Speaking
I am incredibly fortunate to have had the opportunity to speak at leading industry conferences as well as to various different client and internal groups on different topics related to Agile. For my talks, I like to combine humour, demonstrate fallibility (i.e. sharing things I got wrong!) and always providing real examples of application in the topic I'm speaking about. My hope is that by sharing my own experiences you come away with some new learnings and ideas for application within your own organisation.
Keynote: Real World Agility
Agile promised effectiveness, but has it delivered? Drawing from my book, Real World Agility, I share my experiences over the last 12+ years across numerous large organisations where agility worked in being more effective, but also where it didn’t and how I got it wrong. We explore what I believe are the four themes that agility comes down to, and how we can truly evidence if we are being more effective in our way of working.
Framework Agnostic Capacity Planning At Scale
In this talk, I share how I led an organisation in adopting an approach that allows them to do this at scale (over 100 teams), all in a way that is framework-agnostic and allowed the teams the freedom in choosing their own way of working.
I share the practices and techniques to adopt, (free) tools to use, as well as the learning along the way.
How (Agile) Charts Lie
In recent years, measurement has increasingly gained more traction in our industry with many folks wanting to "measure" or even "measure what matters" when adopting new ways of working. Whilst this enthusiasm is great, it often is channelled in the wrong way. This session demonstrates just how prevalent lying with (agile) charts is, particularly with what will be some of your favourite metrics, as well as providing practical tips to improve the visualisation/usage of data within your teams and organisation.
The Importance of Being Blocked
Despite our best attempts at creating small, cross-functional and autonomous teams, being “blocked” is unfortunately still a common occurrence with many teams. Teams often identify when work is blocked but then stop once unblocked, rarely investigating the reason(s) why the blockage happened. This talk demonstrates just how important being blocked is, the insights you may be missing out on and what data/metrics you can track for blocked work in order to quantify their impact.
Coaching In A Data-Driven World
39% of executives say their companies are highly data-driven, but mentioning data can often result in concerned faces. Why is this? Is it the toxic nature that 'metrics' have become synonymous with or is it because we view using data as a dangerous flirtation with placing more value in tools and processes? This session showcases how you can bring to life empiricism into your coaching toolkit. Enabling you to have more open, transparent conversations and informed decision making.
“One of the best talks of the conference, really interesting!
Clear messages, really thought through, and has gone to the next level.”
“This talk was the best! I was only sad that it was too short - I want more:)
A very good and engaging presentation!”
“Coaching in a data driven world. Great talk from @nbrown02 at #LKCE18. lots of great examples and practical advice.”
“Thanks for a great presentation on data visualization! Some great ideas for us to extend our metrics for greater interpretability and ease of use/ application.”
“Really interesting and entertaining presentation on Data-Driven Coaching with a great message: use metrics not as a target, but to gain information, have safe conversations and model curiosity. I’d thoroughly encourage everyone to go to this session, great talk!”
“Inspiring speech by @NBrown02! Metrics as coaching aid instead of metrics as targets. ”
Session: Flow, value, culture, delivery: How we measure team agility across ASOS.com
Scale: 1 = Low, 5 = High
Your score for Content: 4.40
Your score for Usefulness: 4.40
Your score for Speaker: 4.60
Your score for Overall: 4.50
Session: Framework agnostic capacity planning at scale
Scale: 1 = Low, 5 = High
Your score for Content: 4.33
Your score for Usefulness: 4.33
Your score for Speaker: 4.33
Your score for Overall: 4.67
Session: How (agile) charts lie
Scale: 1 = Low, 5 = High
Your score for Content: 4.41
Your score for Usefulness: 4.35
Your score for Speaker: 4.53
Your score for Overall: 4.47
Podcasts
Everyday Agile Podcast
How Agile Coaches can prove their value
Topics include:
The Importance of Data in Agile Coaching
Challenges in Agile Implementation
Technical Aspects of Agile
Drawing Inspiration from Other Fields
Football Analogies and Agile Methodologies
Writing the Book: Flow, Value, Culture, Delivery
Effective Retrospectives and Agile Practices
LeanPub Podcast
Book launch: Real World Agility
Topics include:
My career history and how I got to the point of writing the book - Real World Agility
What agility is all about
Mistakes I made on the journey and how that aided growth/learning
What is it like self-publishing
Better Tech Leadership Podcast
How can you enable teams to thrive?
Topics include:
Framework agnostic approach to agile coaching
How to work at scale with so few coaches and many teams
Using data to guide improvement efforts
Ditching velocity for probabilistic forecasts
Team health metrics
The difference between OKRs and KPIs
