The Agile PMP on InfoQ

Hey... wanted to give you guys a heads up that my Agile PMP talk has made its way up to InfoQ. This one, just like the DZone interview, was recorded at Agile 2009 up in Chicago. I've only watched the first 10 minutes so far, but best I can tell, InfoQ did a great job of putting the content together. I am on screen the entire time (that could be good or bad) with a the presentation deck running underneath, very nicely in sync with the talk I might add ;-)

As I recall, this was the talk where my laptop went dead 60 minutes in and I had to do the rest of my talk with no deck. I'd love to blame the laptop, but I didn't manage to plug it in... doh!? Anyway, hope you guys enjoy. Here is a link, can't embed this one in my blog.

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Back from Edmonton... No More Agile PMP?

I was fortunate last year to have several talks selected for the Agile 2008 conference in Toronto, one for the Agile Development Practices in Orlando, as well as a talk on Agile Certification at the Agile Business Conference in London. The problem was that all this was brand new content... none of the decks were ready made. That meant that in addition to normal client travel, I was traveling internationally for all these conferences, trying to keep up with my blogging, and developing five different ninety minute Powerpoint presentations.

Those few months were pretty stressful and I felt like I spent all my free time creating Powerpoint slides.

One of my goals for 2009 was to get selected for four of the big major conferences, but this time around, get the same talk selected at all four. Furthermore, I wanted to do a talk that I already had prepared. I was pretty lucky to meet that goal and got selected to speak at the Better Software conference in Vegas, the Agile 2009 conference in Chicago, the PMI Global Congress in Orlando, and again in Orlando or Agile Development Practices. The one that got selected was my "Agile PMP: Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks" presentation.

I have to say, this was clearly an example of 'be careful what you ask for'. In addition to delivering that talk at the four conferences I mentioned, I did it for two VersionOne Agilepaloozas, an Atlanta PMI Lunch Meeting, an ASPE webinar, an IT&T SIG webinar... and most recently for the Agile Edmonton group in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. As passionate as I am about delivering the Agile PMP message... it starts to feel like Groundhog Day saying those same things over and over. The cool thing is that the message resonates, it is something that people want to hear.

So... while I am not going to officially retire the talk... I have decided not to submit the talk to any of the big conferences next year. Next year I am going to focus on new content centered around value driven agile transformations. I've already got several decks together, one on 'Adopting Agile in the Enterprise' and another I call 'Value over Velocity'. Both deal with the challenges that large organizations face adopting agile... especially the challenges staying value focused while they do it. The first talk centers mostly on organizational structure, the second on enterprise agile metrics.

Hopefully these messages will resonate with the conference organizers and I'll be able to get some traction in 2010. I've already got the decks together so let me know if you'd like me to do a webinar for your team... I need the practice ;-) We might even be able to arrange a lunch and learn for your company or possibly a talk at your local agile user group. I've got both the decks up on Slideshare if you are interested in taking a look... http://www.slideshare.net/mcottmeyer.

And... if you are REALLY interested... I'd be happy to reprise the Agile PMP talk ;-)

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Managing Expectations about Uncertainty

One of the biggest differences between the PMI crowd and the Agile crowd has to do with our expectations about uncertainty.

The PMI crowd generally believes that a Project Manager is supposed to manage uncertainty out of the project. The Agile crowd tends to believe that uncertainty and change is something that should be embraced. Rather than managing OUT uncertainty, the agilist chooses to manage FOR uncertainty.

This difference fundamentally influences how we go about the business of planning projects... the artifacts we create... and how we interact with and manage our teams. The reality is that both worldviews have a place depending upon your context and problem domain. It's up to us [as Project Managers] to recognize the nature of the projects we are working on and choose the strategy most likely yield a desireable outcome... for both our project stakeholders and our external customers.

We cannot check our brains at the door and blindly follow ANY methodology. It's up to us to assess our situation and choose an approach that is suitable for the task at hand.

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Updated Agile PMP Deck on Slideshare

I did a final cut of my Agile PMP deck right before Agilepalooza Charlotte. I finally have one that I like so I loaded it up to Slideshare. If you were at my talk at Agile 2009 and want the actual deck I used... this is it!

The Agile PMP V3

View more presentations from Mike Cottmeyer.

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The Agile PMP Presentation

Okay... while I am publishing presentations today, here is the one that I am doing next week at the SQE Better software conference in Vegas. I'm also doing this talk at Agile 2009 and again at the SQE Agile Development Practices Conference in Orlando. It's nice to have a presentation that I get to do live more than once... I finally feel like I am getting good a delivering it ;-)

The Agile PMP v2

View more OpenOffice presentations from Mike Cottmeyer.

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