Scrumban is a productivity tool for project management. It combines two popular tools from agile workflows: Scrum and Kanban. By combining these two tools, teams can benefit from the efficiency and reliability of Scrum while using the organizational aspects of Kanban. And because Scrumban is a mishmash of the two, teams can modify the workflow to match their specific needs.
The first component of Scrumban is Scrum. Scrum is a tool used in project development to divide a project into tasks, milestones, roles, and deadlines. This allows the team to take an abstract or looming goal (e.g., Create An App) and break it down into core activities (e.g., Joe will do X by this date, then Y by this date, following Z steps).
The second component of Scrumban is Kanban. Kanban is a visualization tool used to organize the various tasks and milestones being worked on by each member of a team. It's what tools such as AirTable and Trello are built around. Tasks are represented by cards, and on these cards are the description and requirements of the task. These cards are assigned to columns based on how close to completion a task is (e.g., Assigned, In Progress, Under Testing, Complete).
In Scrumban, the two are brought together in a surprisingly seamless fashion. The tools of Scrum are first used to divide a goal into different tasks, assign those tasks, and then add deadlines to each of those tasks.
Once completed, these tasks are then added to a Kanban board. A Kanban board not only acts as a great visualization tool for Scrum, but it also adds flexibility. For instance, things like sprints and retrospectives may become less important to a team using Scrumban.