How long should each topic get?

Five to eight minutes for the first timebox, then a quick vote: thumbs up to continue for a shorter second box, thumbs down to move on. Most topics finish in one box. Write the time on the discussing column header so nobody has to be reminded.

Anyone; the board runs the meeting. A facilitator keeps the timer and moves the stickies, and the role can rotate every session. The host's only privilege is to start on time.

Does it work for a meeting with a fixed agenda?

Use it for the open part: put the fixed items first, in ten minutes, then open the board. A tier meeting has a fixed order; a monthly leaders-and-floor forum does not, and that is where lean coffee shines.

Lean coffee or daily huddle?

A huddle has a fixed agenda and takes 10 to 15 minutes every shift. Lean coffee has no agenda and runs on votes, which suits a monthly forum or a community meeting. Use the huddle for the day's work and lean coffee for the open questions.

The facilitator for the session, and the role rotates. Between sessions the unreached topics stay on the board, so whoever hosts next starts with them.

Can it work remotely?

Yes. On a shared board people add stickies and dots from their own screens, and the facilitator drags the topics and runs the timer.

Lean Studio board · Team & strategy

Lean Coffee board

In one sentence

Lean coffee is a structured, agenda-less meeting format in which the people present propose topics, vote to order them, and discuss each in a short timebox that is extended only by a quick vote.

Lean coffee is a meeting with no set agenda: the people in the room write the topics, vote on them, and discuss them in order, a few minutes each, with a quick thumbs vote to continue or move on. The board is three columns and a timer, and it stops one person's topic taking the whole hour.

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When to use it

When to use the Lean Coffee board

For a CI community, a supervisors' meeting or a cross-shift meeting where everyone has something different to raise.
When a standing meeting has drifted and nobody remembers why it exists.
For a monthly open forum between leaders and the floor.
As a way to run a kaizen team's weekly check-in in thirty minutes.
For a supervisors' meeting across shifts, where a colleague raises the topic of someone who is not in the room today.

What is on the board

1
To discuss
Every topic on its own sticky, ordered by votes.
2
Discussing
The current topic and its timebox, usually five to eight minutes.
3
Done
Discussed topics, with any action written on the sticky.
4
Votes
Each person's dots, two or three, placed before the discussion starts.

Running it

How to run a Lean Coffee session

1
Anyone can host; a facilitator keeps the timer. Six to twelve people, typically 45 to 60 minutes.
2
Two minutes: everyone writes topics on stickies, one per sticky, into the to-discuss column.
3
Read them aloud in a sentence each. Then everyone places two or three dots on the topics they want. Sort the column by dots.
4
Move the top topic to discussing and start the timer. A lean coffee round is usually eight minutes.
5
When the timer ends, thumbs up to continue for a shorter round of four minutes, thumbs down to move on. Majority rules, no debate.
6
Move finished topics to done and write any action on the sticky with a name. Keep going until the time is up; topics not reached stay for next time.
7
Write each topic as a question ('Who owns the die cart?'), not a heading. A question has an answer the room can reach in eight minutes; a heading does not.
8
Good output: the topics the room actually wanted, in the order it wanted them, each with a decision or an action, and nobody's item taking the hour.

Worked example · sample data

Worked example

The sample board is a supervisors' lean coffee mid-session. Done holds the first topic, the pallet bay at the fire door, discussed and closed with an action for R. Patel. Discussing holds the topic with the most votes, seven: who owns the die cart, with 4:20 left on its eight-minute box. Waiting in to-discuss are night shift cover for the setter with six votes, where the new rack goes with four, and shadow board colours with two. When the timer ran out on the die cart the room voted thumbs up, so it got four more minutes and ended with maintenance taking ownership and a date to label it. The setter cover topic came next and was escalated to the plant manager as an action, and the shadow board colours were not reached and stayed on the board for next month.

The board shown at the top of this page, read through. Invented data, not a customer.

Common mistakes

The host writes the agenda. Then it is a normal meeting with stickies.
No timer, or a timer nobody obeys.
Debating whether to continue instead of voting.
Topics with no action written on them before they move to done.
Twenty people. Above twelve, split into two tables.
The same three voices taking every round. The facilitator asks who has not spoken yet before the timer runs down.

How it works in Lean Studio

1
Start from the Lean Coffee template: three columns and a votes legend.
2
Everyone adds topic stickies for two minutes, then each person adds dots to the topics they want; sort the column by votes.
3
Drag the top topic to Discussing, set the timebox, and at the end thumbs-vote to continue or move it to Done with its action noted.
4
Save the finished board to My templates so the next team starts from your version.

Lean Studio boards are drawn with stickies, text, shapes (rectangle, rounded rectangle, ellipse, diamond), arrows and charts, and any board can carry the 15 data widgets, from a scorecard to a kanban. See all widgets and boards.

Also in LeanSuite

Where it goes next in LeanSuite

LeanSuite's Kaizen module runs improvement events and projects with owners, due dates and tracked savings.

Actions from a topic are created from the board with an owner assigned there, and anything a supervisor cannot settle is escalated to the next tier's board. Tiered Meetings
A topic that turns out to be an improvement idea goes into Idea Management, where a reviewer answers it and it can become a Kaizen project. Idea Management
A topic that needs a project becomes a Kaizen with owners, phases and due dates. Kaizen & Projects

See Kaizen & Projects

Open this board in LeanSuite

Lean Coffee is one of the 30 ready-made boards in Lean Studio, LeanSuite's whiteboard. Try the interactive demo in your browser with sample data, or pilot LeanSuite on your own lines for 90 days, with the setup done by our team.

See it in action Start a 90-day pilot

What Lean Studio is

Related boards and templates

In the lean glossary

FAQ