How habits work | kanman documentation

Some things your team wants again and again: what shipped this week, a look at main whenever it turns red, a weekly check of outdated dependencies, a word when a release is tagged. Ask once and kanman makes it a habit: when something happens, kanman does what you asked and tells you where you want to hear it.

kanman decides each time what the moment needs, the way it does with any other request: it may look into a cause, write a story, fix something, ask someone or simply stay quiet when there is nothing worth saying. A habit never runs a fixed script.

Built-in habits

Every team starts with a few habits, listed first on the Habits tab and marked Built in: Review merge requests, Watch main, Keep dependencies and security current, Weekly recap, Retro prompt, Daily update (off until you ask for it), Answer mentions and assignments and Incident from alert. What each one does and whether it is on from the start is in Built-in habits.

Open a built-in habit to see what it does, when, where it reports and its Runs: the last reviews, CI changes, scans, recaps, updates, answers or incidents, each with its outcome and a link to where the work is.

Built-in habits change the same way as every other habit: in the chat. You can pause one, start it again, pick one of its choices or tell kanman how you want it done, for example:

Try this in the chatIn your team's chat

Review every merge request people open, not only when we ask.
Pause the retro prompt until after the release.
Start the daily update at 8:30 in our Slack channel.
When you review, always flag changes to the auth module.

kanman keeps your words with the habit and follows them whenever it does that work. A built-in habit can’t be deleted. Pausing one stops exactly that work; everything else goes on.

Make a habit in the chat

Tell kanman in your team’s chat what it should keep doing, in your own words:

Try this in the chatIn your team's chat

Every Friday afternoon, post what we shipped this week.

kanman answers with a New habit card that says:

When: a time (“Fridays at 15:00”), or an event: main turns red or green again, a new vulnerability is found, a tracker issue reaches a status, an alert arrives on one of the team’s webhooks.
What: your words, which kanman reads every time the habit comes round, and optionally one of the team’s skills.
Where: the team’s chat, or only you.
May do: what it may do in your connected systems. A habit follows each Connection’s setting (Off, Ask first, Automatic) and can only be stricter: by default it asks first before it changes anything outside kanman.
Budget: from the team’s budget. A habit a member starts for the team stays small; owners and team leads can give one more room.

Choose Start it, and the habit appears on the team’s Habits tab. Change puts the draft back into the chat so you can say what should be different; Not now leaves it.

kanman also suggests habits on its own, once, with the same card: for example when you have asked for the same thing three Fridays in a row. It also does so when a new connection starts serving the team (for example, once your incident system is connected, a short brief before your daily), and in a team with merge requests that wait for weeks, a weekly list of them per author in the team’s chat (it never comments on or closes them). Each suggestion comes once; one you turn down is not suggested again. Suggestions name only your team’s repositories and never repeat a habit you already have.

One-off asks

Some asks are needed only once: “tell me when !412 merges”, “remind me on Thursday about the change freeze”. kanman keeps them the same way and lets them go once they have happened. The team’s one-off asks appear under I’m keeping an eye on on the Habits tab and drop off after they fired. Your own one-off asks and personal habits are on For you.

The Habits tab

Open a team and choose Habits. At the top, kanman explains what habits are for: they are how your team makes kanman fit the way it works. Tell me what to keep doing takes you straight to the team’s chat. Below it, the tab shows:

My habits in this team: what kanman keeps doing for everyone.
I’m keeping an eye on: the team’s one-off asks.
Just for you: your own habits in this team. Nobody else sees them.

Where you have no habits yet, the tab offers ideas, one at a time. Step through them with the arrows (swipe on a phone); they do not change on their own. Ask me to do this puts the idea into the team’s chat for you.

Each habit is a card: its name and what it does, whether it is on, paused or off, when it comes round (for example “Every MR” or “Fridays 15:00”), who started it and when it last ran. Open one to see what it does, what it may do, its budget, who started it and its last runs: whether it ran, or why it was held (paused, the same event again, too often, budget used up).

The tab only shows. To change a habit, pause it, start it again or delete it, tell kanman in the chat (“post it at 16:00 instead”, “pause the Friday post”). Change in chat on a habit puts it into the chat for you.

Who may do what

Everyone in the team can make habits for themselves and small habits for the team; built-in habits are paused and changed by the team’s owners and leads. The full rules are in Built-in habits and habit reference.