. While he had full access to all our information, he never had time to look at it. The physical board was in a high traffic hallway on the way to his office. He knew exactly what was happening at all times and this in turn led to him being less hands on not more.

And lest I seem overly biased (I am), in a recent article in the Wall Street Journal IBM’s CIO Jeff Smith was observed:

He also makes use of physical, visual tools such as storyboards. He found that the signs and sticky notes that characterize Agile workspaces work best if they remain in the physical world, not the digital one.  After some experimentation, he found that the physical signs gave people a place to go, and that gathering point fostered more group learning. WSJ.com – CIO Journal

Physical Task Boards for Distributed Teams

A colleague rightly pointed out that I hadn’t touched on this third rail. We can’t deny that in most enterprises having all your teams in one place is pretty much impossible. Even getting a seven to nine person team in one place can be a challenge. So isn’t the physical board only a niche player when the stars align and your team is all in one place?

Yes and no.

First off, the Agile community has long recognized that colocation is rarely practical. Over the last few years the recommended advice of colocation has moved from “all” to “team”. It is a lot easier to have a seven-person team in one place than it is seven full teams.

When you can get your team in one place, the physical board is still of value to them, just not as much to the larger organization.

When the team is truly distributed, then the physical board starts to lose value.

If you have most of your team in one place, the board can still be used. You just have to engage some process and remote technology to keep the remote team members in the know. These are classic distributed team tools, so I won’t dive too deep. Get your teams together for major release planning. Have a web cam pointed at the physical board and burn down. Take hi-res pictures and send them to the remote team members.

And IBM CIO, Jeff Smith? His organization is 20,000 strong. Pretty sure they are not all in one room.

Conclusion

Don’t get rid of your online tool, that’s critical for enterprise organization. However, do grab a chunk of wall space and use your blue tape to create a physical board. You can be even more productive and generate a better, finished product.

Don’t take my word for it, try it for a sprint or two and see what the retrospective says.