New PMI-ACP Classes Announced

I am happy to report that LeadingAgile is ramping up its Public Training Program.  We will now offer regularly scheduled public training classes in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic.  Early bird registration (30 days or more before class start date) will be heavily rewarded, by way of a $300 discount.  The first class to be announced is the PMI Agile Certified Practitioner. For those unfamiliar with LeadingAgile, though all of us offer training, we're all actually Agile practitioners by trade, with years of real-world experience.  We come from a variety of backgrounds, allowing us to offer relevant training specific to the needs of the individual student. Both our public and private classes move at a steady but relaxing pace, delivering the right combination of applicable information, Q&A, and interactive exercises.

When it’s time for your respective exam, you will pass because you understand the concepts, not because you memorized questions and answers. When you go back to your organizations, you will have the confidence of knowing that you understand the fundamentals and how to apply then.

Why Us?

There are a lot of companies out there who offer training but do so from an ivory tower.  The trainers aren't actual practitioners so they aren't going to be able to answer your questions based on their experiences.  When it comes to knowledge about the PMI-ACP content, no company comes close to LeadingAgile.  Both Mike and Dennis were on the ACP Steering Committee and I was an Independent Reviewer.  After the exam pilot phase concluded, I transitioned to a new role as Co-Lead of the PMI-ACP Support Team at the PMI Agile Community of Practice.

Contact Hours/PDUs:

 21

CEUs:

 2.1

Public or Private:

 Both

Duration:

 3 Days - 9:00 am to 4:30 pm

DATE

LOCATION

 EARLY BIRD

PRICE

August 20-22

Tampa, FL

$1395.00

$1695.00

Register

September 10-12

Reston, VA

$1395.00

$1695.00

Register

October

Atlanta, GA

$1395.00

$1695.00

Register

Who Should Attend

Certainly, if you're interested in getting the PMI-ACP certification, you should take this class. But, it doesn't matter if you're an executive, traditional project manager, or a member of a team.  This class is going to give you a lot of value.  In a typical workshop, I've seen anyone from a CTO to an Extreme Programmer to a Tester.  Come with an open mind and you'll see how we're on the bleeding edge of Agile thought leadership.

Class Materials

Attendees will receive a complementary copy of the class training material, ACP practice exam, and ACP flashcards.

Course Content

Though this course was originally designed to be an exam prep course, it was enhanced to be an introduction into the principles, values, and practices of Scrum, Lean, Kanban, and Extreme Programming. Our course is developed around a fun 3-day exercise, simulation, and game driven curriculum that encourages signifiant interaction amongst everyone participating in the course. Topics include:

• Understand the Agile Manifesto Values and Principles

• Have an end-to-end understanding of Scrum, its key roles, artifacts, and meetings

• Understand what are and why we use big visible charts or information radiators

• Understand Scrum from a ScrumMaster, Product Owner, and empowered Team perspectives

• Know and understand the XP (Extreme Programming) roles and who does what

• Understand Test Driven Development. Know how it works and why it’s valuable

• Understand Continuous Integration. Know how it works and why it’s valuable

• Understand the Lean Software Development Principles

• Know what Lean Portfolio Management is and how your organization could benefit from it

• Understand what Value Stream Mapping is and how to do it

• Understand the basics of Kanban, WIP, and why it works

• Know how to write and identify good User Stories

• Know what Personas are and how to use them

• Understand what makes a Servant Leader and what they do

• Understand Velocity and its usefulness

• Know Agile Estimation techniques

• Know facilitation methods

• Understand how Agile deals with risks

• Understand the Definition of "Ready" and “Done”

• ...much more...

Private Training

If you are interested in private training for your organization or team, please contact us for more information.

Joined LeadingAgile

I am happy to report that I have just joined the family at LeadingAgile.  LeadingAgile is dedicated to solving the challenges associated with Agile in larger, more complex enterprises. They provide Agile training and coaching, strategic enterprise Agile transformation consulting, and Agile project and portfolio management services. I've known Mike Cottmeyer since LeadingAgile was his blog, he was at VersionOne, and I was at the National Archives.

LeadingAgile is growing and I'm going to help them stand up Agile training around the Southeast and apply my enterprise Agile coaching abilities to some of the larger client engagements.

This is going to be a very easy transition for me.  The Agile community provides opportunities to know a lot of great people.  Step that up a notch to include someone you trust, respect, and enjoy hanging out with, and you've got Mike.  Come share a cup of coffee or a glass of beer with us at Agile 2012.  We'll be there!

Here are some LeadingAgile links to check out:

Website and Blog Facebook LinkedIn Twitter

Mike Cottmeyer on Twitter Dennis Stevens on Twitter

Filthy Fishbowl

I read a really great post over at Mike Cottmeyer's Leading Agile blog.  To paraphrase, he wrote about his son having a fishbowl that was in desperate need of cleaning. He described the situation as

this poor little goldfish was swimming literally in it’s own filth. The water was yellowish brown and just gross.

Mike went on to use the fishbowl as an analogy, to write about an Agile adoption and transformation client. He wrote that it’s easy from an outsiders point of view to see what’s going on, but the folks inside a company have a difficult time seeing how they can transform their environment. The challenge is that sometimes there is so much that has to change to get healthy, it’s difficult to figure out where to start.  If you are that little fish, swimming around in that filthy bowl, how do you even begin to see what can be done about it?  Have you just gotten used to the filth?

If you are in the bowl, how do you imagine getting out of the bowl, emptying the water, cleaning the glass, refilling the bowl, and getting back into a healthy environment?

I would say, if you are that goldfish, either you learn to clean your own bowl, hire someone to do it for you, or you find yourself a new bowl.  There will certainly be some who will choose to swim in their own filth, until it chokes every bit of life out of them.  I see too many analogous goldfish swimming in filth, because they lack the skills necessary to maintain their own bowl, because they believe that someone will someday come and change the water, or they think they can just live with it.

If your fishbowl becomes filthy, what would you do?

HT: Leading Agile

Mike Cottmeyer talks about scaling Scrum

On our current project, we have over 100 people across 14 Scrum teams.  The challenge?  How do you communicate between Scrum teams?  Well, that all depends. What are the dependencies between the teams? Though I could write a 1000+ word post about this, I figured I would just link to a short but informative video.  In it, you'll see Mike Cottmeyer talk about scaling Scrum and how you might have different types of scrum-of-scrums (the way you would communicate between Scrum teams).  Mike is a Product Consultant and Agile Evangelist at VersionOne.  You can read more from Mike on his blog, Leading Agile, or on the VersionOne blog, Agile Chronicles. I'm hoping if all goes well, we'll be bringing Mike to Washington DC to offer a few days of training.  I'm sure this will be one of the many important topics to cover.