Round up for 2017 and beyond: Agility, DevOps, and Everything In-between

TL;DR

The author reflects on a busy year of speaking at global conferences and delivering workshops focused on Agile, Scrum, and DevOps, noting that training provides more lasting value to clients than consulting. Key insights include the importance of stepping out of comfort zones, sharing practical knowledge to empower teams, and prioritizing structured, engaging training. Development managers should consider investing in team training to build internal capability and drive better outcomes.

28 November 2017
Written by Martin Hinshelwood
4 minute read
Comments
Subscribe

This year has been relatively busy for conferences. Which is unusual since I usually forget until after the call for papers and wonder what’s going on. Well, this time I got some submissions in on time. It does, however, baffle me which papers are selected. I always submit around 6 papers for workshops and talks, and always the one I would least like to present is picked.

C40AC1A0-41B0-4F01-90D8-87917B7CEC87 Figure: DevOps Vilnius 2017 (Keynote) - Agile is Dead?

Getting out of my comfort zone is something that was instilled in me working with Adam Cogan and Steven Borg. That fear of failure that drives me to be that little bit better is what seems to set me apart…

I worked for Adam Cogan when, on my first visit to Australia, he told me the day before that I was doing two talks at the Silverlight Code Camp; one on TFS and the other on SharePoint. I worked with Steven Borg through the night on his presentation for the ALM Forum. It has been an exciting last seven years since I left the FTE world behind; What’s in store for me next…

Here is a round-up of all of the 2017 conferences with links to the presentation that I used:

In between, I ran many workshops and courses in Norway, Ghana, India, USA, UK, Lithuania, & Poland… I am finding more and more than the value in training vastly outweighs the value in consulting. I believe that every customer I leave should have more knowledge than when I arrived. If we can do that in a structured and fun way that leaves the majority with many more tools in their toolbox, then that’s even better. Although I have been teaching a lot of Scrum classes rather than technical its that technical foundation in building lousy software that gives me the energy to help everyone else.

nkdAgility-Akaditi-professional-scrum-ghana-police-service-group

Figure: Professional Scrum Foundations training for the Ghana Police Service

The stories I could tell! And I do… if you come to one of my courses you can find out that your practices and processes are not that bad after all…

That’s just a few of the classes that I have already booked for 2018, and you can find more on the training page.

I think that 2018 is going to be more training than consulting, although now I have booked a bunch of training I have customers looking for consulting time… ho hum… that’s the way it is I guess…

Comments
Subscribe

What to read next

Article Scrum

My journey into Professional Scrum

Reflects on experiences with Professional Scrum, highlighting its impact on software development, team culture, training, and the challenges …

Read article
Article Scrum Product Development

Professional Scrum Training for the Ghana Police Service

Professional Scrum training introduced Ghana Police officers to Agile methods, using hands-on sprints to support organisational change and …

Read article
Article Scrum

Professional Scrum Foundations in Salt Lake City, Utah

Covers hands-on experiences teaching the Professional Scrum Foundations course in Salt Lake City, highlighting teamwork, agile practices, …

Read article
Article Engineering Excellence

NDC London: Second Look, Team Foundation Server & VSO

Overview of a session at NDC London demonstrating new features in Team Foundation Server and Visual Studio Online, with end-to-end ALM demos …

Read article
Video Leadership Product Development

What is the most interesting outcome you have achieved as an agile consultant?

Real-world examples of agile consulting outcomes, highlighting both challenges and successes in agile transformation, DevOps adoption, and …

Watch video
Article

Agile in Africa 2016

Agile in Africa 2016 brought together experts in Accra, Ghana to promote genuine Agile practices, share knowledge, and support local …

Read article