Ask An Agile Expert!

Here’s your chance to ask your toughest agile questions to a panel of experts. The panel includes ScrumMasters with specialties representing Project and Product Management, Development, Testing, Documentation, Directors and Executives.

Paul Brownell – BMC Software, Inc., Director of Engineering
Paul Brownell is Director of Engineering at BMC Software, Inc. He has been a practitioner of Agile methods since 2003, including XP and SCRUM methodologies. Paul was a key player in the SCRUM project highlighted in Dean Leffingwell’s book “Scaling Software Agility: Best Practices for Large Enterprises.” His Agile projects were identified as “best in class” by Cutter Consortium in an evaluation of over 7500 Agile projects. These projects involve teams distributed across India, Israel, and the United States.

Michael Maham – Borland, Product Manager and Certified Scrum Practitioner
Michael is a Certified Scrum Practitioner with Borland currently working in the role of Product Manager for the Together product. He has worked in software development and process improvement for almost 20 years, including on teams applying Scrum in diverse areas such as developing data warehouses and consulting service offerings. He spoke at Agile2008 on release level retrospectives (http://submissions.agile2008.org/node/1464) and blogs with other Borlanders at http://borland.typepad.com/agile_transformation/

Jeffrey Palermo – Headspring Systems, CTO
Jeffrey Palermo is the CTO of Headspring Systems in Austin, TX. Headspring is a consultancy that provides custom software solutions, agile coaching and .Net developer training. He blogs about managing software teams and practices that make software delivery reliable, predictable and maintainable. Jeffrey advocates using the best tool for the job regardless of the vendor, which is often open-source. He is an MCSD.Net , Microsoft MVP, Certified Scrummaster, Austin .Net User Group leader, INETA speaker. Jeffrey leads Headspring's Agile Boot Camp developer training course that focuses on Agile teams using extreme programming.

Vishal Sheth – Vignette, ScrumMaster, Certified Scrum Practitioner, PMP
Vishal Sheth, CSP, CSM, PMP is the Scrum Lead/Coach at Vignette Corporation which started its Agile/Scrum transition 18+ months ago. Vishal brings to the discussion an elaborate experience on agile rollouts – from inception to maturity and engineering to marketing. A Certified Scrum Practitioner and ScrumMaster, Vishal has spent 10+ years creating software in positions such as Software Engineer, Project Manager and Program Manager.

Bill Skrapits – TESTCo, QA Manager, ScrumMaster, PMP
Bill has been a QA Manager for TESTCo since 2005. His background is in software development and consulting project management. He has managed software development and system integration projects for start up and Fortune 500 companies including USAA, Temple Inland (Guaranty Bank), Northrop Grumman, IBM, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Clear Commerce. Bill has a Bachelors degree in Computer Science, is a certified Scrum Master and is certified as a Project Management Professional by the Project Management Institute.

Mike Wethington – Troux Technologies, Technical Communications Manager, Scrummaster, Scrum Practitioner
Mike Wethington has been a Technical Communications Manager for ten years and a professional writer for over eighteen years. He is a Certified Scrum Practitioner and has worked on several (successful and unsuccessful) Agile projects for different companies. Currently he is the Technical Communications Manager and a Scrum Master at Troux Technologies (www.troux.com) in Austin, TX.

Jack Yang – HomeAway, Director of Engineering, Certified Scrum Practitioner
As the Director of Engineering at HomeAway, Jack Yang implemented Agile development practices into what was previously a waterfall "loose process" development organization. He has now managed and facilitated over 150 weekly sprints following Scrum and Agile development practices and has scaled the HomeAway development team from a twenty person team to ninety over three years.

Cost: Free
Contact: www.AgileAustin.org or info@AgileAustin.org