Creative Sparks

They are everywhere!  Right now, near you, is another person.  That person cares about something, cares enough that they could talk about it with enthusiasm, energy and sparks!  And even if you didn’t really care about the subject, their enthusiasm just might rub off on you.

One of the things that helps create a high performing team is diversity of opinion, personal culture and points of view.  Make sure you help team members give each other the gift of passion.  Hold learning events to present about hobbies.  Ask for book reviews or presentations on some new technology.  Heck, go bowling.  Do things that expose your people to new ideas.  One day those “unrelated” creative sparks will trigger your next market-winning innovation!

Check out more inspiring presentations at the Ignite Phoenix YouTube Channel.  What will they inspire you and your team to do?

This Wednesday, March 24th, I will be the featured speaker at the Brown Bag session. I’m very excited to give and get some education with the Phoenix creative and small business community! My presentation will be:

Business Benefits of Being Agile

Agile practices such as Scrum and Extreme Programming are touted as a way to improve software development teamwork and their results. There are benefits to the business in and out of the team that are not always obvious at first. I argue these benefits are large enough, any business should jump to apply Agile any way they can!

Please come participate in the discussion. I’m sure you will enjoy it!

Certified Scrum Practitioner

The end of September my application for Certified Scrum Practitioner was approved!  How I could have been quiet about that I don’t know.  The process was interesting.  My first submission draft resulted in some requests for additional information.  The requests were spot on, pointing out weaknesses and missing information.  I was very glad for the review and extra work.

Approval took around two months.  I was disappointed and worried about this slow turn-around.  Of course, this was also the time of the recent tumult when Ken Schwaber and Jim Cundiff left the Scrum Alliance.  Maybe that had an effect on the processing time.

Gaining the level of CSP had been helpful with my work.  A few skeptics who actually know little of Scrum or Agile have expressed some additional interest after learning of the new level.  Some seem to take me a bit more seriously.  I see this as a positive benefit, but a minor one.  Continuing the learning is more important to me.

PhxSUG Topic Tables

October 21st the Phoenix Scrum User’s Group had our monthly meeting.  This time we concentrated on drawing for ideas from each other.  We declared the event “Topic Tables” to have multiple discussions at once around various topics.

After we wrote suggested topics, we voted on them as a group.  The four highest vote winners were distributed teams, integration of Scrum and traditional project management, calculation and use of velocity measurement and measuring performance of team members.  I found it to be a fun and interesting way to do the meeting.  It allowed for both learning and getting to know new people.

Ignite Phoenix 5

I posted earlier about my involvement with the crew of volunteers working on Ignite Phoenix events.  Last week Ignite Phoenix 5 went off so smoothly, I still can’t believe the lack of drama for us the organizers.  I love the Phoenix area and the great people on the team and that attend our awesome events!

Local ScrumMaster Discussions

I have been enjoying more interaction with local ScrumMasters and Agile practitioners.  In particular, I enjoyed a recent discussion with Chris Young, ScrumMaster at Integrum Technologies.  He has some great ideas and questions around working with small teams and handling the Product Backlog.  The contrast to the large teams I am currently working with was very interesting.  I hope to do some story workshop study with him very soon.

Developer Ignite 2

While I have worked on organizing Ignite events, I have never presented at one.  A few weeks ago I submitted a topic for Developer Ignite 2.  Intel has a significant presence in the Phoenix area.  They have taken up to sponsoring an Ignite event centered around software development topics.  My submitted topic is “The True Measure of Agile,” which was accepted for presentation!  The event will take place tomorrow, on the evening of November 11th.  I have been practicing my presentation as much as possible.  20 slides in 5 minutes without stopping is not easy to work in!  Certainly forces focus on the core message.  We’ll see how I do tomorrow.

My desire is to reveal the need to work toward the values expressed in the Agile Manifesto.  That whatever framework or practices you use, it’s not Agile unless these values are supported.  I’ll find out if I can do that in only 5 minutes!

I attended Ignite Phoenix 1 more than a year ago.  I was blown away by the willingness of people to stand up and talk about thier passion, the support from the audience and the creative minds connecting.  When Jeff Moriarty and Roger Williams asked for volunteers to organize the next one, I jumped at the opportunity.  I’ve been working the events ever since.

My Experience

Have you ever had a great planning meeting?  One where everyone is at least supporting the discussions and when innovative and powerful ideas just seem to flow?  Have you seen a speech or concert or movie that left you moved, passionate and uplifted?  Fireworks in your head as the passionate presentation awakens power, connections and creativity in your own mind.  This is Ignite Phoenix for me, for 18, five-minute presentations in a row.  A brainstorming session of 550+ people led by 18 presenters with passion!

OK, so maybe it’s not directly Agile or Scrum related, but it is powerful.  It recharges me to work with a fabulous “naturally agile” team.  And the power of team building, on a huge scale, is on display.  I love it!

The Points

• If you have passion to present, please submit your idea by Friday, October 2nd.
• If you are in the Phoenix, Arizona area on November 3rd, you should be at Ignite Phoenix 5.
• We’ll be at The Tempe Center for the Arts in the 600-seat theater.  Watch the web site for updates on ticket availability.

It will stretch your mind!