Significant Updates to Popular Kanban Software in 2019

How Jira, Hygger, Asana, and Others Surprised Their Users in 2019?

No doubt, Kanban-focused online project management tools provide more functionality than physical Kanban whiteboards. Interactive boards provide instant project visibility for all team members. Using such a convenient virtual tool, companies can simplify processes and reduce the time required to complete projects, thereby reducing their cost.

Nowadays the popularity of the Kanban methodology is growing and software for project management is developing as well.

In this article, we will share the latest news from the popular Kanban-focused tools. Exciting insights from Jira, Hygger, Trello, Asana, Kanbanchi, Taiga and Monday will not leave you indifferent! However, first, let's dive deeper into the essence of Kanban methodology.

At first sight, Kanban may seem like a complex system. However, the main idea of ​​this Agile methodology is that, as soon as the team begins to apply it, it can immediately standardize and optimize its work processes.

Here are just the main benefits of Kanban:

• organizes all segments of the workflow
• quickly visualizes bottlenecks
• motivates teams to collaborate
• helps to succeed when the support team has a high degree of uncertainty and variability
• suitable for working with remote employees
• reduces costs

The main criteria that will help you choose the best Kanban tool are a Kanban board with a set of Kanban cards, analytics for creating reports, the ability to integrate and automate work processes.

Kanban is not only for the IT sector

Kanban for project management is used to increase the productivity and efficiency of not only software development teams, but also in various fields and companies.

Functional Kanban boards help to identify areas of inefficiency and facilitate competent collaboration between team members or departments.

Kanban can be used anywhere. Here's what quickly came to mind:

• Complex projects of a medical clinic;
• Planning tasks in a sports club network;
• Bank rebranding campaigns;
• Managing clients' issues in an insurance company;
• Task management of a brewing company;
• Daily worries of any startup;
• Planning in a logistics center;
• The university curriculum and many other different fields and directions.

How can Kanban boost productivity?

Among the many advantages of using Kanban, one can be surely put in the first place - the visual order and sense of satisfaction that the manager and team receive, observing how the entire amount of work spreads in all directions. This has an actual positive effect on the performance of all team members.

This is clearly demonstrated with the example of moving a card with a task from the “to do” column to the “done” column, which gives you a sense of satisfaction from the completed task, which is not so much felt when using other project management methods or productivity techniques.

How to choose software with Kanban functionality?

Choosing a Kanban toolkit, it is better to first understand and decide how you will use it. For example, it is crucial to understand whether your team works in one place or whether it is distributed geographically. Teams working together can use a combination of physical Kanban boards and the online tool. This, by the way, is practiced by many today.

Companies with remote employees from different cities and countries will quickly appreciate the benefits of using online Kanban boards, as they can access them from anywhere with an Internet connection.

Teams that try Kanban for the first time are often pleasantly surprised about how much trash disappears from work processes through the use of Kanban boards and cards.

Kanban is a visual tool that allows reflecting and transmitting a large amount of information not only with cards but also using convenient columns, color dividers for tasks, labels, badges and other visual indicators that help people understand and store information.

Most teams using Kanban boards develop their own unique configurations that facilitate the management of work processes and tasks that are important to ensure the smooth operation of their business.

So, what do popular project management tools with Kanban functionality offer today?

The Latest News, Features and Interesting Proposals of Popular Kanban Tools in 2019

JIRA

JIRA is considered a universal project management tool that provides development teams with functionality for scheduling tasks, appointing meetings, working with sprints, prioritizing, and much more. JIRA has a lot of filtering options, convenient visualization, detailed reports and a quality time tracker.

JIRA in 2019

This multifunctional tool is often blamed for its complexity and emphasis on technical teams and projects. In addition, users often left the tool, because they needed a simple timeline in the functionality.

Finally, JIRA has figured it out and has introduced the Jira Roadmap feature.

The company announced timelines in 2018, but the feature was finalized a couple of months ago, several interesting updates were added that improved the functionality of sharing and working with roadmaps. JIRA roadmaps are only available as part of the JIRA Software project, which is now available to all Jira Software Cloud customers.

Hygger

One of the brightest representatives of the new wave of project management tools, Hygger, is increasingly becoming the choice of product companies, startups, and medium-sized organizations. The platform offers convenient to-do lists, Kanban boards with Swimlanes and WIP limits, timelines, various prioritization methods and much more.

Hygger in 2019

At the beginning of 2019, Hygger pleased its users with six frameworks for high-quality prioritization.

For the success of the project, it is important to know your most important tasks, features of this project that are of great benefit to the business. That is why prioritization looks like a very important feature that helps to evaluate and sort tasks by their importance and choose the most profitable for further development.

In Hygger, you can choose one of the following types of prioritization: 2×2 priority matrix (based on the Eisenhower model), Value vs Risk and Value vs Effort, Weighted Scoring matrices, as well as ICE and RICE prioritization models.

Trello

Trello is another popular management tool that offers quality organization of tasks, initiatives, to-do lists, discussions and ideas on comfortable online boards. 

Unlike Jira, Trello is simple and intuitive. Many companies are quite satisfied with the basic free version for work, although, Trello has recently made a number of changes. 

Trello in 2019

Trello also continued to grow rapidly in 2019. However, the main event in the company, perhaps, can be related to its update in pricing.

In March, the Trello team announced that it would limit teams at no charge to 10 boards. The Trello Enterprise plan receivesd13 new features, including improved admin controls, new visibility settings, and certificates of compliance. This was the largest product update in the history of Trello Enterprise.

The free version of Trello still includes a lot of useful things: boards, lists, members, and attachments. Users can attach files up to 10 MB in size from a computer or from Google Drive, Box, Dropbox or Microsoft OneDrive. You can upgrade your status to Trello Gold for more advanced features ($5 per month or $45 per year).

A business plan costs $ 9.99 per user per month (if paid annually). The costs of a corporate plan are multilevel and vary depending on the number of users.

Asana

Asana is popular among companies focused on task management, tracking deadlines and setting priorities. This platform allows you to monitor the status of tasks and the status of entire projects.

Asana is often chosen for personal use and for the work of small teams, which primarily need to-do lists and basic Kanban boards.

Asana in 2019

The Asana team has developed a special program for using the product in non-profit organizations with small teams and limited resources.

The program offers non-profit organizations a 50% discount on Asana Premium or Asana Business. Since the launch of Asana for non-profit organizations, 1000+ non-profit companies have already used the product.

They also introduced the automatic removal of empty tasks, increasing the limit of projects in the team calendar, new templates, updated pricing, and much more.

Kanbanchi

Another prominent player in the market for task management and collaboration with Kanban boards, Gantt charts, and time tracking is Kanbanchi. Applying this software solution, users can easily visualize workflows using convenient project boards with lists and cards.

Kanbanchi is used for the G-Suite. You need to register with your Google account, manage boards in the form of files on a Google drive, put dates on a Google calendar, etc.

Kanbanchi in 2019

In 2019, the Kanbanchi team focused on optimizing subscription management. Now, right in the application, you can buy and manage subscriptions, distribute spots for team members, and also monitor the status of the subscription.

They also introduced Board Templates. Users can implement 1 of 10 standard templates or create their own to speed up the workflow and convenience.

Taiga

Taiga is typically chosen by developers, project managers, marketers, designers and other practitioners of the Agile approach. The tool includes project collaboration, task management, bug tracking, reporting, and a convenient time tracking system. When choosing Taiga, you also get custom Kanban boards and backlogs.

Taiga in 2019

Among the news and updates in Taiga, the release of the On-Premise version stands as a flexible private Taiga deployment without restrictions for organizations that are abandoning SaaS but still need proper support.

There is also news for the customers who speak Basque and Hebrew as now they are able to work in Taiga using these languages.

Monday

Another powerful project management tool is constantly rewarded and helps various teams to effectively plan and execute projects that deliver results on time. Its ease of use and flexibility mean quick adaptation for your team and the ability to manage work in your own way.

Professional features for increasing productivity and tracking time help teams to achieve the best and fastest results at every stage of the project.

Monday in 2019

According to the results of the outgoing year, Monday.com may be called one of the fastest-growing platforms. The company raised $ 150 million to develop collaboration functionality.

This funding is tremendous growth, opening great opportunities for companies. In addition, the company experienced an active increase in customers to 80K companies compared to 35K a year earlier. There are many well-known brands among Monday customers: Carlsberg, Discovery Channel, Philips, WeWork and many others.

Monday’s plans include global improvements related to the addition of a level of free use, the geographical expansion of distribution, the expansion of supported languages, the development of integrations and automation, etc.

A well-chosen and implemented Kanban tool may save thousands of hours of work and reduce costs while opening up additional opportunities for developing external and internal communication.

Popular Kanban platforms are not going to stop there. They are constantly offering users new features and the latest innovations. What tool do you prefer?