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hackforla / design-systems

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Kanban board - cleanup & protocol recommendations #395

Closed kelenelee closed 1 year ago

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

5/4 update: this issue got way too unwieldy so some sections have been moved to separate issues

@allthatyazz originally tasked me with reorganizing our team's Google Drive and Project Management board. Leave your feedback on the changes in the discussion

Columns

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

Observations

I suspect that the confusion around Github, and reluctance to use it, might be due to:

Observation "Plan"

I can use information architecture heuristics to get things started, but observation of team members would be ideal to discover the best way to organize the Github project management board, to increase making of issues and decrease confusion.

For now, I will continue to observe volunteer behavior in meetings.

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

Moving things outside of the PM Board

  • move onboarding and offboarding tasks to a different project board

This would be a logical choice since onboarding/offboarding does not occur as frequently. Also if the purpose of Onboarding issues (first tickets for new joiners) is to train new joiners and make them more comfortable with the GitHub environment, we can expose the new joiners to a less crowded project board.

  • move project info board to wiki page

I looked at the other HfLA projects. It seems most projects use the project info column for the main Github board.

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

@kelenelee For the GitHub columns, we are required to follow the order you find here https://github.com/hackforla/.github/projects/2

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

@allthatyazz Hi, thanks for commenting. Feels different from talking on Slack, but this is fun to try out!

This would be a logical choice since onboarding/offboarding does not occur as frequently. Also if the purpose of Onboarding issues (first tickets for new joiners) is to train new joiners and make them more comfortable with the GitHub environment, we can expose the new joiners to a less crowded project board.

My thoughts exactly!! I can help with making it.

For the GitHub columns, we are required to follow the order you find here https://github.com/hackforla/.github/projects/2

Thank you for catching that and I'm sorry I moved things around 😅 But I think I disagree with the template. I have a hunch that this column order is contributing a bit to everyone's confusion.

Volunteers will be looking at first few columns the most. If I were to pick the columns that I reference the most, they would be Prioritized Backlog and In Progress, not Start Here and Ice Box.

I understand that the categories are in chronological order from left to right, to show how an issue moves from not a priority all the way to done. But the volunteers actually using the project board may see the layout a different way

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

Let’s start making a new board for onboarding. The columns can be as simple as the templates, In progress, questions and Done. What do you think? We have some issues related to onboarding/offboarding in the weekly operations. We can maybe move those to the new board as well?

For the GitHub columns, we are required to follow the order you find here https://github.com/hackforla/.github/projects/2

Volunteers will be looking at first few columns the most. If I were to pick the columns that I reference the most, they would be Prioritized Backlog and In Progress, not Start Here and Ice Box.

100% agree about the Ice Box. It was the most confusing for me when I joined the project.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

@allthatyazz It would be amazing if Backlog and In progress could be moved further left.

I created the onboarding board. I also rewrote the wiki article. In the future I hope DS newcomers are sent there without hiccups.

I have moved the onboarding issues from Weekly Operations to the Onboarding board.

To be honest, having an issue house a template with the actual work in the comments has never made sense to me. I think templates can live in the wiki. Each time a task recurs, it should be its own issue. Then we won't need a "Weekly Operations" column, either.

We could even move agendas to Discussions.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

Observation: Github columns have optional automation, for example:

If there is no automation in place for Backlog, new issues created "await triage" next to the "Filter cards" search box. @allthatyazz Therefore, we could get rid of "New Issue Approval" and "Ice Box."

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

As a test, I deleted some board columns.

Also, I'm wondering if epics should be separate boards. I was fiddling around in Jira and each initiative gets their own board, which seems to make a lot more sense than having all projects in one board

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

I created the onboarding board. I also rewrote the wiki article. In the future, I hope DS newcomers are sent there without hiccups.

I have moved the onboarding issues from Weekly Operations to the Onboarding board.

I saw the changes. The onboarding board looks great along with the Wiki article. I found all your Wiki revisions very useful. We can expect the new joiners to have a smoother onboarding experience from now on. The next step really would be to improve the onboarding tickets themselves. Our UX writer, @sandraberjan can be a great help to improve the copy and IA further. I encourage you two to start working together.

To be honest, having an issue house a template with the actual work in the comments has never made sense to me. I think templates can live in the wiki. Each time a task recurs, it should be its own issue. Then we won't need a "Weekly Operations" column, either.

Your observation is true to some extent. In many project management instances, the comments on an issue are not any less than the main body of the issue (the very first comment). The comments are meant to show the progress in a timeline format and naturally, everybody knows that each comment is an update about "the actual work." For some recurring tasks, if we create a new issue every time, we can hardly comprehend the process and track the progress.

If our goal is to simplify the project board, we can move the templates to a separate project board. Currently, we have a project board called Guides and Templates for Design Systems. We can utilize that board to include all our templates. We can rename the columns to whatever the templates are going to be used for (e.g. Usability study templates or Interview Templates).

We could even move agendas to Discussions.

It is not an ideal solution either. It is not common among HfLA projects to include the meeting agendas on any other board other than project management. If a PM from another project wants to add an item to our agenda ( we have instances in the past), they have to be able to find the agenda from a consistent board.

As a test, I deleted some board columns.

Thanks for taking the time to declutter the issues. I have to admit that the board looks very neat with the new changes (very user-friendly). But, I think we still need the first column to be "start here" with some basic info (like quick links, agendas ...). Probably we can get away with not having the new issue approved because all the issues that our team members create are either assigned by the PM or the leads, so they are all inherently approved. Right?

I think our project was previously using the Ice Box in the wrong way. Ice Box should be used for issues with dependencies (issues that we cannot work on them right away because they are dependent on other issues.)

Also, I'm wondering if epics should be separate boards. I was fiddling around in Jira and each initiative gets their own board, which seems to make a lot more sense than having all projects in one board.

Our project is not mature enough to have separate boards for separate epics. I looked at the previous epics for our project and most of them are not even qualified as an epic.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

btw @allthatyazz just wanted to thank you for your detailed replies and guidance on this issue :)

Thanks for taking the time to declutter the issues. I have to admit that the board looks very neat with the new changes (very user-friendly). But, I think we still need the first column to be "start here" with some basic info (like quick links, agendas ...).

Currently the quick links are in the first card of backlog

Probably we can get away with not having the new issue approved because all the issues that our team members create are either assigned by the PM or the leads, so they are all inherently approved. Right?

New issues are hidden next to the "Filter cards" search bar. The hidden panel kind of functions like they're waiting for approval

Ice Box should be used for issues with dependencies (issues that we cannot work on them right away because they are dependent on other issues.)

The dependency can be shown with labels or a column

The next step really would be to improve the onboarding tickets themselves. Our UX writer, @sandraberjan can be a great help to improve the copy and IA further. I encourage you two to start working together.

Agree. Happy to work with @sandraberjan !

Your observation is true to some extent. In many project management instances, the comments on an issue are not any less than the main body of the issue (the very first comment). The comments are meant to show the progress in a timeline format and naturally, everybody knows that each comment is an update about "the actual work." For some recurring tasks, if we create a new issue every time, we can hardly comprehend the process and track the progress.

Understood

It is not an ideal solution either. It is not common among HfLA projects to include the meeting agendas on any other board other than project management. If a PM from another project wants to add an item to our agenda ( we have instances in the past), they have to be able to find the agenda from a consistent board.

I still think that Github's discussions feature may be more powerful for agendas. You can leave comments, and replies under the comments as well. You can also tag participants, and label the discussion with the same project management labels. As long as the board has a link to our agendas, other PMs will be able to find the agendas.

Our project is not mature enough to have separate boards for separate epics. I looked at the previous epics for our project and most of them are not even qualified as an epic.

Understood... I guess it doesn't make sense to me to have epics with subtasks to be an issue just like the subtasks themselves

If our goal is to simplify the project board, we can move the templates to a separate project board. Currently, we have a project board called Guides and Templates for Design Systems. We can utilize that board to include all our templates. We can rename the columns to whatever the templates are going to be used for (e.g. Usability study templates or Interview Templates). Create a column for User Interviews in Templates board. Move the following issues you recently closed from Project managment board to the to the Templates board : Interview, Note Taking and Analysis.

I'm not sure if a separate board is ideal... if the task has to do with the project, they should be part of the same story/epic/board. Maybe, we should have an issue with each copy to be made as a dependency / task.

I think that "Guides and Templates" board was created last year for the FF templates.

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

Looking at other HfLA's projects, I found the following teams' first columns interesting:

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

Looking at other HfLA's projects, I found the following teams' first columns interesting

Looks like the first column is largely dependent on what filters the members frequently use

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

@kelenelee Very nice job editing the first comment of this issue. Few things:

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

@allthatyazz I just took a look at the agenda project board and OHHH I get it now!!! Thanks so much for clarifying and helping me understand. I completely understand your points now

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

I just noticed that yesterday. After my meeting with Bonnie, I did more digging in HfLA's repository to gather more information. I suspect that there is more stuff at play that we are not aware of (just yet). Also, you can read the notes from Yesterday's PM meeting.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

Just read through those meeting notes. Thank you for writing them – they were also very helpful.

allthatyazz commented 2 years ago

@navarroliuanthony @hdchangie Hi Please feel free to provide your feedback on the research templates.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

As of now, the Kanban transformation is complete. User feedback has been good so far but no observations were done. If an observational study can be done, a new issue will be created.

kelenelee commented 2 years ago

sooo maybe multiple projects is too out-of-sight, out-of-mind?... will need the input of others