Transforming childrens' lives one Kanban board at a time

When you left school, how long did it take you to realize you were the driver in control of your own life? Were you lucky enough to know early on, or did it take years? Are you still waiting for someone to tell you what to do with your life?

While many agile companies have adopted Kanban as a way to work smarter, I recently stumbled on an Agile Learning Center in Manhattan that is addressing the above questions by injecting Kanban into the school system. How does this work?

Every morning there is a daily stand up meeting where students declare their intentions for the day. In the afternoon, they meet again to see if they accomplished what they had intended.

I think most of us in the software industry would say we're bad at estimating how long it takes to get something done, and that we regularly overestimate what we think we can accomplish.

What if we had grown up in an environment where we learned to estimate every day, learned to be accountable for those estimations, and had that many more years to improve our skills in self-direction?

If your school or work environment hasn't adopted Kanban as a practice, what if each family had a section in their living area where everyone had a Kanban board? I've personally transitioned from using a to do list to having a LeanKit personal Kanban board.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, what if we were to introduce Kanban into assisted living facilities, to help the elderly self-direct their lives and self-organize around that which they are passionate?

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