Can JIRA "truly" enforce WIP on a kanban board?

[Tristan Boughton]

Is it possible to set a WIP limit on a kanban board in JIRA and prevent users from adding issues beyond the limit? 

[Brendan Wovchko]

Hey Tristan!

As general guidance, you don't want to enforce WIP Limits using software.  It's better to let the behavior occur and discuss it as a team.  The Jira team got it right by using a visual indicator when WIP Limits are broken.

The reason teams break WIP Limits is because they don't understand the benefits of why they are there.  Enforcing the limits will only force work "underground" where people hide their efforts.  It's better to deal with the root social behavior.

Brendan Wovchko

Accredited Kanban Trainer

HUGE IO

[Deleted user]

bump up.

[MikeS]

I cant figure out a way in base to get this working but using a 3rd party add-on like ScriptRunner you could add a validation script to ensure that you dont progress a JIRA through the workflow if it will exceed a WIP limit. 

[Paul Miles]

No. The only thing that happens when the WIP is exceeded is a visual indicator appears because the column changes color. In addition, one can change workflow directly in the issue itself (not using the board) and there would be no indicator at all that the WIP is exceeded.

[Deleted user]

@Giorgio Sironi , did you read @Brendan Wovchko 's answer?

While your answer is "jira" correct, it's not taking into account that if you're really trying to leverage Kanban, the tool is just the tool, and its there to assist you in helping the humans recognize what they might be doing to themselves via what they're seeing. In that sense, Jira is enabling them to do the right thing, by NOT forcing itself on them.

I know that's NOT what others might be hoping to hear, but when 2 Accredited Kanban Trainers tell you the same thing...maybe it's worth thinking about.

Marcelo R. Lopez, Jr. AKT, CST

Accredited Kanban Trainer/Certified Scrum Trainer

[Giorgio Sironi]

I can't find a way to do it, which seems to mean that "Kanban support" in JIRA is actually just a CSS change that makes the column red when there are too many tasks.