Waiting work
Also known as Work waiting in queue, Queued work
Definition
Waiting work is unfinished work that is not currently receiving the next processing action it needs. It includes queue time and may include explicitly blocked items, depending on the workflow definition.
Waiting is still work
Waiting work is easy to overlook because no one is actively editing it. Yet it consumes attention, increases age, and can create downstream uncertainty. Naming the wait makes it possible to decide whether to pull, unblock, cancel, split, or change the policy.
A concrete example
An illustrative team has three changes in review and two waiting for a deployment window. All five are unfinished, even though only some have a person working on them at this moment. Reporting only active edits would understate the system's load.
Reduce avoidable waiting
Measure queue time by state, inspect the oldest items, and identify the reason for each pause. A WIP limit can stop new work from hiding the queue. Some waiting is intentional, but intentional does not mean it should be unmeasured.
Limitations
“Waiting” is a policy judgment and can be hard to infer from timestamps. An item may be undergoing invisible investigation. Confirm the state with the people doing the work before assigning a cause.
How this relates to Weave
Weave can help teams investigate review and delivery activity around waiting changes. Its evidence should be combined with the team's full workflow, because waiting product work, operational requests, and dependency records may not appear in repository events.
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