January 2012 Meetup: Agile Goes Way Beyond Software

** NOTE ** This is the rescheduled November 2011 event that had to be canceled last minute

Date: Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Time: Networking 6:00-6:30PM , Meeting 6:30-8:00PM

Location: The new Agile Tuesday location is Mercury Grove on 738A Bank St. between First & Second Ave.

RSVP: http://www.meetup.com/Ottawa-Scrum-Users-Group/events/44942252/(Requested by not required, Free)

Agile Methods have been used for some time to develop software applications with a great deal of success, however, this presentation focuses on its application for infrastructure projects, IT project management, and service and product development initiatives.

Our speaker, Dan Murphy, has had considerable success using this approach within the Federal Government to develop new IT services as it relates to the development of IT Shared Services, and believes a more global enterprise approach is required making Agile a much more transformational element within the GC and other large public and private sector organizations.

Mr. Murphy, President of DJM Systems, is a leader in Government of Canada Information Technology strategy. While at Cisco Systems  in the late 1990’s he led the development of the “Shared Services” concept and pushed it into existence at the political level.

More recently, as an advisor  to the Senior ADM of  Transformation at Shared Services Canada, he has spearheaded the movement toward cloud computing in the Canadian Federal Government through the implementation of benchmarking programs, Agile implementation approaches and competitive marketing techniques.

Lightning Talks

Date: Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Time: Networking 6:00-6:30PM , Meeting 6:30-8:00PM

Location: Momentous, 26 Auriga Drive, Ottawa, ON Canada K2E 8B7

RSVP: http://www.meetup.com/Ottawa-Scrum-Users-Group/events/16291877/ (Requested by not required, Free)

Note that a hot meal will be provided! While we say registration requested but required it will help with food planning if you keep your meetup status up to date.

This month Agile Ottawa is hosting Lightning Talks. These are 5 minute talks. Topics are all around “agile”… but expect some to drift into many related topics around teams and teamwork, collaboration, values, and principles. Of course some of the lightning talks will be covering the core agile topics, but surely with a twist and a great story (there are many stories and many great story tellers that have been attending!)

The only condition for standing up for 5 minutes is that you are in the room. Want to get practice speaking? How about a report on what your organization is doing with agile and how its going? Perhaps you just read something about agile and you want to give commentary. Maybe you just want to listen and hear what others are thinking about in the agile community… come on out. Who knows you may get engaged in the dialog!

We look forward to the opportunity to learn from each other.

CANCELLED!!! November 2011 Meetup: Agile Goes Way Beyond Software

Date: Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Time: Networking 6:00-6:30PM , Meeting 6:30-8:00PM

Location: Adobe Ottawa, 343 Preston Street, First floor (Enter by Starbucks and go up one floor)

RSVP: http://www.meetup.com/Ottawa-Scrum-Users-Group/events/38774062/ (Requested by not required, Free)

Agile Methods have been used for some time to develop software applications with a great deal of success, however, this presentation focuses on its application for infrastructure projects, IT project management, and service and product development initiatives.

Our speaker, Dan Murphy, has had considerable success using this approach within the Federal Government to develop new IT services as it relates to the development of IT Shared Services, and believes a more global enterprise approach is required making Agile a much more transformational element within the GC and other large public and private sector organizations.

Mr. Murphy, President of DJM Systems, is a leader in Government of Canada Information Technology strategy. While at Cisco Systems  in the late 1990’s he led the development of the “Shared Services” concept and pushed it into existence at the political level.

More recently, as an advisor  to the Senior ADM of  Transformation at Shared Services Canada, he has spearheaded the movement toward cloud computing in the Canadian Federal Government through the implementation of benchmarking programs, Agile implementation approaches and competitive marketing techniques.

Video/Slides from Creativity for Agile Team Meetup

Video: http://my.adobeconnect.com/p4vu8yxu64g/

 

Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/mlevison/creativity-for-agile-teams

Enjoy!

October 2011 Meetup: Creativity for Agile Teams

Date: Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Time: Networking 6:00-6:30PM , Meeting 6:30-8:00PM

Location: Adobe Ottawa, 343 Preston Street, First floor (Enter by Starbucks and go up one floor)

RSVP: http://www.meetup.com/Ottawa-Scrum-Users-Group/events/36609312/ (Requested by not required, Free)

Creativity can manifest in several ways including creation of something new, refinement of something that exists and problem solving. How do we support, enable and enhance the creative abilities of Agile teams? There are many ways to shape the work environment for greater creativity. We will describe how creativity happens and can be enhanced by providing a safe, nurturing environment, enhancing group interactions, pacing activities that utilize different sensory modes and trusting in the power of subconscious integration.

Mark Levison will lead this reprise of his and Roger Brown’s joint Agile 2011 conference session.

We look forward to the dialog with you as we build a strong Agile community here in Ottawa!

September 2011 Meetup: Season Planning Session

Date: Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Time: Networking 6:00-6:30PM , Meeting 6:30-8:00PM

Location: Adobe Ottawa, 343 Preston Street, First floor (Enter by Starbucks and go up one floor)

RSVP: http://www.meetup.com/agile-ottawa-canada/events/32750722 (Requested by not required, Free)

Have you ever wondered how Agile principles and practices could help you and your organization achieve goals? Perhaps you want to understand the basics of some of the Agile practices? Why does iterative and incremental help? How can we plan our releases better?

If you have some of these questions, then please come out and help the open Agile Ottawa community group  put an agenda in place for this season. By coming out you can get your burning questions and topics onto the backlog.

Bryan Beecham and Ellen Grove will lead an Agile Ottawa planning session. Leveraging Agile/Scrum techniques the evening aims to build a backlog of topics that are of interest to the community. This session is meant for newcomers and experienced alike.

We look forward to the dialog with you as we build a strong Agile community here in Ottawa!

One-day Open Source Conference in Ottawa: Saturday August 27, 2011

Members of Agile Ottawa may be interested to attend the Open Source conference happening here in Ottawa on August 27th. What a great opportunity to meetup with some of the open source luminaries of the software industry.

Details and registration here: http://www.fosslc.org/drupal/sc2011

Excerpt from their web site:
FOSSLC in partnership with IEEE will be hosting our 4th annual conference on Saturday, August 27th, 2011 from 10am to 5pm. FOSSLC avec IEEE accueillera notre conférence annuelle le samedi 27 août 2011 de 10h à 1700h.
This year’s theme is software development. Talks will cover the best of software development technologies and communities demonstrating outstanding practice in software development.

Ottawa Scrum User Group session with Joe Little

Announcing a new Meetup for Ottawa Scrum Users Group!

What: Last Minute Special Event – The Basics of Release Planning & Scrum
When: Tuesday, July 26, 2011 5:30 PM

Where: YOU i Labs
515 Legget Drive Suite 310
Ottawa, ON K2K 3G5

The Ottawa Scrum User’s group along with Agile Ottawa are pleased to be holding a special event hosted by Joe Little – The basics of Release Planning & Scrum.

We hope to have a brief group discussion of the basics of Release Planning & Scrum.

Then we expect to break into small discussion groups (tables) to discuss sub-topics further,

Among other things, we expect to discuss (a) is release planning needed at all?, (b) if needed, how much is enough?, and (c) what are the true benefits of release planning?

Joe Little is an Agile Coach and Certified Scrum Trainer.  And MBA.  He has co-trained many times with Jeff Sutherland.  He has spoken at Agile conferences in many cities, including Toronto and Montreal.

Please note the starting time of 5:30 (and ending time of 7:30), which is sooner than previous events. Networking will start around 5:15.

As usual the event is free and refreshments will be served.

Special Event – Guest Speaker James Grenning

When: Tuesday, May 31, 2011 6:00 PM

Where: Alcatel-Lucent (Map)
600 March Rd.
Kanata, ON

Testing Is Not For Finding Bugs

Please join us in a special joint event with Ottawa Scrum Users Group!

Test is something that has to get done sometime before shipping the product. Test can wait while we do the important work of specifying, designing and coding the system. Test helps find bugs. Test happens at the end.

Wait! Don’t quote me on that!

Test is not that unpleasant activity at the end of the *development phase*, it is an integral and critical part of everyday work.  It does not add drudgery, and overhead, it adds rewarding feedback and makes it possible to put more value into the software instead of wasting time chasing bugs. Test is not about finding bugs anymore. Test is specification; test is defect prevention, test drives good designs. Tests must be largely automated. You may think that you cannot afford to automate; when in reality, you cannot afford not to.

Note:  This talk is not just for embedded developers.  Anyone involved in development from the technical side or business side needs to hear what James has to say about test.  If any embedded developers show up, James will have a few copies of his book with him.

About the Speaker:

James Grenning is the founder of Renaissance Software Consulting, where he trains, coaches and consults worldwide.  With more than thirty years of software development experience, both technical and managerial, James brings a wealth of knowledge, skill, and creativity to software development teams and their management.  James’ mission is to bring improved technical and management practices to development teams.  As his professional roots are in embedded software, he is leading the way to introduce Agile development practices to that challenging world.  The ink is still wet on his book Test Driven Development for Embedded C. James was one of the original extreme programming coaches and trainers, always working with the best.  He invented Planning Poker, an Agile estimating technique used around the world.  He participated in the creation of the Manifesto for Agile Software Development.

May Meetup Slides

The slides from the May 10th meetup are now online. Enjoy!

Technical Debt Agile Ottawa May2011