Full disclosure requires me to let you know that this is a very biased, unscientific view as I managed to get through Agile 2012 talking to folks for what felt like 24/7 but never going to a talk at the conference itself. I wasn't actually trying to do this, of course.  There were many great talks. It's just that I'm blessed to be able to have lots of 1-on-1s or 1-on-2s with folks.  I had some great conversations with the likes of Ron Jeffries, Chet Hendrickson,  Dean Leffingwell, David Koontz, Si Alhir, Mark Ferraro, David Bernstein, Llewellyn Falco, Lyssa Adkins, and Michael Spayd, amongst others.  Not to mention dozens of participants asking me questions and sharing stories.  It just doesn't get better than that.

What struck me was a continuation of what I saw at SQE.  While we have definitely crossed the chasm at the team level, many have dropped into it at the enterprise level.  My two talks - Scaling Agile with Multiple Teams (slides and recording of presentation) and De-Mystifying Kanban: Understanding Its Many Faces (slides and recording of presentation) were both very well attended and received.  I had given talks like these before without generating the level of excitement I did last week.  I can only attribute this to the fact that folks are seeing they need more than team-based Agile insights to achieve the results they are looking for at the enterprise. 

While at the conference I gave out many articles and recommended several books.  I've created a page that points to these, you might find it of interest.

I do believe that we are finally seeing a shift from Agile meaning "let's spin up a team" to Agile making a difference at the organization level.  Exciting times.

Alan Shalloway
CEO, Net Objectives