In the last five years there has been a tremendous surge in the volume of Federal procurements calling for lean and agile solutions to complex problems.  In spite of this, many of these same Government agencies still cling to traditional waterfall models of delivery.

How do we embrace lean and agile principles while delivering under these constraints within large-scale Government agile software delivery initiatives? 

What agile approaches can be effectively used "out of the box" while others may need to be tailored to address legacy Government processes and operating environments? 

In this talk I’ll walk through each of the seven Lean principles and unveil how -- on two Federal Government scaled-agile engagements -- specific lean-agile processes and approaches were tailored for program delivery success, while remaining compliant with agency mandates.   

Skeptics may say that it is too hard to bring User Centered Design (UCD) into the Agile process, but when the two worlds collide you get the benefits of both.  UCD can improve your game by ensuring that your focus stays on delivering product value and that teams produce working software that end users will actually use.  During this talk you will hear from experts with both Agile and UCD experience who will share stories and examples of how their teams have successfully integrated the two practices and what challenges they have faced along the way.  In addition, you will leave with three tools that you can use to integrate UCD into your projects today.

Do you have a person hanging around your agile team who is responsible for training clients or end-users on a product or service you are developing?  (Or, maybe you are a learning professional (a trainer, instructional designer, e-learning developer, or curriculum designer) embedded with an agile team?) Who are they? What do they want? What can they do for your agile team? Leveraging insights from learning professionals working with agile projects, this session will explain the role of a learning professional; offer some potential benefits of having a learning professional embedded on an agile team; and offer some practical tips for a successful relationship between agile teams and learning professionals.

Organizations follow frameworks and playbooks and drive to achieve successful results in their Agile transformation.   As the organization and teams continue on their journey the challenges may seem to increase rather than decrease.   The larger the organization and the more detailed their software development life cycle the more arduous it is to make the shift.   This session discusses observations on five common misconceptions that slow an Agile transformation and the ability of teams to embrace the mind shift needed to be Agile.

My name is Dottie Swanson and I’m a Skeptic …

I began my career as a software developer and grew into a Project Manager role. I thrived on the control – I could dictate delivery dates to my team without debate. They were always so quick to appease me by immediately getting to 90% completion without a hitch. They were such good soldiers by never allowing scope creep and always sticking to the requirements. Sure, there were big surprises near our delivery date, but that’s normal, right?

Then a client asked me to take a Scrum Master role on an Agile program. I was sent to a CSM course where I spent the entire two days with my arms crossed and a giant pouty face. The program kicked off and we started “failing” early, my soldiers were retreating and sabotaging Agile. My client still wanted Gantt charts. My inner cynic hit rock bottom and I felt overwhelmed – how is this ever going to work? Since the client was requiring Agile, I had to reset my thinking, seek help and get the team onboard. Once I began to embrace Agile, I was able see that the PMBOK and Agile are not mutually exclusive.

Today, I am still in recovery and require Agile on all of my programs.

Join this session to hear my experience as a skeptic and my journey so that you too can transform to an Agilist.