Agile2018

Abstract:
Making the transition to agile ways of working brings about an approximate 10% personnel turnover on average and in some cases even higher. Why?
For the individual, some feel they can't work in this new open and collaborative environment they are experiencing, others are managed out as their lack of engagement becomes apparent, still more leave just at the discussion of Agile before even getting to see the benefits. On the other hand, there are those who have always worked in agile ways before they knew it was called "Agile". They want to work for an Agile Company but keep getting rejected because they don't have the background in an agile organization.
As an Agile Company, you understand the critical nature of the culture change going on and how difficult it can be to maintain that shift. You want to add to the great people you have now and support the foundation of the changes going on. Bringing the wrong person into the organization could completely undermine your efforts and create a cancerous situation that sets you back as opposed to propelling you forward but you fear missing out on the "Diamond in the Rough".
What do you do as an Agile Company when you need to hire "agile people" to continue to build & promote this new culture and show how awesome you are?
What can you do as a passionate Agilist wanting to help an Agile Company be great and just need to get your foot in the door to show how awesome you are?
Robert Woods, National Agile Practice Director and Holly Carman, Sr Account Executive for Matrix will be helping attendees in easy and practical ways to change your internal hiring practices, interview techniques, message and onboarding into one designed to entice the type of folks that can help build your agile culture. They will also help those who want to work in an Agile organization to know how best to market yourself to an agile organization to get the best possible chance for landing that great job.

Learning Outcomes:

• * Techniques for hiring and onboarding practices that encourage agile prospects to apply.
• * How an Agile Company can find the agile diamond in the rough.
• * Techniques for successfully marketing yourself to an Agile Company.
• * What you need to know to ace an agile interview .
• * What NOT to do as an Agile Company hiring or in looking for an Agile position.

Abstract:
"Where do we find great people?" It sounds like a simple question, but it means a whole bunch more.
How do we hire great people? What goes in a good job description? How do you review résumés? Should we have pre-tests? What about trick questions? Who should interview and for how long and what kind of interview is it and, oh my gosh, how do we even interview people properly? What should we evaluate candidates against? How do we know they will fit? What if we make a bad hire? How much time will it take? How do we help new team members succeed?
ARGH!
Hiring isn't harder than coding, but it's a lot more complicated than picking where to have lunch. Come to this interactive presentation to learn about a hiring process that was part of building a world-class team. Along the way we will talk about all the elements, how they fit together, what might be changed, and how you can apply these steps to your organization.
If you are ready to answer these questions and find the very best for your team (whether technical or not), attend Hunting for Diamonds!

Learning Outcomes:

• Understand what's needed before the job description is posted
• Observe a step-by-step process for hiring
• Compare & contrast your hiring process to what other organizations are doing

Attachments:

• hunting_for_diamonds-davidson_avent-preview.pdf

Abstract:
Success requires extreme alignment, an intense clarity of the intent and reasoning behind what truly matters for the organization, shared by everybody with a part to play in that success.
Failure to achieve this alignment exists in every organization I’ve encountered. The cost of poor alignment is staggering, leading to wasted efforts and duplicated work on a huge scale. The cost of forcing alignment through top-down techniques is equally wasteful, denying human potential, disempowering your workforce, and adding friction to every action performed in the enterprise. The strategies required to excel require bringing together many disparate perspectives drawn from your many functional silos and organizations, followed by well-aligned activity by hundreds or thousands of practitioners in every part of your company.
This talk addresses the core challenge head on: Senior leadership lacks the tools and approaches to effectively articulate the strategies they conceive, frequently failing to achieve clarity within their own leadership team, much less across their entire organization. We help senior leaders and their influencers explore the common symptoms resulting from poor articulation, discuss the application of one OKR-based approach to creating effective strategic clarity across many siloes, and explore how the resulting strategies are then deployed with alignment into typical agile implementations using the Scaled Agile Framework as an example. Groups applying these techniques have seen an immediate increase in the ability to coordinate across functions, as well as dramatically improved energy focused on the key tactics to advance the core company strategies.

Learning Outcomes:

• Recognize symptoms of poor alignment.
• Facilitate leadership awareness of the challenge
• Apply basic framing techniques using OKRs
• Transition strategic intent into various functional organization

Abstract:
In the modern economy, companies do not have the luxury of stability. The impact of change, both technological and cultural, is greater and faster than ever before. In this environment, it is only those companies that are agile, innovative and dynamic who thrive.
This interactive presentation will show you who these companies are, how they operate and (more importantly) how you can become one.
Sally Elatta and Evan Leybourn will present key findings from the State of Business Agility report as well as transformational case studies from the industry and our experience. Throughout all this, we’ll make it relevant and actionable for you through a series of hands-on activities designed to show you where to focus your organisational efforts.

Learning Outcomes:

• You will come away with a deep understand of business agility; both its context, definition and execution in companies around the globe. You will also;
• Understand what Business Agility really means and why it is an organisational imperative now
• Meet new friends and learn from others in the business agility community
• Gain new insights from the State of Business Agility report
• Be able to apply actionable takeaways for their transformations
• Evangelise and champion business agility within their organisation
• Engage community around the State of Business Agility

Abstract:
In the 21st century, organisations need to
Put the customer in the centre of our focus
Shed outdated ways of thinking
Embrace an agile mindset
Incorporate new ways of working
Leverage the pace of change for competitive advantage
This talk explores what it means to be agile in a business context. It looks at the key elements needed, how they are interwoven and what is needed for organisations to transform their thinking and behaviour into new ways of working.
Business Agility is about putting the customer at the center of the organization’s focus, changing from measuring activities to outcomes and creating an ecosystem which unleashes the productivity and innovation already present in the people in the organisation.

Learning Outcomes:

• Why business agility is imperative to cope in a VUCA world
• Ways the organisation needs to change to become an agile business
• Ways the individuals in the organisation need to change in order to allow the organisation to become truly agile
• Participants prepare a personal action plan with ideas about how to start making changes that will move themselves and their organisations towards being a more agile business

Attachments:

• Shane Hastie Talk Foundations of Business Agility_V2.pdf

Abstract:
We all know the story of how the Agile ‘Software Development’ Manifesto emerged out of Snowbird in February of 2001. And we all know that Agile is still the current best practice for software development. What remains to be fully realized is that Agile has evolved to a best practice for business in general; a way of life for that matter.
I had the privilege of bringing Agile into business over the last couple years. In that time, I introduced my executive leadership team to Business Agility. After getting executive participation in the inaugural Business Agility conference in Feb 2017, we partnered together to seek the benefits of a comprehensive Business Agility adoption.
Using our corporation’s strategic planning and execution effort to exemplify, I will share with you how the Agile mindset and practices apply to business and drive the highest impact possible towards the most valuable goals and initiatives. Modern leadership and business practices such as those under the Business Agility umbrella bring a value-driven, data-driven, efficient focus on impactful delivery.

• Revenue and growth accelerate as we focus the company’s resources on delivering in the most valuable way
• Corporate processes lean out as we remove wasteful bottlenecks, saving money, time, and providing competitive advantage
• Employees are more capable as corporate practices are more meaningful and less taxing
• Back-office tools and data are integrated into a unified experience allowing real-time awareness and predictive analytics, increasing effective decision-making and enabling empowerment at lower levels
• Employees are happier. Customers are happier. The corporate bottom-line reflects this happiness.

I am enthusiastic about the spread of Agile beyond IT. And as such, I am excited to illustrate the brilliance of Business Agility to session participants, adding examples from my most recent corporate transformation effort to exemplify the mindset and practices presented. It is my interest that participants come away with an understanding of how Agile mindset and practices benefit the corporate back office as much as they do software delivery, and how their companies can begin to benefit too by applying what they learn from this presentation.

Learning Outcomes:

• How Agile mindset and practices benefit the corporate back office as much as they do software delivery
• Specific practices, tools, and integrations that can be used to enable Business Agility
• How your company can begin to benefit too by applying what you learn from this presentation.

Attachments:

• Agile FTW! - An Agile2018 Presentation.pdf

Abstract:
Agile has been pervasive and proven to be successful for technology product development for more than two decades. Today more organizations are taking agile principles and practices and applying them outside of IT to their business as usual (BAU) activities such as marketing or strategy development. But how easy is this next generational aspect of Business Agility? Can an approach that was rooted in technology product development be successfully applied as an accelerator to achieve overall business efficiency and effectiveness?
In this session, different case studies, including a large Canadian insurance provider, will demonstrate lessons learned from organizations that have taken agile principles and practices to help them drive commercial impacts, build people and their capabilities, adoption of the right mindset and behaviors, and improve performance. Some of the questions that will be addressed:

• What does business agility mean and why does it matter?
• How can Corporate Functions such as HR, Finance, Risk and Marketing, which are often entrenched in traditional ways of working, become agile delivery centers?
• Do agile practitioners need to “stay true” to the principles and practices they originally learned for technology in order to be effective in the business?
• How should agile business teams be optimally structured to align with an enterprise agile COE?
• What can leaders learn from others’ journeys so we can determine whether agile can truly thrive outside IT and be scaled across the organization?

If you are a Business Leader who is considering next steps on enterprise agility, organizational resilience, and a culture of adaptability, attend this session to learn valuable and pragmatic insights as you begin your own agile journey.

Learning Outcomes:

• How to adopt the agile principles and practices, and drive the mindset and culture outside of technology into business operations
• How to structure and support your organization in this transformation
• How to assess readiness and how to implement and adopt agile within the business through use of leading practices

Attachments:

• Agile2018 Business Agility_08032018_2300 (Upload Version).pdf

Abstract:
Whereas output metrics (such as stories completed per week) measure aspects of a team’s localized productivity, outcome metrics (such as how much these features increase customer productivity) measure the difference the teams’ work makes in the world.
Focus on output metrics can lead to increased waste and unnecessary stress, and distracts the organization from achieving more valuable outcomes.
In this talk, through stories and group exercises, you’ll see how you can better measure and improve your organization’s effectiveness.

Learning Outcomes:

• People can tell an outcome metric from an output metric (sparrow deck participation)
• Connecting the things that we do to the difference they make in the world (by drawing metric chains and then shortcutting them)
• People stop stressing about things that don’t make a difference (evidence in stories)

Abstract:
Let's face it, most performance reviews suck! Many in the agile community suggest abandoning performance reviews, but few offer suggestions for alternatives. A large percentage of software developers work in an enterprise environment where performance reviews are mandated. And even when they are not mandated, what if you could do performance reviews that will honor agile values and not only suck less, but actually provide value to the individual and the organization? Todd will demonstrate such a program that was rolled out successfully with strong support across the enterprise--from the individual colleagues, to people leaders, and even including HR. He will demonstrate the principles and the specific implementation of the system which you can tailor to your organization’s values and constraints. While the system was originally designed to cover developer roles, the approach has been broadened and utilized to cover many knowledge worker roles and then expanded to cover leadership roles.

Learning Outcomes:

• How to go about designing a performance management system that honors agile values and actually provides value to both the organization and the individuals.
• An approach for developers and other knowledge worker roles
• An approach for leadership roles

Abstract:
The Dojo; it's not just for IT teams anymore. What can your business teams gain from spending time in the Dojo? Immersive learning experiences helping them to adopt Agile and Product values, principles and practices while strengthening their working relationships with IT and technology development teams. The Dojo is helping teams bridge the gap between business and IT while accelerating Target's journey towards Business Agility.
Like so many organizations, Target is in the midst of a volatile industry. Transformation is necessary and agility is essential. Being several years into this journey, iteration, experimentation and a culture of continuous improvement and learning are taking hold. Where we started and where we are now does not look the same, and it is product thinking and business involvement that have emerged as the next step in our evolution towards Business Agility.
During this session, we will share our journey of how we leveraged the Dojo to bring agility to our business teams. Join us in this session to hear stories from the trenches as we highlight experiences from a variety of business teams (Global Supply Chain & Logistics, Marketing, Learning & Development, Store Operations, and Property Development).

Learning Outcomes:

• - How to leverage the Dojo to meet business transformation needs
• - How we're changing the way we work by extending Agile to business teams
• - Learn from successes, and failures, of business agility at Target - what worked well and what did not

Attachments:

• Agile2018 Dojo IT Business Unite AUG 9 2018.pdf

Abstract:
Lean Kanban Inc. is the premier source of professional Kanban. What have we learned running a Kanban business Kanban style? While the Kanban Method got its start in IT, it is a general approach to managing knowledge work. At Lean Kanban we have very little software, but almost everything we do is knowledge work. In this talk we will discuss 5 different areas where we have taken direct or indirect learning from Kanban. We will discuss areas such as accounts receivables, our Kanban Coaching Professional certification process, optimizing capacity allocation, developing fit for purpose solutions, and data driven real time risk management. Through this session attendees will learn about:

• Applying Kanban concepts to a company outside IT
• Using lead time as a tool to improve accounts receivables predictability
• Understanding system workflows and using tools to drive continuous improvements
• Anticipating demand and balancing the allocation of capacity
• Designing solutions that are fit for the purpose of solving specific business problems
• Managing risk through a data driven scenario modeling

Learning Outcomes:

• Applying Kanban concepts to a company outside IT
• Using lead time as a tool to improve accounts receivables predictability
• Understanding system workflows and using tools to drive continuous improvements
• Anticipating demand and balancing the allocation of capacity
• Designing solutions that are fit for the purpose of solving specific business problems
• Managing risk through a data driven scenario modeling

Attachments:

• Agile2018-Kanban Style.pdf

Abstract:
So many successful companies get BIG and grow fast, but how does a company scale while still providing community and culture that feels small?

For months, a group from my scientific institute visited growing companies across the East Coast; interviewed staffers; and came away with reports and conclusions related to "being big and feeling small." We wanted to know what we could adopt or adapt to better handle our own fast growth. Leave with major takeaways based on my own organization's growth as well as the takeaways from external visits, case studies and interviews that were part of this project. These takeaways include tips, tricks and techniques shared by these organizations.

Learning Outcomes:

• understanding the benefits of being big / staying small
• organizations' cultural principles and initiatives related to maintaining community in midst of growth
• tips for maintaining connection in larger organizations 
• how to create physical space that accommodates growth and promotes connection

Attachments:

• Vaz_BeBigFeelSmall_Agile2018.pdf