Work in review is closest to value
Work in review is closest to value
Work in review is the work closest to value. It has already been thought through, implemented, and put in front of the team. The remaining path is shorter than the path from a fresh ticket to shipped software.
The rule
When your hands are free, read the board from right to left:
- Is anything blocked on me?
- Is anything in review that I can move?
- Is anything ready to merge, deploy, or verify?
- Only then: should I pull new work?
Starting new work can feel productive because it puts code in your hands. But from the team's point of view, it often sends capacity back to the start of the value chain while nearly-finished work waits.
Why this matters
Review queues create invisible waste. The author waits, starts something else, or keeps the PR loaded in the back of their mind. Every hour a review sits idle makes the already-paid implementation work less useful.
The team should bias toward finishing rightmost work before starting leftmost work. Not always, not mechanically, but enough that the board flows instead of collecting half-finished slices.