Call for Speakers
Agile Midwest Conference 2018
27 Aug 2018
30 Aug 2018
St. Charles Convention Center Saint Charles, Missouri, United States
agilemidwest.org
Agile Midwest is an annual tracked conference held in the St. Louis, MO, USA metropolitan area. For 2018, the conference will be held at the St. Charles Convention center located just west of St. Louis, MO.
The 2018 conference will feature the following key events:
- Thursday, August 30, 2018 – A 1-day program focusing on agile software development.
- Wednesday, August 29, 2018 – A 1-day open space focusing on agile software development - open space participation is included with all conference registrations.
- Tuesday, August 28, 2018 – Half-day workshops and tutorials on agile software development practices – these workshops are available for an additional fee.
The 2018 Agile Midwest conference will feature sessions spanning 4 tracks:
Agile Transformation – Stories, experiences and practices to enable adoption of agile methods. This track will focus on how teams and organizations have been able to change to enable faster delivery of software products to customers and end-users. Included in the transformation track are methodologies and practices related to agile portfolio management and scaling agile software development.
Coaching Agile Teams – Guidance, practices and activities intended to create awesome agile teams. This track will focus on activities for team collaboration, team leadership, establishing team charters & working agreements, facilitating effective team ceremonies and retrospectives, promoting psychological safety, and also measurement & metrics to enable teams to make data-informed decisions. The coaching track will also include activities to enhance / improve agile training workshops and also touch on ways to use improv and other collaborative activities on agile teams.
Agile Technical Practices – Practices, demonstrations and tutorials of technical activities necessary for successful agile development, including but not limited to: automated testing, test driven development, continuous integration, test engineering, design patterns, automated code analysis, code katas, pair programming, mob programming, agile technical metrics and technical key performance indicators. The technical practice track will also include sessions focusing on continuous delivery, DevOps, agile infrastructure, platform as a service (PaaS), cloud / cloud native development practices (example: 12 factor applications), user experience (UX), and human centered design (HCD).
Innovation – Stories and practices to apply the values & principles of agile software development outside of software development teams and Information Technology, such as within marketing, accounting, human resources, education or other new / emerging applications. Discussions, demonstrations & tutorials of how to apply agile practices & methods within business activities to improve idea generation, group collaboration, rapid prototyping and business model experimentation. Stories and case presentations of using agile practices to guide business operations and/or lean startup activities.
Call for Speakers
10 May 2018
07 Jul 2018
Agile Midwest 2018 Submissions - FAQ
What kinds of sessions are we looking for?
- We are looking for engaging sessions that span our 4 tracks – a session could be a talk, an exercise, a game, a demonstration, or a tutorial.
- People attending the conference are looking for advice and insights that they can learn at the conference and then apply on their agile teams, so practical sessions are ideal.
- Sessions that make learning on agile topics interactive and fun.
What kinds of sessions are we not looking for?
- As Agile Midwest is a learning focused conference, we are not looking for “sales pitch” sessions that focus exclusively on a demo of for-sale tool, methodology, or framework – we do have vendor sponsorship packages available if you’d like to exhibit to demo a tool.
- It is OK to provide a brief demonstration of a tool, but demos should support learning objectives agnostic of any specific tool or framework.
- Sessions that are NOT supportive of the intent of our code of conduct to "Be Kind & Professional to All" - non-professional and/or disrespectful behavior & activities will not be tolerated.
What makes a great session at Agile Midwest?
- Highly interactive and engaging content – hands on, real coding / configuration / testing, agile games for learning.
- Include practices & activities to reinforce learning objectives – have people work in groups/pairs, debrief activities, etc.
- As our conference sessions are short, be sure to provide references and ways that people can learn more after your session at the conference.
What makes a great submission?
- The information you share about your session in your submission is the primary source of information by which your session will be evaluated, so it helps to be specific so that we can determine what you will focus on and how you will present / share it with those attending.
- State clear learning objectives that people will learn / experience by attending your session.
- Tell us how you will spend the time in your session – how much time will be spent presenting, how much time will people spend in activities, etc.
- Detail what kinds of activities people will experience in your session and how you will present / facilitate them to support your learning objectives.
- Tell us how you will debrief your session to ensure participants have a positive experience and achieve the session's learning outcomes.
- If you’ve presented this session before, what you have learned as you have presented it and how have you improved it?
Submission & Selection Timeline
- 5/10/2018 - Call for Submissions Opens
- 7/7/2018 – Call for Submissions Closes
- 7/21/2018 – Selected Presenters Notified of Acceptance
- 7/28/2018 – Deadline to Confirm Participation
- 8/1/2018 – Full Program Announced
Session Format Breakout
Most sessions at Agile Midwest are 45 minutes long – the approximate breakout of session formats is noted below for reference:
- 45 minute sessions – ~24 sessions held on Thursday, August 30, 2018
- 75 minute workshops – ~6 sessions held on Thursday, August 30, 2018
- 180 minute workshops - ~8 sessions held on Tuesday, August 28, 2018
Presenter Compensation
- All selected presenters will receive complimentary admission to the conference on Thursday, August 30, 2018 and the open space on Wednesday, August 29, 2018.
- Selected presenters will be invited to a presenter social held during the conference.
- Selected 180-minute workshops presenters may receive monetary compensation for presenting a 180-minute workshop on Tuesday, August 28, 2018.