Agile Open Northwest kicked off this morning, and the whole Agile Learning Labs crew is here. Chris hosted a session called “An Experiential Intro to Agile” in the first time slot. Sixteen folks new to agile gathered and we quickly discovered a common theme: participants were about to join agile teams, but didn’t know what to expect. Out came the rubber balls and we dove into the Self-Organizing Ball game.
The topics that this surfaced included:
- The value of short iterations to to allow productive “trial and error”
- How effective retrospectives generate continuous improvement
- Time-boxing can push a group towards productive chaos, while protecting it from prolonged unproductive chaos.
- The way a shared goal can unite a team, and focus the energy and self-organization
It was a lot of fun, and a good start to one of my favorite conferences.
Cheers,
I was writing Lyssa Adkins the other day to update her on how briskly the seats in her upcoming class are selling, and I almost called her a “rock star”… But it just didn’t feel right. Lyssa has absolutely nothing in common with Keith Richards (which is a good thing, believe me!). She’s more of a Christina Aguilera type, which is kind of the opposite of the dark, moody troubled-but-oh-so-talented rock star: Lyssa is open, magnanimous, confident, snappy with a comeback, and very, very shiny–a classic pop star.
