Latest Research On Visual Management (2024–2025)

Making Continuous Improvement Visual: What the Latest Research Says About Visual Management (2024–2025)

By My Visual Management

Visual management isn’t just a shop-floor nicety — it is increasingly supported by empirical research across manufacturing, healthcare, construction and safety environments. In this article, we collate latest insights (2024–2025) to show what works, why it works, and how to apply it in real settings (with your boards, status indicators, 5S zones and so on). As a result, see how to implement best visual management based on latest findings.

1. Visual boards strengthen daily accountability and problem visibility

Key insight
One of the clearest findings is that visual management boards (VMBs / huddle boards) help bridge the gap between frontline staff and leadership, making problems visible. Therefore, enabling daily problem-solving.

Supporting evidence

• A 2024 implementation study in a U.S. healthcare system showed that VMBs are inexpensive but powerful tools to engage staff in solution development, raise issues early, and communicate status upward. (PMC, 2024)
• In construction settings in Peru, an exploratory study found that sites with stronger visual management and transparency practices had measurable improvements in team performance, particularly in reducing rework and defects. (ResearchGate, 2024)

Practical implications

• Firstly, use a consistent daily huddle at the VMB location.
• secondly, display deviations (yesterday vs plan), open tasks, outstanding actions.
• In addition, assign visible ownership (name + date) of issues.
• Resist overloading the board — a few critical metrics is better than many ignored ones.

2. Design — layout, colour, icons — matters more than we often think

Key insight
How a board looks — the visual grammar — influences how quickly people grasp it, what they remember, and how faithfully they act on it.

Supporting evidence

• In a study using eye-tracking with construction workers, features like colour and shape had significant effects: e.g. red and rectangular signs reduced cognitive load. Meanwhile, “unfamiliar” symbols required more processing time. (MDPI, 2022)
• Broader work on visual attention and neural processing also underscores that surrounding shapes (frames, borders) influence how we interpret interior symbols — meaning careful layout is not cosmetic but cognitive. (ScienceDirect, 2024)
• A systematic literature review in 2025 on business process visualisations also highlights the importance of user-centred design: visuals should engage cognition without overwhelming it. (arXiv, 2025)

Practical implications

• Reserve bright or saturated colours for alerts, thresholds, or exceptions.
• Use consistent icon sets across boards/areas.
• Enforce strong visual hierarchy: headline, metric, trend, action.
• Place boards or visuals so they are readable from typical team standing positions. For example, 2-3m away.
• Test your visuals:  show to someone unfamiliar and ask them to explain it in 60 seconds.

3. Visuals improve safety by guiding attention, reducing errors, and enabling faster decisions

Key insight
Visual cues are not just reminders — they bias attention, reduce cognitive load, and sometimes act as automatic prompts that mitigate risk.

Supporting evidence

• A 2025 safety study in immersive construction settings examined the impact of proactive warning systems; these visual cues significantly improved safety performance (fewer near misses) compared with static signage. (ScienceDirect, 2025)
• More broadly, research in manufacturing safety shows that implementing visual management tools correlates with greater awareness of hazards and reductions in accidents. (ResearchGate, 2023)

Practical implications

• Place visual cues at the point of decision or hazard, not just at entrances or generic zones.
• Use simple, clear verbs (“Stop • Isolate • Test”) and standard icons.
• Audit and remove outdated or duplicated signs weekly — clutter dilutes impact.
• Align all safety visuals with recognised standards (e.g. ISO 3864, ANSI/ISO symbol standards) to reduce misinterpretation.

4. Kanban, flow boards, and hybrid work contexts — visuals help manage complexity

Key insight
As workflows get more flexible (especially with hybrid or cross-functional teams), visual flow (Kanban) boards help maintain clarity, limit WIP (Work in Progress), and highlight bottlenecks.

Supporting evidence

• Kanban boards, with columns for “to do / doing / done” and explicit WIP limits, remain a widely accepted visual method for flow management. (Industry reviews, 2024)
• Recent academic reviews of business process visualisations emphasize that visual flow tools help reduce “invisible work” and improve organizational effectiveness. (arXiv, 2025)

Practical implications

• Impose WIP (Work in Progress) limits visibly — e.g. no more than 3 items allowed in “Doing” at one time.
• Highlight blockers visually , for example use a counter status system, along with owner and date.
• Blend Kanban boards with daily huddles — review flow metrics (lead time, throughput).
• When digitising, maintain a mirror — the physical board should match screen views where possible, reinforcing trust and consistency.

5. The rise of smart visuals: integrating sensors, dashboards & hybrid data

Key insight
Visual management is evolving beyond whiteboards: the latest trend is boards that act — dashboards + sensor triggers + alerts feeding frontline visuals. For example, status indicators.

Supporting evidence

• In manufacturing research, “Visual Management for digitizing production scheduling” describes embedding visual techniques into real-time dashboards. (ScienceDirect, 2025)

Practical implications

• Start small: pick one pilot line or cell.
• Configure thresholds/alerts so that when a metric nears limit, a status indicator flags.
• Use the board as the single source of truth — avoid conflicting dashboards or shadow systems.
• Ensure visuals remain human-centred: a red flag must lead to a clear next action

6. Co-creation, literacy, and adoption — the “soft” enablers that make visuals stick

Key insight
Even the best visual board fails if people don’t use it. Research from fields like healthcare and change management show that co-design with teams and applying visual literacy principles drastically improve adoption and retention.

Supporting evidence

• In healthcare visual management, co-designed boards with frontline staff produce higher adherence, fewer corrections, and more sustained usage. (PMC, 2024)
• Research in construction and lean contexts shows that visual management is more effective when staff feel ownership over the visuals, not just as passive viewers. (ResearchGate, 2024)
• The literature on business process visualisations highlights the importance of usable visualization — meaning visuals must align with end users’ cognitive models and context. (arXiv, 2025)

Practical implications

• Run sketch & stick sessions: bring the team, ask them to draft what they want to see on the board.
• Use teach-back: after building, ask someone to explain the board in their own words.
• Pilot the board for one week, observe — then iterate. Don’t let a “draft” live in perpetuity.
• Provide a simple maintenance guide: who updates, when, how often, and checks for clarity.

Practical checklist & rollout flow

Here’s a quick checklist and suggested rollout sequence to tie the research into action:

Summary & next steps

Visual management is not static — the evidence is evolving. What remains constant is that clear, relevant, and human-centred design matter more than decoration. The best visuals are those that:

• Make problems visible, early
• Guide people’s attention to what matters
• Minimise mental friction (layout, colour, icon design)
• Align with data systems but remain anchored in frontline action
• Are co-owned, iterated, and upheld