Visual management and communications boards, empirically testing design principles

This paper considers theuse of visual management in operational settings, particularly focusing on the design of communication boards. Implementation in industry has mostly been practice lead with limited research providing theory-based guidelines on how to use or design communication boards. This research paper contributes to theory byexploringhow operational teams use these boards. It empirically assessesteamproblem-solving by conductinga seriesof15 experimental trials to test different formats. The research concludesthe most important factor is the placement of the relative elements of the board as this supports team decision-making by inference support and discourse management.