My first agile meetup was in April 2009. I was going alone and didn’t know what to expect. My experience with agile was limited, and I was shy. Awkward small talk while waiting in line for pizza. Uncertainty about where to sit. Gratitude when the session started because I could relax and listen.
Thankfully my shyness wore off, my agile experience increased, and I’ve since welcomed a number of folks to the Dallas-Fort Worth agile community. Local meetups and events are great opportunities to learn and connect with others. Many people—myself included—are relieved to discover that they are not alone in the challenges they face in agile adoptions.
I wrote about my community experience as part of Tips from the Trenches, a compilation of wisdom organized by Yves Hanoulle for Scrum Masters and currently available on LeanPub.
Working with leaders has given me a deeper appreciation for how hard change can be in an organization. Alignment can be a struggle, and leaders often feel isolated as they face challenges supporting new practices and changing the workplace. Introducing leaders to the larger agile community provides them a sense of comfort. “It’s not just us,” I’ve heard. “Wow, I recognized some of the problems we’ve already solved.” Hearing others’ stories connects them to different thinking than their day-to-day office holds.
Some of my favorite user group moments have come from seeing managers excited about ideas they can take back to their workplace. Maybe they take photos of slides as a presenter speaks, animatedly whisper to a colleague sitting nearby, or send a text to coworkers not present—they’ve gained a morsel of wisdom that has unlocked something new and want to make it real. We’re headed in the right direction, we need to watch out for this obstacle, or we need to try this new thing—they leave thinking and feeling differently about their work.
Witnessing leaders share their stories and give back to the community continues the transformative effects. Authenticity captivates the group. Leaders own their agile journeys, claiming their successes and failures along the way. Learning happens for the leaders who are sharing as well as the listeners, strengthening the group’s bonds. By the end, we recognize one another as being part of the agile tribe.
This was originally published as part of a longer article at Apple Brook Consulting blog.
It's been incredible visiting Phoenix, Indianapolis, and even Cornwall, Ontario this year meeting other agilists and sharing ideas--I love the conversations that start from one person sharing their experiences. However, this post is all about Dallas.
The agile community in Dallas continues to grow, and I want it continue to thrive. If your team or organization would benefit from a lunch and learn presentation related to an agile topic, please contact me. I would love to share my knowledge and experiences, answer questions, and get to know others in the local community. I've grown through my involvement in Dallas, and it's a joy giving back.
If you are working in an organization, you might be thinking about how to share practices across agile teams. Agile teams inspect and adapt over time, using retrospectives in particular to change their behaviors and practices with the goal of improving. A team improving is great, and it would be awesome for that team to share what they’ve learned so that others can benefit. To encourage good practices across teams, organizations often establish centers of excellence or communities of practice. I recommend creating communities of practice, but what's the difference?
Communities of practice are groups of people with similar interests who share experiences with a common goal of improving. People talk to one another and learn from each other. All levels of expertise are welcomed, and all experiences can provide learning. A community of practice can work together to solve a problem and adopt a common solution if the community agrees to do so.
In contrast, a center of excellence implies that a smaller group recommends (or even requires) certain practices or templates be used. The leaders of the center of excellence have authority. Experience sharing may not be welcomed if it is not aligned with the leaders’ views. There is a sense that excellence comes from applying the same behaviors and practices across teams. Maybe a center of excellence is a good starting point for an organization, but communities of practice hold more possibility for learning and applying of practices.
Am I saying that a community of practice is better than a center of excellence? In my opinion, yes. There’s goodness in sharing experiences and ideas as peers that comes from being part of a community. The safety of community allows for deeper sharing and exploring of ideas. Communities of practice support adult learning and promote ownership of ideas—what’s not to love about that?
The differences between a center of excellence and a community of practice in your organization might not be as black and white as I describe them, but many organizations that I’ve seen are more comfortable creating centers of excellence than communities of practice. Leaders feel assurance that only the best practices will be spread through centers of excellence. Self-organizing communities are unpredictable and rely on some experimentation to encourage learning. And that's precisely where the goodness lives. Go ahead: embrace community.
I'm excited to share that there are quite a few agile events coming up in Texas where I will be speaking! I continue to be amazed at the strength of the agile community, and I look forward to meeting new people and seeing old faces.
What upcoming events are you excited about?
DFW Scrum user group - 2nd location added!
BIG NEWS! The DFW Scrum leadership team has focused our efforts to be an organization by the people, for the people, and of the people. Over the last two years, we have had various requests for remote MeetUps (simulcast, etc...) and actual satellite locations. Given that North Dallas may not be convenient for everyone and we have not been able to secure our quarterly location in Irving, we have decided to try adding a second location.
Starting with our July 15 MeetUp, DFW Scrum will now be held at two different locations across the DFW Metroplex. Our first satellite location will be in Southlake at the Sabre Headquarters-Solana (3150 Sabre Drive Room: A1-157 Southlake, TX). We have added a new member to our leadership team, Chris Palmer, to facilitate the 2nd location and are thrilled to have him onboard. Right now, the locations will likely hold different topics that suit the needs of the audiences in the locations. When we have large events (Agile Manifesto authors or industry thought leading speakers), we will work to simulcast the meeting so both locations can participate.
For now, when you look on our site however, you will notice two MeetUps occurring on the same date. We will try to keep the meetings to our 3rd Tuesday of each month and at our regular times of 6:30PM-8:30PM to afford better planning. Please be sure you look at the title of the MeetUp as the location will be the first piece of information in the title (i.e. DALLAS or SOUTHLAKE). We hope this helps those who are not always able to attend in Dallas participate in the agile community. Our goal is to help you do better today than you were doing yesterday.
Continuous learning is essential in agile, and I think it is sometimes taken for granted. I’ve noticed an attitude—complacency—that can show up after a team or organization has been following scrum for a while. It’s as if the team or organization decided it has learned “enough” and can sustain itself at the level of knowledge it has. Like they have arrived at the top of the agile mountain. But I’ve found that if an individual or group is not pushing forward, then it is going to move backward.
For me, learning is a given. I read constantly. I take classes where there is interaction with other students, I attend conferences and user groups, and I blog—a significant amount of learning can be gained from sharing with others. In fact, my peers and I have formed our own little community of practice. We struggled to meet as a group when we planned purely social events, and we’ve had more participation since we made learning the agenda. Our calendars are stuffed with meetings, and we all have more work than can fit in a 40-hour week. We push ourselves. And as a group, we prioritize learning into our busy schedules.
Forming a coaching community of practice has deepened our relationships and renewed our energy for the work we are doing. We are active practitioners and continuous learners.
I wish I could say that running an agile user group meeting is as easy as declaring, "woo woo hippie hippie agile time" and watching people self-organize a magical knowledge-sharing experience. But after talking to people and thinking about the meetings I've attended, I must say: running a great user group meeting requires effort.
Arrive early – Getting stuck in traffic and hitting technical difficulties happen, and you can minimize your stress level as an organizer by arriving early for the meeting so you can setup and relax. This is a good time to eat some food and drink some water.
Make people feel welcome – Recruiting volunteers to open doors for attendees and direct them to the meeting space is a great idea. If food and drinks are available, make sure attendees know where to find them. Chat with them and introduce them to other folks. Requiring people to sign in, provide their contact information, or introduce themselves to the entire group can be off-putting; focus on creating a safe environment first and foremost.
Allow time for networking – Whether it’s at the beginning of the meeting, in the middle, or at the end, make sure there’s time for people to talk to one another and make connections. Many people show up to user groups looking for new opportunities or to recruit folks, and creating a community means relationship building. I like to allow time at the beginning and at the end of the meetings for this to happen organically.
Give a brief introduction about the group and logistics – What is the group’s purpose? Who are the leaders? How can someone learn more about the group? Where are the restrooms? What else might someone need to know? Keep it light. Try to cover these topics and thank your sponsors in under 15 minutes.
Provide quality content – This is what drew the crowd after all! The actual content portion can take many forms: a presentation, a formal talk, a facilitated discussion, an open space event, activities/games, or a combination of formats. Keep an eye on the group dynamics and engagement.
Soak it in – You did it: you created an event! Every new attendee is a win. Every attendee who leaves with a new idea or something learned is a win. Count the number of attendees, take photos, and enjoy your accomplishment.
Stay a little late – Answer questions, thank people for coming, and clean up the space. This is a good time to get feedback on the meeting and suggestions for future topics and improvements.
I'd love to hear suggestions on how to run a great user group meeting--please comment to share your ideas.
I was pleasantly surprised by the size and enthusiasm of the Austin agile community! The conference was sold out with 500 people registered. Cherie Silas and I co-presented Beyond Removing Impediments: Scrum Master as Team Coach to an engaged audience of about 100 people in the morning, and it was a great start to the day. The ideas from our session seemed to really resonate with folks, and I heard the ideas repeated in other sessions and conversations throughout the day.
I was also very excited to have a good-sized group from Dallas attend Keep Austin Agile—many who had never been to an agile conference before. They were excited to be a part of the larger agile community and discover that others faced many of the same challenges as them. Best of all, they were reminded of the successes they had achieved thus far in their agile journeys. The conference presented them with new ideas and reinvigorated their enthusiasm for agile. Our group went out to dinner after the conference at the Oasis and had a lovely view of the sunset—it was a perfect ending to a wonderful agile conference trip.