Commitment and Delivery Point in Kanban

A Kanban system shall have identified distinctive points in its workflow. These are:

Commitment Point

Commitment point, which is the point in the workflow where work is selected into the Kanban system. Before the commitment point, there is a set of options to choose from; that steps of the workflow may form of a Discovery (or Upstream) Kanban. 

A work item crossing the commitment point means an explicit or implicit agreement has been made between the customer (or requestor of work) and the delivery team.

The customer (requestor) commits that they want to have the requested work done (and will not change their mind once the work is started), and the delivery team commits that the work will be completed (however, the commitment on the delivery dates can happen at a different moment).

The Replenishment Meeting (one of the Kanban cadences) is often the moment when the work items are moving over the commitment point; however, the commitment can also happen on demand – depending on the policies set for that Kanban system.

Delivery Point

Delivery point – a point at the end of the workflow at which the work on a work item is completed. Once a work item reaches the delivery point, any results/deliverables can be handed over to the customer/requestor or the following team.

The time a work item spends between the commitment point and the delivery point is system lead time. Read Kanban Measures to learn more about Kanban measures.