The “Agile Lounge” is a new series of sessions being added to the 2019 Agile Midwest conference on Thursday, September 26th. The lounge will provide a dedicated space (Room 103 at the conference center) for conference attendees with agile experience to share what they know. As the lounge is intended to promote discussion & information sharing on identified agile topics, attendance will be limited to ~25 people per session – first come, first served. Although there is no requirement to share or speak when attending an agile lounge session, this intimate space is intended to encourage all to share with others attending agile lounge sessions.

And to state the obvious, as the focus of the agile lounge is conversation and information sharing amongst those attending, participants should be prepared to sit in the round, and of course there will be NO SLIDES.

In the lounge, there will be facilitated discussions and activities to surface insights & share lessons learned on topic of focus in each session. High level artifacts will be created, captured and shared following the Agile Midwest conference that will summarize the outcomes of agile lounge discussions without going into the details of the specifics or the people who shared various stories / insights

Agile and You – 10:30 AM – 11:15 AM – Room 103
Discussion Focus – How do you sustain and guide your personal journey as an agilist inclusive of career and personal activities?

For the first half of the discussion, participants will be invited to share who they are now, and perhaps more importantly how did they get to where they were – hence the discussion may touch on education, training, work/career tracks, work experiences, industry activities, mentoring, advocacy, promotion, etc. Those attending may gain awareness of additional strategies or activities to enable their own growth / journey.

During the second half of the discussion, participants will be invited to share how they sustain themselves as agilists. Discussion in this portion of the session may touch on practices for self-regulation & focus, goal setting, self-care, mindfulness & mediation, and inquire how participants may have been able to integrate / merge activities to sustain their focus on agility within work (corporate) or personal (home) settings.

Agile Challenges & Mistakes – 11:30 AM – 12:15 PM – Room 103
Discussion Focus – It’s time to be brutally honest and vulnerable with yourself – what mistakes have you made in your practice of agile in the past?

Participants will be invited to share personal stories of their own activities (not the activities of others) which did not achieve their intended outcomes or resulted in other challenges. Those who share their prior mistakes & challenges may be surprised that the mere act of sharing openly helps to enable closure, while also providing insight & awareness to others of potential mistakes / challenges to avoid. Those who do share stories of personal mistakes and/or challenges, will have the opportunity to invite feedback / advice from those in the lounge; however, feedback / advice will only be offered if those who share invite it.

Agile & The Future – 2:45 PM – 3:30 PM – Room 103
Discussion Focus – You’re attending Agile Midwest 2019 – it’s 2019 – where do you think “agility” will be in ~5 years? What is the vision for what we will be talking about, promoting and celebrating at Agile Midwest 2024, and what are some activities that can be done now to start to make progress toward this vision?

Search Twitter, LinkedIn, and blogs and you can find everything from “agile is dead”, “agile is reborn”, “agile never died”, “agile is great”, “agile 2.0”, “agile 3.0”, “agile needs to go away”, “agile is an excuse”, “agile is a side show”, “agile is not serious”, “agile is all fun & games”, “management doesn’t take agile seriously”, “agile projects do not succeed”, “agile allowed us to deliver successfully” and many many more – you get the idea.

Let’s put all this controversary aside and come together to brainstorm the vision of where those in the agile lounge would like “agility” to be in 2024. As a group, we will complete empathy maps for several personas to identify what we’d like people to be saying, thinking, doing, hearing, etc about agility in 2024. Participants will then be able to suggest activities or insights that agilists can start to enact now (2019) to guide agility toward the desired future vision.