Sako has grown rapidly in recent years. As the organisation expanded, its IT team needed clearer ways of working, greater transparency, and a more structured approach to managing work.
A long-standing culture of self-organisation had worked well in a smaller organisation, but growth created a need for a more systematic approach. Sako’s IT team wanted a solution that would make ongoing work visible, improve prioritisation, and establish clearer ways of working both within the team and with stakeholders. They also wanted to test the new approach quickly and with minimal overhead.
Practical Kanban training focused on ways of working
Taskmill delivered a one-day Kanban training and workshop for Sako. The training covered key Kanban principles, including visualising work with a Kanban board, managing workflow, limiting work in progress (WIP), establishing a sustainable work cadence, and supporting continuous improvement.
The theory was intentionally kept concise and practical, with discussions grounded in real-life examples. Participants particularly appreciated that technology and tool choices were deliberately left out of the session. Instead, the team could focus on how to organise and manage work effectively, rather than which tool to use.
After the training, the team moved directly into a hands-on workshop to put the principles into practice. Team members visualised their current work on a shared board, providing a clear overview of the team’s workload. At the same time, the team discussed how new work enters the workflow and how it should be managed.
With guidance from Taskmill’s coach, the team categorised its work and built its first Kanban board. By the end of the day, the team had a ready-to-use Kanban board and a shared set of working agreements covering:
- how new work is received
- how work is prioritised
- how blocked tasks are handled
- how the Kanban board is mainained as part of everyday work.
This gave the team a practical foundation for improving workflow management, transparency, prioritisation, and collaboration.
Sako’s team rated the training 5/5.
“The training was exactly what we needed. The team was highly engaged, and we plan to start applying what we learned and the ways of working we designed during the training already this week.”
Pasi Kalliokoski, IT Director, Sako