Agile + DevOps East - Conference List Schedule | TechWell

Conference archive

Conference Schedule

Monday, November 9

Tutorial MA Continuous Delivery in Practice: A Hands-On DevOps Workshop NEW
Melissa Benua, Janna Loeffler
10:00 am to 5:30 pm

What is continuous deployment? How does it differ from continuous integration and continuous delivery? Every company thinks they want CI/CD, but few teams have experience in knowing what that means and how to build it out. Join Janna and Melissa as they walk through building your own build pipeline using GitHub Actions, Docker, and Azure to continuously deploy to production. They will walk you through some of the basics of Git, Docker, and YAML to create build pipelines that run test automation and deploy an application. These tools and techniques will help reduce debugging differences...Read more

Tutorial MB Getting Started with Microservices and Serverless
10:00 am to 5:30 pm

Do you wonder how computers can be “serverless”? Does “microservices” seem like just another buzzword? These two technologies are actually changing software design and operations. They work together to help solve complex problems by breaking them down into smaller pieces through loose coupling and modularization. Where some traditional software design techniques required assembling a monolithic piece of software on a platform, a microservices architecture and a serverless programming paradigm focus more on how to keep the pieces independent, orthogonal in function, and interconnected...Read more

Tutorial MC Finding Performance Issues Early with JMeter
Robert Foster
10:00 am to 5:30 pm

Performance issues can be difficult to resolve when found late in the software development lifecycle. Using an open-source tool like JMeter to develop, manage, and execute load and performance tests while the code is being developed, is an inexpensive way to help find performance issues. Executing these performance tests as part of your CI/CD pipeline enables users to find and resolve performance issues as soon as they are introduced. This hands-on workshop will help attendees develop a foundational understanding of JMeter, while engaging them in creating and running performance tests...Read more

Tutorial MD 3 Steps to Grow your Product Culture and Build Products Users Love NEW
Julee Everett
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

There is a shift happening. A shift puts the user closer to the center of our work than ever before. We are moving away from the question "Are we building it right?" to asking "Are we building the right thing?" This approach isn't new - it's growing in response to the increasing speed and complexity of competing in today's marketplace. It's founded in Design Thinking and human behavior. A study by the Design Management Institute's says Design companies outperform others by 211% percent! You know the names; you use the products - companies like Apple, Starwood, Nike, Walt Disney to name a...Read more

Tutorial ME Lean/Agile Metrics for the Rest of Us
Larry Maccherone
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

For many agile practitioners, software metrics beyond a burndown chart are little understood or, perhaps, very scary because poor metrics can be worse than no metrics. In this enlightening session, Larry Maccherone explores how you and your organization can use metrics to bring management and lean/agile teams closer rather than becoming a wedge that drives them into conflict. Larry covers the entire lifecycle of the metrics process—from metric selection to reporting data—in compelling ways. You’ll gain an understanding of a wide range of concepts including common (101-level) metrics,...Read more

Tutorial MF Busting Myths around Organizational Change NEW
Linda Rising
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

You're smart, and the people in your organization are smart. So making an organizational change should be easy—simply craft a transition plan and transparently explain the benefits, and it will all go smoothly, right? Not quite. Linda Rising will tackle this assumption and other organizational change myths. Learn about patterns for introducing new ideas and some useful tips for helping you grow any innovation step by step, starting right when you get back to the office.Read more

Tutorial MG Developer First: A New Leadership Mindset
Kate Wardin
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

Developer First Leadership is the drive to focus on the growth and advancement of your team members before yourself. Kate Wardin will demonstrate how developer-first leadership can translate directly to the daily lives of technical leaders. Participants will leave with tactical methods to truly embrace the human side of software development and serve your teams as intentional, respectable, and inspiring leaders. Participants will be required to step outside their comfort zones as they share personal experiences and discuss challenging topics such as: giving feedback, working with different...Read more

Lunch—1:30pm–2:00pm
1:30 pm to 2:00 pm
Full & Half-Day Tutorials Continue—2:00pm–5:30pm
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm
Tutorial MH An Agile Coaching Practicum in 360 degrees
Leon Sabarsky, Bob Galen
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Let’s face it, agile coaching isn’t for the timid or faint of heart. In most companies, it’s an incredibly challenging and nuanced role. And an important part of it is having the ability to coach in 360 degrees: downward—across your teams, outward – across managers and peers, and upward—towards those pesky leaders. Oh, and did we say that virtually EVERYONE is an agile coach? In this workshop, join Mary Thorn and Bob Galen as they share tools and experiences coaching in all directions. They will review three different coaching models from the X-Wing, to Powerful Questions, to 9-Stances, to...Read more

Tutorial MI Product Backlog Refinement: Tell the whole story, not just the User Story NEW
Julee Everett
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Going Agile implies a lot of change. It’s all about breaking work down into small chunks, radical collaboration, and freedom to deliver through self-organizing teams. So, what about Requirements? Teams still need to have a backlog of requirements to work from. But how do you evolve from long, detailed specifications to lightweight, incomplete Product Backlog Items? How do you know when you have enough to get the development team started, but not too much so you don’t create the solution? With Agile Requirements, we paint the broad strokes, focus on only documentation that adds value, and...Read more

Tutorial MJ What DevOps Means for Testers and Testing
Jeffery Payne
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

DevOps is more than a buzzword or a passing fad. It's a radically new approach to rapidly deliver high-quality software applications. However, many organizations don’t fully grasp the magnitude of this change or what it means for everyone involved in the software development lifecycle. Jeffery Payne says that DevOps—when done right—drives higher quality and efficiency into software development, software testing, and application management activities. It empowers teams to remove impediments to quality and productivity throughout the entire software lifecycle. However, when DevOps is done...Read more

Tuesday, November 10

Tutorial TB Test-Driven Development for the Uninitiated
Byron Katz
10:00 am to 5:30 pm

You might have heard of test-driven development (TDD), a practice where tests are the drivers of the code, and you want to know more. You might have even tried it, but come away feeling dejected and confused. Now is your chance to have an expert show you the ropes! TDD is the best practice for high-quality, low-defect-count software. That said, why is it still unfamiliar to many developers? Byron Katz will do his part to help rectify that issue, through this intensive workshop led by an experienced practitioner. But what is TDD? Practically and simply, in TDD you write a test first, then...Read more

Tutorial TC What's Your Leadership IQ?
Jennifer Bonine
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

Have you ever needed a way to measure your testing leadership IQ? Or been in a performance review where the majority of time was spent discussing your need to improve as a leader? If you have ever wondered what your core leadership competencies are and how to build on and improve them, Jennifer Bonine and Jeremias Rößler as they share a toolkit to help you do just that. This toolkit includes a personal assessment of your leadership competencies and the evolution of testing and testing leadership. They will explore a set of eight dimensions of successful leaders, provides suggestions on...Read more

Tutorial TD CI/CD Tools for Database Development
Blaine Carter
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

The database is one of the most critical components of just about any application. Unfortunately, it is also often overlooked when it comes to automating the development process. Too often database changes simply take the form of "a bunch of scripts we hope work". The good news is that there are a lot of tools available to help automate and test database changes, many of them are open source. In this hands-on workshop, experience Open Source tools you can use to help integrate your Database application development into your CI/CD pipeline. Begin by using a schema migration tool to manage...Read more

Tutorial TE Creating a High-Performance Agile Team
Mary Thorn, Bob Galen
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

Many teams have a relatively easy time adopting the tactical aspects of agile methodologies. Usually a few classes, some tools’ introduction, and a bit of practice lead teams toward fairly efficient execution. However, these teams are quite often simply going through the motions—neither maximizing their agile performance nor delivering as much value as they could. Borrowing from their experience and lean software development methods, Bob Galen and Mary Thorn explore high-performance team patterns, which are the thinking models of mature agile teams, including large-scale emergent...Read more

Tutorial TG Agile Project Failures: Root Causes and Corrective Actions
Jeffery Payne
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

Agile initiatives always begin with high expectations—accelerate delivery, meet customer needs, and improve software quality. The truth is that many agile projects do not deliver on some or all of these expectations. If you want help to ensure the success of your agile project or to get an agile project back on track, this tutorial is for you. Jeffery Payne discusses the most common causes of agile project failure and how you can avoid these issues or mitigate their damaging effects. Poor project management, ineffective requirements development, failed communications, software development...Read more

Tutorial TH Don’t Make Your Training Work Against the Brain! NEW
Dana Pylayeva
10:00 am to 1:30 pm

We’ve all been there - 300 pages PowerPoint slides, a full day ”brain dump” lecture-style attempt at upskilling for a new technology or onboarding new hires. Boring and ineffective! Our brain will surely fight back by forgetting 70% of it the very next day and almost all of it in about a week. What a waste of time and money! Join this tutorial to experience a different way to learn, train, and facilitate your meetings. Dana Pylayeva will take you through best practices for designing and delivering your content for long-term retention. You will be introduced to some of the key ideas from...Read more

Lunch—1:30pm–2:00pm
1:30 pm to 2:00 pm
Full & Half-Day Tutorials Continue—2:00pm–5:30pm
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm
Tutorial TI Getting Started with AI Approaches Preview
Jennifer Bonine, Jeremias Rößler
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

How do you train an AI bot to do your software testing and speed development and delivery? Integrating AI into your development activities can be intimidating, but in reality, it is pretty easy it just takes some strategy. Learn how to directly apply AI to real-world problems, without having a Ph.D. in computer science. Jennifer shares a wide survey of all the different ways AI is applied to software today. Get some hands-on experience using AI. Whether you are just AI-Curious or want to reap the benefits of AI-based DevOps approaches on your product today, this session is a must...Read more

Tutorial TJ Introduction to DevOps with Chocolate and LEGOs Preview
Dana Pylayeva
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Organizations today can no longer afford to deliver new features to their respective markets once a year or even once a quarter. In the attempt to catch up with the competition, they jump onto DevOps journey starting with the "How" and losing the sight of "Why" and "What". Join this gamified simulation tutorial to gain a solid understanding of foundational principles of the DevOps culture. Experience the benefits of DevOps transformation even before initiating one in your enterprise! This tutorial is ideally designed for organizations that are evaluating their approach to DevOps...Read more

Tutorial TK Learning How to Lead High-Performing Agile Teams
Mary Thorn, Bob Galen
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Currently much of agile adoption—coaching, advice, techniques, training, and even the empathy—revolves around the agile teams. Leaders are typically ignored, marginalized at best, and in the worst cases even vilified. But Bob Galen and Mary Thorn contend that there is a central and important role for managers and leaders within agile environments. Join Bob and Mary as they explore the patterns of mature agile managers and leaders. Examine why those who understand servant leadership know how to effectively support, grow, coach, and empower their agile teams in ways that increase the team's...Read more

Tutorial TL Threat Modeling NEW
Jeffery Payne
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

If it seems as though attacks are always getting better, it’s because they are. Computers, apps, networks, and connected devices are all subject to different types of threats. Systems are facing new threats from things such as voice cloning and computational propaganda. Not to mention the growing importance of threats “at the human layer.” All of this can make it hard to keep up, let alone get ahead of potential threats. So isn’t it time that the threat modeling used by security pros, developers and systems managers evolve? Join Jeffery Payne as he shares his knowledge and experience on...Read more

Tutorial TN The Transformation Mindset: A Leader's Guide to Embracing Agile NEW
Steven Granese
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Many leaders want to transform their organization to become more agile, adaptive, and responsive to the market. However, most do not deeply understand how to lead their organization through such a massive change. They install prescriptive scaling frameworks and send employees to training, but discard the elements of true transformation that are difficult. When the inevitable failure ensues, they switch frameworks, fire people, and revert back to what worked for them in the past. What these leaders fail to recognize is that the mindset they used to build their organization conflicts with...Read more

Tutorial TO Test Design for CI/CD Delivery Preview
Melissa Benua
2:00 pm to 5:30 pm

Imagine this … As soon as any developed functionality is submitted into the code repository, it is automatically subjected to the appropriate battery of tests and then released straight into production. Setting up the pipeline capable of doing just that is becoming more and more common and something you need to know about. But most organizations hit the same stumbling block—just what IS the appropriate battery of tests? Automated build architectures don't always lend themselves well to the traditional stages of testing. In this hands-on tutorial, Melissa Benua introduces you to...Read more

Welcome Reception and Cocktail Making Class with Chef Bai
5:45 pm to 6:30 pm

Wednesday, November 11

Morning Yoga—8:30am-9:15am
8:30 am to 9:15 am
Visit the Expo—9:45am–6:00pm
9:45 am to 6:00 pm
Keynote K1 Scaling Scrum without Crushing Its Soul
Patricia Kong, Scrum.org
10:00 am to 11:15 am

At the core of Scrum is the empowered, self-organized team. However, when organizations scale, if they are not careful, they can disempower teams and destroy self-organization. When they do, they don't get what they are looking for, and the teams end up feeling defeated and unmotivated. When organizations impose order and consistency from the top down, they lose the benefits of Scrum. What organizations need is to scale the benefits of Scrum to multiple teams working together to deliver an integrated product, but without destroying transparency and the courage, respect, commitment, focus...Read more

Networking Break in the Expo—11:15am-11:45am
11:15 am to 11:45 am
Concurrent Sessions—11:45am–12:45pm
11:45 am to 12:45 pm
Concurrent Session DZ1 Getting Application Developers Onboard the DevOps Train
Ray Elenteny, Solutech Consulting, LLC
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Exceptional businesses understand that frequent delivery cycles can be leveraged as a competitive advantage. This has been a primary driver in the evolution and importance of DevOps culture and processes. A group that often suffers from a lack of urgency in delivering more value more frequently is the people writing the code. It seems ironic as software developers often state that they are most satisfied when their code is being used. A healthy DevOps culture requires willing participants from all constituents. While one would think that development teams having a seat at the table...Read more

Concurrent Session AW1 Culture-Shaping: An Agile Leadership Imperative
Bob Galen, Vaco
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

It’s largely a chicken & egg problem. Where does organizational culture come from? Does it grow organically from the bottom-up? Is it tied to organizational structure? Is it strongly tied to the culture that leaders are setting? While it comes from all of the above and more, Bob Galen asserts (and has observed in his coaching) that leaders play the most important role in culture-setting. But he doesn’t believe they really understand that responsibility, what it entails, and tactics for actively setting the culture. Thus, this workshop. We’ll start by exploring the dynamics of...Read more

Concurrent Session AW2 Obeya 大部屋 : A Systems Thinking Approach to Business Agility
Jon Stahl, LeanDog, Brian Link, LeanDog
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

We believe that executives must practice what they preach. If they want teams to be transparent and agile, they need to practice themselves and lead by example. This talk will share some Agile & Lean techniques, applied in a new way, to help organizations understand their constraints so they can transparently carry forward their journey to business agility. “Seeing the Whole” includes organizational design, customers, products, demand and applications. Your journey to business agility has to start where you are today, so gaining a deep understanding of your current state is critical to...Read more

Concurrent Session AW3 (E)mployee E(x)perience
Kimberley Miller, Spotify
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

“ What’s on the inside shows up on the outside. ” -Earl Nightingale At the center of every company are the employees. As we move into 2020, an age dedicated to digital outlets that allow employees to have more potential places of work, companies need to move their focus on building sustainable employee structures to stay ahead of the competition. Adopting an agile mindset where individuals and interaction have more value over processes and tools, companies can create environments where continuous improvement is ingrained into the culture and not just something meant for software...Read more

Concurrent Session AW4 Are you ready for AI to take over your automation testing? Preview
Lisette Zounon, Zsquare Solutions Inc
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

We all know that Artificial Intelligence is here and here to stay. Most teams are wondering how to leverage AI for their automation. In this session, Lisette will cover a case study on how to successfully leverage Artificial Intelligence in your automation strategies. Attendees in this session will take away : - Determine if your automation strategy can leverage AI tool - Discuss the learning curve and mindset shift necessary for your QA team to embrace AI Tool - Discuss success case study of using AI tool as part of automation testing - Leverage AI tool in your CI/CD environment...Read more

Concurrent Session AW5 DevOps From a Different Dataset: What 30M Workflows Reveal About High Performing Teams
Michael Stahnke, CircleCI
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

What can we learn about DevOps best practices by looking at data from a SaaS with 800k dev users, 30K orgs and 30m+ builds a month, particularly when compared with surveys where users opt-in? Takeaways include: - Teams using CI are fast: 80% of all workflows finish in less than 10 minutes, compared to teams not using CI at all. - They stay in flow: With CI 50% of all recovery happens in under an hour, and 50% of orgs recovered in 1 try. - The average team using CI achieves high-performing results: 50% of orgs start six workflows per day across all of their projects, and at the highest end...Read more

Concurrent Session AW6 Investing in Quality to Increase Velocity: Leveraging Automated Testing to Speed Up the Software Development Lifecycle
Tyler Yates, Indeed.com
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Everyone wants to develop software quickly, but there is a valid concern that increasing velocity may decrease quality. At Indeed, we set a company-wide goal to double velocity of our software development without hurting the quality of our releases. To accomplish this goal, we looked at each stage of the software development lifecycle and found which parts took the most time. Deployment and verification in our QA environment was one of the biggest bottlenecks and was due to our historic reliance on human quality assurance testing for each release. To alleviate this bottleneck, we wanted to...Read more

Concurrent Session AW7 The Lack of Feedback Loops kills DevOps Preview
Chris Riley, Splunk, Inc.
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

DevOps has created great application velocity for organizations, higher application quality, and automation. However most organizations are nelgecting one of the key tenants of DevOps which is continious improvment. Without learning from production incidents, and data organizations are not completing the DevOps cycle. By doing so there is a missed opportunity to use the information to further improve the product and processes, and the risk of DevOps being a short term practice. In this session we will:

1. Talk about the benefits of continuous improvement 2. Discuss what...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP1 Shift Left: Engage Business Users in Automation Early to Remove Risk and Accelerate Agile+DevOps Timelines
Chris Kraus, Worksoft
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

BizDevOps is an approach to software development that encourages developers, business, testing and quality assurance (QA) teams to work collectively. This approach enables an organization to align closer to business deliverables while minimize risk and shorten deployment cycles. Integrating the business quickly and early, gaining their process understanding and involving them in process discovery are keys to moving from DevOps to the BizDevOps framework. Moving code to production faster does not help when the code does not help business be more efficient and nimble.

However,...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP2 Are You Keeping Up With Continuous Delivery?
Dr. Peter Cherns, Eggplant
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Organizations today face unprecedented pressure to reduce bugs, technology glitches and other performance issues while also keeping up with ever-increasing expectations for continuous delivery. At the same time, the importance of providing a high-quality user experience at every interaction has never been more paramount.

Regardless of whether it’s a banking customer accessing account information via a mobile app or a nurse entering critical patient data into a custom workflow, users will settle for nothing less than a seamless experience every time.

Join us to learn how you...Read more

Lunch (Visit the Expo)—12:45pm–1:15pm
12:45 pm to 1:15 pm
Concurrent Sessions—1:15pm–2:15pm
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm
Concurrent Session DZ2 Automation Justification
Judy Johnson, Onyx Point
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

To many people, DevOps is solely about automation. Automation is a huge part of the DevOps process, but there are many other aspects to consider. I’ll be talking about how and why DevOps is important to me, and how automation is a part of each of our DevOps steps. We’ll discuss how automation becomes important to each workday by streamlining tasks and leaving time for the more important (and fun) work. We’ll go over why we automate, what we automate, and how we automate. We will have examples of some of the many tools and processes to simplify automation while noting how important choice...Read more

Concurrent Session AW8 3 Disciplines for Leading a Distributed Agile Organization
Mark Kilby, K5Labs LLC
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

How can you lead people you may never see in your distributed organization? Your personal operating system drives your leadership and guides your organization. While your distributed employees may rarely connect with you beyond a video screen, phone call or chat message, you can model a personal operating system that helps you and them navigate the complexities of a distributed agile organization. In this talk, we will explore three key disciplines composing your personal operating system for leadership: manage change through experimentation, amplify communication and collaboration, and...Read more

Concurrent Session AW9 Dev && UX: (Correctly) Integrating UX, Product Design, and Agile
Debbie Levitt, Delta CX
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Software development methodologies often lack the details of how UX fits into projects. Some suggest that a Product Manager describing features is enough for developers, UX should train others to do their specialized jobs, or excluding UX experts solves them being “too siloed” and “not collaborative.” This happens with no other role in software dev; it’s hurting culture, efficiency, and productivity, and creating poor products for customers. Your customer only sees your UX, not 1000 developers or if you were Agile or Lean. Companies are figuring out that UX specialists and the User-...Read more

Concurrent Session AW10 How Psychological Safety Will Help Promote You and Your Team to the Next Level
Rachel Schumacher, ClearlyAgile
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

In this piece, we will recognize the value of psychological safety as a crucial component for building great teams and even for our personal lives. We will bring together concepts from different thought leaders from around the world such as Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Tony Robbins' Six Needs of Human Nature, Tuckman’s Stages, Dr. Clark’s Four Stages of Psychological Safety, and Modern Agile theories. Then we will discuss tangible data proving how important these concepts are to achieve high performing teams. For the grand finale, we will perform guided activities so that you can apply...Read more

Concurrent Session AW11 Faster and Smarter DevOps Testing Through an Enterprise Test Automation Architecture
Yoosuf Maktoum, Sysco Corporation
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

At Sysco, we have crafted a unique test automation architecture that both supports and accelerates test automation. Enabling reusability, smarter and faster automation is accomplished in any context and the architecture is suitable in both DevOps and Agile settings. Sysco applies a test automation script for functional testing to nonfunctional tests, test data management, and test environment management demonstrating this reusability. Further, this component-based architecture supports both legacy and modern applications test automation. Key Take-Aways from this session will include: • How...Read more

Concurrent Session AW12 DevSecOps for Managers, Executives, and Mere Mortals
Tom Stiehm, Coveros, Inc.
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

DevSecOps isn’t meant for just Gods and Unicorns, it is for mere mortals as well. One of the challenges we have in using Application Security practices is where to start, how to get value, i.e., be successful with initial efforts, and how to build on that success. The world is being driven more and more by network-connected applications and services that are constantly under attack from the curious and malicious. By simply adding steps to your pipeline, you can iteratively add AppSec practices to your process and dramatically increase the security of your software. Join Tom as he lays out...Read more

Concurrent Session AW13 Maximise the benefits of remote working with better Pull Requests Preview
Abraham Marin-Perez, Cosota Team LTD
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

The demands of the modern workplace are changing. Trends like flexible hours, remote working, or “bleisure” travel are being introduced to give employees more work-life balance. Moreover, organisations that are capable of working remotely in an effective manner are more resilient to external shocks, like the recent Coronavirus outbreak showed us. In order to remain effective when workers aren’t in the same place at the same time, teams need to leverage coordination tools. For the case of developers, one of the most important of these tools is the Pull Request. Join Abraham to...Read more

Concurrent Session AW14 DevSecOps Fireside Chat with Jeff Williams
Jeff Williams, Contrast Security
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

You've got questions about DevSecOps, and we've got Jeff Williams to answer them for you. He won't really be sitting by the fire, but he will be on hand to talk about all things DevSecOps, development pipelines, breaking down silos in an organization, and digital transformations. And he wants to talk to you about your DevSecOps hopes, dreams, fears, and nightmares. Jeff Williams brings more than 20 years of security leadership experience as co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Contrast Security. He recently authored the DZone DevSecOps RefCard and launched the Java Observability...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP3 3 Major Ways to Improve API Test Automation as Part of Your CI/CD Pipelines
Temil Sanchez, SmartBear Software
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

API automation is important now more than ever, in a world where we are building more than we can keep up with to ensure useful software that fills the needs of our users, how can we make sure we are doing all in our power to work as efficiently as possible to deliver on what users expect? We'll discuss 3 key actions a testing team can take to meet these expectations.Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP4 The Key to DevOps? Testing Early in the Pipeline
Joe Lust, mabl
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

As teams become more deeply integrated into the DevOps lifecycle, they find that quality becomes a bottleneck to reaping its full benefits. Traditional QA practices of waiting until post-merge for functional testing are not cutting it in this new era of lightning-fast development - teams need to test earlier and more often.

In this session, learn how to implement E2E testing at the earliest stages of development: from initial code build, to proposed changes in a branch, to ephemeral environments and merge to default. This practice enables teams to solve issues faster, proactively...Read more

Networking Break in the Expo—2:15pm–2:45pm
2:15 pm to 2:45 pm
Keynote K2 Taking Your DevOps Culture to the Fourth Ideal
Dana Pylayeva, Agile Play Consulting LLC
2:45 pm to 3:45 pm

How is your DevOps adoption going? Are you seeing results on par with the elite performers from the State of DevOps report, or is the transition causing anxieties and disengagement in your organization? Dana Pylayeva will zoom in on the cultural aspects of DevOps adoption and lead you through a number of experiments on a journey toward the fourth ideal: psychological safety. We will be using games and the Liberating Structures framework to practice turning DevOps fears into DevOps Culture success stories.Read more

Concurrent Sessions—4:00pm–5:00pm
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm
Concurrent Session DZ3 17 Metrics to Accelerate Delivery Without Damaging Culture
Ariel Illouz, LinearB
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

Some engineering managers confuse using data to make better decisions with using data to monitor and stack rank individual developers. I call this the "data-driven trap". Stack ranking is a culture killer but unfortunately lots of great dev leads with good intentions fall into this trap. It is possible to run a highly data-driven engineering organization without measuring a single individual performance statistic. We do it on my team today. In this session I share 17 team-based metrics we use to accelerate delivery, remove process friction and maintain positive team culture. Plus I explain...Read more

Concurrent Session AW15 Evolving from Projects to Products: The Product Leader’s Journey
Julee Everett, ClearlyAgile
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

The Product Leader is the link between the products we build and the culture of the organization building them. It's the foundation for operating in a digital economy. There is a shift happening. One that puts the user closer to the center of our work than ever before. We are moving away from the question "Are we building it right?" to asking "Are we building the right thing?" This approach isn't new - it's growing in response to the increasing speed and complexity of competing in today's marketplace. The future of business agility is creating a healthy ecosystem that provides space for...Read more

Concurrent Session AW16 Now You See It! Observing Flow Using Kanban Boards
Craeg Strong, Ariel Partners
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

“I didn’t know you could do that with Kanban!” This interactive workshop reveals how Kanban systems can help solve the governance and coordination problems that threaten large-scale initiatives. Too many strategic priorities chasing too few resources. Dependencies between teams. Delays due to lack of clear delineations of ownership and responsibility, and a crisp definition of ready. We will explore innovative new Kanban designs that can significantly simplify these difficult problems, ultimately resulting in better outcomes with less stress. We will start by reviewing Kanban board designs...Read more

Concurrent Session AW17 DevOps Culture – A Transformational Component for Rapid Value Delivery in the Government Preview
Kimberly Davis, ASRC Federal
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

For government agencies, value generally flows through layers from the agency itself to various contractors and vendors, and eventually into the hands of the users. For meeting agency missions in a timely manner, it is imperative we build a culture of shared responsibility based on the foundations of DevOps and Lean Agile Leadership to transform how we’ve traditionally delivered products, solutions and services. This cultural transformation fosters a “badge-less society” where value driven collaboration becomes the core for delivering faster and with higher quality. This culture...Read more

Concurrent Session AW18 Test Automation and Beyond: Implementing Continuous Testing Effectively Preview
Gerie Owen, Cubic Transportation Systems
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

Continuous testing is one of the most effective ways of building quality into the continuous delivery pipeline; yet it is difficult to implement in practice. Continuous testing involves more than test automation. Although test automation is a must; continuous risk analysis and optimizing the test suite is critical so that test automation doesn’t become a bottleneck in the continuous integration pipeline. In this presentation, you’ll learn how to implement an effective continuous test strategy throughout the continuous delivery pipeline. We’ll look at real life examples of what...Read more

Concurrent Session AW19 Breaking Iron Triangle Thinking: A New Approach to Agile vs. Continuous Testing
Erik Fogg, ProdPerfect
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

An old adage in software development is: “Speed, quality, cost. Pick two.” In other words: if you want a higher quality product, you have to sacrifice speed, cost, or both. In this “iron triangle” decision-making philosophy, true improvement is not possible. But the fallacy of Iron Triangle thinking is believing that the parameters of these choices are fixed, limiting our potential for innovation. Engineering teams can break this thinking by structuring their improvement cycle not around trade-offs, but on continuous improvement. Typically, in the agile development approach, quality is...Read more

Concurrent Session AW20 The Recipe - Baking a diverse set of ingredients into a tasty integrated system Preview
Peter Tiegs, Intel Corporation
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

Challenge: At Intel each of the various software and firmware teams had independent source code management and CI systems. Consequently the product system integration teams had no consistency from the ingredient software and firmware teams requiring manual over head during system integration. This presentation will discuss how we addressed this by creating a common recipe for the ingredient software and firmware teams to follow. It will discuss what tools from the industry we used (Git, Jenkins, Artifactory) and what tools we had to create (Web Portals, Build Scripts). It will...Read more

Concurrent Session AW21 Practical DevSecOps Using Security Instrumentation
Jeff Williams, Contrast Security
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

The traditional “outside in” scanning and firewalling approach to application security has failed. Vulnerability rates are still staggering, attacks are increasing in volume and severity, and security is disrupting software pipelines. We need a new approach to security that doesn’t slow development or hamper innovation. In this talk, we will show how you can ensure software security from the “inside out” by leveraging the power of software instrumentation. Unlike scanning and firewalling, this approach is fast, accurate, and scalable. Security observability also creates an environment...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP5 An Antidote for an Ailing Agile Implementation
Jona Qorri, Coveros
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

Most companies have started an agile journey, however the vision of agile does not match the reality of what has been implemented. What is the right approach to address the difference between vision and reality? How do you accurately understand your current situation and devise action plans that align with your vision and goals? In this session you'll learn about the knowledge and skills necessary to overcome these challenges and keep your agile journey alive. Join members of the Coveros Agile Solution Delivery Team to learn:

How to start with an appropriate vision and well-...Read more
Industry Technical Presentation ITP6 60 Minutes to a More Robust Agile DevOps Framework!
Sohail Haque, Checkpoint Technologies
4:00 pm to 5:00 pm

Successfully working with Agile DevOps tools and Agile management frameworks, such as Scrum, SAFe, Scrumban is challenging. These frameworks are based on lightweight process models and are intended to be augmented as necessary by individual teams for their project context. This is in contrast with traditional project management methods, which have well-defined processes and standardized templates and are intended to be configured for a specific project. Focusing on Atlassian solutions, this presentation proposes extensions to framework models to enhance formal requirements and test case...Read more

Keynote K3 Promoted From Dev to Team Lead: 8 Things They Didn't Tell Me
Dan Lines, Linear B
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

I was three years into my software engineering career and loving it. Not a care in the world. Then a freight train hit me. I got promoted to dev team lead. The technical skills that make us great developers don't translate to management. In fact, they often hold us back. I learned this the hard way. In this session I expose the top surprises I experienced and the biggest mistakes I made during my first year managing a team. Like going into “superman mode” when there was a problem. Plus, I share 8 things I wish my boss told me before I took the job. Like being data-driven does not mean...Read more

Thursday, November 12

Morning Yoga—8:30am-9:15am
8:30 am to 9:15 am
Visit the Expo—9:45am–6:00pm
9:45 am to 6:00 pm
Keynote K4 The Business Agility Behind a Virtual Band that Topped Real-World Charts
Ahmed Sidky, Riot Games, Michael Robillard, Riot Games
10:00 am to 11:15 am

How did a virtual band top Billboard’s World Digital Song Sales chart? It was a desired yet unexpected result of building a foundation of business agility—not to avoid disruption or adapt to external forces, but to place our players firmly in the center of our universe. Ahmed Sidky and Michael Robillard will explain the business agility practiced by Riot Games, the video game developer behind League of Legends, whose characters make up chart-topping virtual K-pop girl group K/DA. They will discuss the "Copernican Revolution" that informs their mindset, and how they balance the interplay...Read more

Networking Break in the Expo—11:15am-11:45am
11:15 am to 11:45 am
Concurrent Sessions—11:45am–12:45pm
11:45 am to 12:45 pm
Concurrent Session DZ4 Before Disaster Strikes: Training DevOps Engineers for the Worst Preview
Alireza Chegini, On Air
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Picture this: you are startled awake in the middle of the night by a phone call from your supervisor. An emergency has occurred in production, and the only description is that a heavily trafficked site is down. You rush to a conference call with five of your colleagues to find that everyone has a different assessment about what the problem is and how to fix it. There’s no plan in place for this, and as the DevOps engineer, the decision and responsibility for fixing the problem is yours. There’s only time to try one of these methods; you have minutes, not hours, to find the issue...Read more

Concurrent Session AT1 Let it Flow: From Frozen Middle to Agile Ninja
Sanjiv Augustine, LitheSpeed
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Stuck in bureaucratic systems, middle managers have been unfairly dismissed as recalcitrant towards change in many quarters. On the contrary, research shows that 80% of change efforts initiated by middle managers succeed. As organizations scale up full bore to agile, where can middle managers – project managers and other leaders – best add value in a fast-moving, agile and entrepreneurial world? Leading companies have shifted from a project to a product operating model. Moving from agile teams to end-to-end value stream teams, they have achieved time-to-market accelerations and created...Read more

Concurrent Session AT2 Design Thinking for Agile Teams: Change Your Approach
Jennifer Bonine, AI Appstore, Inc.
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Design thinking is a human-centered process for creative problem-solving that focuses on the people you're creating for, which leads to better products, services, and processes. Utilizing the design thinking approach made popular by Amazon, Apple, and other large software companies, learn how to modify your whole agile strategy and approach around a technique that can speed your time to success and failure. Learn how to get to a proof of concept and prototyping sooner, for faster feedback from customers and buyers. This workshop will explore what the design thinking approach is and walk...Read more

Concurrent Session AT3 Measuring Success in DevOps Transformations
Jeff LaFavors, ClearlyAgile LLC
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

At the highest level, a successful DevOps implementation is meant to reduce the time between a developer’s commit to source control and that commit being available in a production environment, while maintaining quality. DevOps is a performance enhancer for Agile. While the measure of success for an Agile team is working product, the measure of a successful DevOps implementation is speed. Including DevOps in the process allows the team to deliver working product more often and with greater confidence. A team’s DevOps implementation should improve over time. There are several components to...Read more

Concurrent Session AT4 How to Select the Right Selenium Tools to Boost Your Test Automation
Eran Kinsbruner, Perfecto
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Success in cross-browser test automation relies on many variables. Today’s reality forces practitioners within DevOps/Agile teams to join effort in assuring quality, removing risks, and releasing fast. To meet these goals, business testers, developers, and test automation engineers need to work together with the proper technology stack that matches their skillset. Join Perfecto’s Chief Evangelist and author, Eran Kinsbruner, in this session as he provides recommendations for high coverage, high reliability, and maintainability of cross-browser test automation. In this session, Eran will...Read more

Concurrent Session AT5 Observability - Inside and Out
Melissa Benua, mParticle
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Observability is the gathering of information - metrics, logs, and traces - to determine the health of software systems. Of course this applies to production systems! Monitoring live services is the bread and butter of any DevOps organization. What about our internal systems - the ones that all engineering organizations require in order to ship software safely, swiftly, and securely? Can we apply observability principles to those systems? How can an organization ship code when the critical infrastructure to get bits from a developer's machine into the cloud have mysteriously vanished? When...Read more

Concurrent Session AT7 How automated governance tamed the data dragon at USCIS
Nate Conroy, NTT Data, Ken Moser, US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Melinda Solomon, USCIS
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

At USCIS, we’ve set the standard for government agility with hundreds of daily deployments, rich SecDevOps practices and an increasingly data-driven culture. But it’s been a tough road, particularly for QA and change management. Presenter Ken Moser helped guide USCIS’s Delivery Assurance Branch from waterfall to agile governance, using data to governance policy uniquely focused on outcomes. We’ll detail how data on program performance and health powered a revolution at USCIS. We’ll identify which metrics proved useful at USCIS, what recurring challenges we found collecting data, and what...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP7 Best practices for managing your open source artifacts
Havoc Pennington, Tidelift
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

Our digital infrastructure balances on the shoulders of open source maintainers. This can create security, licensing, and technical risks for the enterprise. At most organizations, there isn’t a clear answer to this problem that feels great for both risk teams and development teams. Is your development team struggling to manage the open source components that are now part of your applications and keep them up to date and secure? What are the approaches that could allow your organization to stay safe AND move fast.

Join Tidelift for answers to these questions:

What does it mean...Read more
Industry Technical Presentation ITP8 For a Flawless Customer Experience, Just Add Sauce Labs
Stan Williams, SauceLabs
11:45 am to 12:45 pm

As engineering organizations make the shift from waterfall to Agile development practices, they find that one of the most difficult, and expensive bottlenecks to achieving true CI/CD is continuous testing. This presentation will show how to get this critical piece of your pipeline right, and properly implement automated testing in a DevOps environment. Stan Williams, Senior Solution Engineer at Sauce Labs, will demonstrate how to leverage test automation at scale with the Sauce Labs cloud. With access to 1,000+ browser/OS/device combinations (including mobile) to run your functional and...Read more

Lunch (Visit the Expo)—12:45pm–1:15pm
12:45 pm to 1:15 pm
Concurrent Sessions—1:15pm–2:15pm
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm
Concurrent Session DZ5 DevOps Your Amazon Skills
Xavier Portilla Edo, Altran
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Since 2011 voice assistants have been entering our lives little by little. It wasn't until 2014 that Amazon created the Echo devices with its built-in assistant, Alexa. In 2018 they give us the opportunity for anyone to add functionality through skills, it means to be able to create voice based applications for the first time. Developing an Alexa skill can be a lot of fun, but nobody likes to find negative comments and reviews in order to begin to identify and correct bugs. Skills developers use tests and automation to minimize these risks. In this talk, I will talk about how to test your...Read more

Concurrent Session AT8 Reimagining Careers for the Age of Accelerations
Anjali Leon, PPL Coach
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

The rules of the game have changed! Studies indicate that by the year 2030, half of jobs will be ones that do no exist today and half the jobs of today will no longer exist. The volatility, uncertainty, and ambiguity ushered in by this age of accelerations extends not just to our environment, politics, and communities, but our organizations as well. In response, organizations are undergoing a massive transformation in technology, structure, culture, and values - fundamentally changing not only what we work on, but how we work, and who we work with.

Where does this leave our careers...Read more

Concurrent Session AT9 Scaling the Mountain, One Step at a Time - High-Level Feature Planning for Large Scale Projects
Jim Collins, CUNA Mutual Group , Amanda Palovcsik, CUNA Mutual Group
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Every organization, large or small, has a complex project that seems impossible to address. Significant tech debt, substantial impact to the business, risky to tackle – we all have behemoth systems that take the backburner, and we hope outlive their necessity.

When a large system overhaul is initiated and funding is a primary focus, high-level feature planning provides a way to inform the team, as well as management, an understanding of scope and complexity. It also helps set direction without committing to a firm end date. High-level feature planning allows teams to...Read more

Concurrent Session AT10 Partnering Up – Giving Leaders the Limelight of Transformation
Allison Pollard, Improving, Zeenat Fadwani , Lean Agile Solution
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

As agile coaches, we feel the frustrations with teams and leaders, we see the pain points in the organization, and we want to lead people to a more lean-agile future. Moreover, agile coaches may put the weight of the entire transformation on their own shoulders. At times, our own egos can get in the way of our effectiveness by limiting our ability to partner with others and share the limelight.

What would it mean to share the burden of transformation—and the limelight—with leaders?

How can an agile coach enable them to be the face of the change and motivate others to think...Read more

Concurrent Session AT11 Continuous Security at the Speed of DevOps
Abhishek Singh, Araali Networks
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

How does best-in-breed security at the speed and performance of DevOps looks like? How can the DevOps team stops advanced threats from laterally moving, communicating with your apps, or talking out (command and control, exfiltration)? How can you do it in a way that all apps and workloads are covered? How should you think about cross-team sharing? How about workflows for automation and policy creation? This session will cover how leading companies are integrating security into the software delivery cycle and delivering software on the planet-scale. This should also help enterprises that...Read more

Concurrent Session AT12 The Twins: Agile Methodologies & DevOps Techniques
Hasan Yasar, Software Engineering Institute
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

This talk will explain the relationship between Agile and DevOps and the mechanisms of DevOps that require Agile or Agile activities with DevOps techniques (such as Continuous Integration, Continuous Delivery/Deployment and Continuous Feedback) . Collectively, we will discuss and seek an answer to Agile and DevOps relationship. I will also share the lesson learned on DevOps adoption and how it relates to Agile to setup required processes. And then list Agile principles including 12 principles and common agile techniques. I will also talk on common principles DevOps principles a map those...Read more

Concurrent Session AT13 Code Review Practice for Empathy with Egoless Programming Preview
Dongsik Kim, Samsung SDS
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

We will prepare code for code review and progress sheets and assessment template, and role cards for the participants. (Please check attachments.) We want to share that code review is not heavy and authoritative thing, but it is fun and can help participants understanding of business logic and improve their development skills at the same time. This practice is hands-on, and this practice has been used and spreading in our company since 2017. This code review practice will lead participants to become interested in code review. Participants will learn how to code review in a fun...Read more

Concurrent Session AT14 Journey to Automation: How to start?
Larissa Rosochansky, CI&T
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

The concept of digital transformation was introduced to us a few years ago and is now a wishful thinking for many companies. But do you really know what is Digital Transformation? And how do we go further in this transformation? The answer is easier said than done: through automation. And how to start our automation journey? In this talk, Larissa will explain briefly Digital Transformation, how it correlates to automation and then proceed to the concept and types of automation, and detail how to embark on this exciting journey! After understanding what automation is, we will learn how to...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP9 Continuously releasing value through Lean-Agile, DevSecOps, and SRE
Gabriel Fuentes, Softtek, Diana Rodriguez, Softtek
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Organizations across industries and around the globe struggle to tangibly attain the potential of Lean-Agile approaches. During this 60-minute session, Softtek will present a compelling vision and proven framework that enables organizations and teams to constantly deliver value by implementing DevSecOps, Site Reliability Engineering, and Shift-to-left Quality assurance principles, illustrated with case studies from multiple enterprises and industries.Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP10 Value of Certification in Agile & DevOps
Andrew Pollner, ASTQB - American Software Testing Qualifications Board
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Testing continues to evolve as Agile, DevOps, and now DevSecOps are the new standards for the software application lifecycle. Great efficiencies have been gained and automation plays a larger role in development, testing, and deployment. With a “shift-left” mindset, testing is now more involved, and earlier in the process. Automated processes continue to make inroads, not only for testing but for quickly and efficiently move code from unit to system testing, then to production, and finally with monitoring and continuous improvement steps to provide feedback and increase quality. This adds...Read more

Networking Break in the Expo—2:15pm–2:30pm
2:15 pm to 2:30 pm
Keynote K5 The Change You Need to Become a DevOps Organization
Aimee Bechtle, S&P Global Market Intelligence
2:30 pm to 3:30 pm

Seven years ago, Aimee Bechtle began leading DevOps transformations. Her extensive and diverse experience as a transformational change agent across three very different enterprise organizations provided her with keen insights. Aimee will share the lessons she learned that allow her to meet people where they are in their journey, to understand how company history and culture influence the success rate of adoption, and to be empathetic to people’s tolerance for change. She will share with you how DevOps adoption and DevOps as a culture have changed since she first started practicing DevOps...Read more

Concurrent Sessions—3:45pm–4:45pm
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm
Concurrent Session DZ6 Being VP of Engineering is Harder than Being CEO
Ori Keren, LinearB
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Being CEO is notoriously challenging. But there’s another job that’s even harder… VP of Engineering. I would know. I’ve been both. As VPs of Engineering, we spend all day translating between two different worlds. We spent time in both worlds but don’t fully belong to either. Other executives see us as technical. Our teams see us as business. It’s lonely. It’s also the reason we’re in a unique position to help our company succeed. The best engineering leaders are great translators. We bring context about the business to developers and educate non-technical stakeholders on how software gets...Read more

Concurrent Session AT15 Impactful Contributions-Maximize for Game-Changing Results
Veronica Stewart, Ingenious Agile
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Organizational alignment will make or break your agile transformation, but how confident are we on what organizational alignment really means? How many people can accurately describe their company's top three initiatives? How many people understand their role and how they can best contribute to them? What happens when we hit a new change curve with newly defined outcomes? How has knowing you are "blue" helped with those efforts so far? In this interactive session, we will explore the ways an individual, team or organization can dramatically increase the likelihood of success. How? By...Read more

Concurrent Session AT16 High-Performance Teams: Core Protocols for Psychological Safety and EI
Richard Kasperowski, Certified Agile Team Building™
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Want awesome teams that build great products? Great teams don’t happen by accident. And they don’t have to take a long time to build. In this session, Richard lays out the case for Continuous Teaming. Session participants will join in a flight of fun learning activity-sets. These will give you a taste of team awesomeness and how to start when you go back to work. Richard builds on the work of Jim and Michele McCarthy, Google, Bruce Tuckman, Gamasutra, Standish Group, Peter Drucker, and Melvin Conway. His learning activity-sets are short games, using elements from improvisational theater,...Read more

Concurrent Session AT17 Things We May Never Get Right
Ann Marie Fred, IBM, Craig Cook, IBM
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

When there's no clear right way to solve a difficult problem, how do you avoid getting frozen in indecision? How do you know if you made the right decision? How do you know when a decision that used to be the best one isn't any more, and it's time to try something else?

We're part of a global marketplace developed and operated by multiple squads. We consider ourselves a mature DevOps organization, but there are several things we've really struggled with over the years, and we've even reversed direction at times. For example: Should designers be assigned to one squad for months at a...Read more

Concurrent Session AT18 Agile Tester Toolkit - make an impact Preview
Julia Pottinger, QualityWorks Consulting Group
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

An Agile QA does more than write test cases or execute them. They participate in activities such as "Estimating Stories" and "Backlog Grooming", interact with developers, attend daily scrum and sprint-planning sessions and they AUTOMATE. QA's are expected to be knowledgeable on the different tools and methodologies used, find the root cause, bringing fresh ideas and perspectives while still ensuring that releases are sent out on time. How do you set yourself up for success or make an impact? An Agile QA toolkit will allow you to be knowledgeable in the right areas, think quickly...Read more

Concurrent Session AT19 Three Waves of DevOps: How we scale speed and quality through AI Preview
Andreas Grabner, Dynatrace
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Since 2015 we at Dynatrace experienced 3 waves of transformation bringing us from DevOps (Speed), via NoOps (Stability) to what we call AI-Supported Autonomous Cloud Enablement (Scale). While DevOps and our approach to NoOps resulted in 1h Commit to Production and a 93% reduction of end user impacting production issues we had a hard time scaling speed and keeping our quality promise as we went through a 10x growth in size of engineering over the past 5 years. We forced ourselves to leverage and enhance our deterministic AI engine by integrating it into every phase of our software...Read more

Concurrent Session AT20 Using failure to successfully deliver software
Robert Foster, Coveros
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Failure is feedback and feedback is the breakfast of champions, or in this case software delivery teams. How do software delivery teams “welcome changing requirements, even late in development“ while maintaining "continuous attention to technical excellence"? The answer is simple, through feedback, early and constant feedback. So why is it so hard to accept feedback? If feedback is so important why don’t we welcome it as early as we can and as often as we can? Many times it can be the delivery if you’re not asking for feedback it can come across as negative or as criticism. Fortunately,...Read more

Concurrent Session AT21 Permit to Cloud: Land with Confidence in Azure
Mike Benkovich, Imagine Technologies, Inc.
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Are you ready for the Cloud? An application is an idea that has code, data and infrastructure, and choosing whether to build a conveyor belt or to put up guard rails for that path is important in maintaining velocity to the cloud. In this session we show the core tools available in Azure for creating and enforcing governance rules and infrastructure, including Azure resource template technologies, policies, blueprints, as well as DevOps processes you can use to ensure your cloud journey is predictable , secure and compliant. We'll see how the tools work and share best practices for...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP11 Design + Engineering: Telling a product story through an agile process
Kanika Rehani, test.ai
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Imagine that you have two deeply rooted, well-established teams in your organization — design and engineering. Collectively, they consist of highly skilled practitioners who are capable of solving your organization's greatest challenges. However, to accomplish this, they must be able to effectively collaborate on various projects and present their results to key stakeholders. So how do you bring these teams together and enable them to communicate the data from complex projects in a way makes it actionable and easy for stakeholders to digest? Join Kanika Rehani as she explains how...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP12 Agile Testing for Mobile in Today’s Environment
Jamie Moore, Mobile Labs
3:45 pm to 4:45 pm

Enterprise mobility teams face challenges thanks to digital transformation and consumer demand. There is pressure to develop apps that are better and more innovative than ever. With increased development comes the heightened demand for more testing. In today’s world, consumers expect user experiences that work with no issues right out of the box.

But how can enterprise mobility teams keep up with demand? With the right tools and platforms, mobile teams can thrive in an agile, DevOps world by delivering high quality applications. This presentation explores mobile DevOps and Agile...Read more

Concurrent Sessions—5:00pm–6:00pm
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm
Concurrent Session DZ7 Developers Gaming the Agile Process? Say it Ain't So!
Ray Elenteny, Solutech Consulting, LLC
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

Who doesn’t like the affirmation in hearing, “Job well done.” Most of us have experienced receiving salary increases, bonuses, and other forms of reward. These rewards are often tied to meeting or exceeding objectives set for us as individuals, teams, and businesses. Regardless of profession, most businesses recognize and reward individuals based on meeting defined goals. Over time, Ray Elenteny has observed an interesting dynamic where the spirit of Agile can take a back seat to leveraging Agile metrics to evaluate individuals and teams. Evaluation by Agile metrics seems very reasonable,...Read more

Concurrent Session AT22 Reframing Conflict: The Heads, Hearts, and Hands of Productive Disagreement
Jason Schreuder, Inspired Iterations
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

So you and your teams know that healthy conflict is a hallmark of high performing teams, right? Yet you find yourself struggling to actually live this reality. You’re likely caught in the same vicious cycle of trying to change other’s minds and being locked in heated debate with no end in sight. Whether you are a team member, coach, or manager, this session will give you practical models and techniques for understanding and navigating conflict, rather than micro-managing or ignoring it. You will learn how to help teams identify, understand, and have productive disagreement that leads to...Read more

Concurrent Session AT24 Why do lean agile transformations fail? The good bad and ugly of lean agile and DevOps transformations
Michael Nir, Sapir Consulting US
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

Why do lean agile transformations fail more often than succeed? Teams argue about user stories, pointing systems and tickets. Mangers measure and compare teams based on velocity. Scrum masters going through the motions chasing the South Star. No one is validating customer hypothesis for fast feedback. In the turning point of the software digital age where organizations face a Cambrian extinction - the scientific application of agile, lean, design thinking, lean start up, lean UX, OKRs and DevOps together with high performing teams is crucial to business survival.

Let’s Explore...Read more

Concurrent Session AT25 Why aren’t your test automation efforts working? Preview
Susan Brockley, Independent Consultant
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

Test automation. Great concept and easy to do, right? Not so fast... There are many different ways to fly off course. Join me as we explore the not-so-obvious ways that we waste time and money on failed test automation attempts. Learn how to recognize and correct early missteps. Discover solutions that keep you from going in the wrong direction regardless of whether you are an Agile or traditional organization. Understand how to erect guardrails for your organization that keep test automation between the lines. Take away proven strategies for dealing with test automation pitfalls...Read more

Concurrent Session AT26 DevOps Fireside Chat with Aimee Bechtle
Aimee Bechtle, S&P Global Market Intelligence
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

Got S’More questions about DevOps adoption? Bring some graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows and join Aimee Bechtle for a fireside chat and hear about life in the trenches of Agile and DevOps transformations. Aimee has a background in Software Systems Engineering and has been working in Information Technology for 27 years. She has worked in management consulting, financial services, and federal research and development. Named a DevOps Top 100 Influencer Aimee has lots to share on how to successfully influence organizations and people in a transformation.Read more

Concurrent Session AT27 Metric-driven CI Stability Preview
Lindsey Whitley, Gusto
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

When I joined our Developer Experience team, we had very little visibility into how we were serving other engineers with our CI tools. We had no hard-evidence to back up any claims. We identified what we could and should measure. Then we established SLIs/SLOs to formalize those concepts and conducted an experiment to improve Buildkite stability. In the end we reached our goal on stability going from ~95% to 99.5%+ of builds that didn't fail because of something we had control. Now that we have hard data around the job we are doing, we don't have to make a decision about when to...Read more

Concurrent Session AT28 Strengthening Shift Right Testing(Testing in Production environment) in DevOps Preview
Shubhra Goyal, Infosys
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

The session would help in understanding the following w.r.t. shift right testing.

• What is shift right testing? • Why shift right testing? • How shift right testing benefits DevOps process ? • Role of automation in shift right testing. Overall this session would be helpful for the QA Managers , DevOps practitioners to adapt and strengthen the QA process by adapting shift right testing. It also provides some real time scenarios with the business benefits. This session would help attendees to include the shift right testing in the current DevOps process and also understand...Read more

Industry Technical Presentation ITP14 DevOps DORA Metrics and Beyond – Implementation Demystified
Hector Guerra, Klera, Bhavin Shah, Klera
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm

While the DevOps Research and Assessment (DORA) group’s metrics are taken as gospel for tracking DevOps success, many enterprises have a hard time getting started. Some organizations have even lost business since they could not establish DevOps compliance, owing to lack of visibility throughout the DevOps lifecycle . Given the value of continuously tracking DevOps success is already established, and the potential business impact of not doing so is huge, why haven’t enterprises been able to get started and crack the code?

Join Bhavin Shah and Hector Guerra from Klera, as they...Read more

Monday, November 16

Agile Leadership Summit
1:00 pm to 4:30 pm

"LEADING CHANGE" Monday, November 16 • 1:00pm–4:30pm ET & Tuesday, November 17 • 1:00pm–3:30pm ET

This is an interactive workshop and live event participation is highly recommended for both days!

The business world is changing faster than ever. Dynamic global markets are forcing organizations to continuously transform to stay ahead. But internal and external forces provide both opportunities and challenges for leaders. Join in the...Read more

Leadership Summit Session SMT1 Agile Leadership Summit: Opening Remarks: Jeffery Payne, Coveros (Summit Moderator)
Jeffery Payne, Coveros
1:00 pm to 1:15 pm

Join Jeff Payne as he kicks off the Agile Leadership Summit right before the first Keynote speaker presentation.Read more

Leadership Summit Session SMT2 Turning Execs Into Champions for Driving Tech Change
Michelle DeCarlo, Lincoln Financial Group
1:15 pm to 2:15 pm

Whether you are responsible for driving transformation in the DevOps, Data, Cloud or Agile spaces, success hinges in large part on your ability to effectively message and engage executive leaders. Knowing how to strategically manage the executive landscape by educating leaders on benefits, earning their trust, gaining sponsorship and motivating them to action is an art, and something that doesn’t just happen—it takes a focused and purposeful approach, hard work, creativity and a lot of patience. Michelle DeCarlo will share proven executive engagement strategies she has successfully...Read more

Leadership Summit Session SMT3 Managing the People Side of Change
Perry Riggs, SoftPro
2:30 pm to 3:30 pm

Change in any size organization happens at the individual’s level. Compelling visions, world class strategies, and an army of consultants are powerless to transform the organization if the needs of the individuals are not incorporated into the program approach. Join Perry Riggs while he looks at the application of ideas from various organizational change management frameworks such as Prosci/Adkar, Lewin, and the Kotter change framework. We will also review ideas from recent literature like Drive - Daniel Pink, Start with Why - Simon Sinek, Dare to Lead - Brene Brown, The Fifth Discipline...Read more

Leadership Summit Session SMT4 Agile Leadership Summit: Think Tank Discussion Part I: Problem Definitions
Jeffery Payne, Coveros
3:45 pm to 4:30 pm

Join with your peers in an engaging and highly interactive session to discuss the issues that affect you most. Using answers to the question “As a Leader, What is Keeping You Up at Night?” that we will discuss as a larger group, participants will form their own small groups to work on finding solutions to pressing test management issues. Discussions will review identified issues, barriers to change, and focus on innovative strategies and practical next steps. At the end of the think tank, all feedback will be collected and posted online to encourage further collaboration.Read more

Tuesday, November 17

Leadership Summit Session SMT5 Agile Leadership Summit: Think Tank Discussion Part II: Leadership Solutions
Jeffery Payne, Coveros
1:00 pm to 2:00 pm

Based upon the problem definitions developed during Part I of the Think Tank, small groups will brainstorm on how to best solve these challenges, leveraging the collective wisdom of peers and Summit speakers. Each group will designate a representative to present its results and practice delivery.Read more

Leadership Summit Session SMT6 Agile Leadership Summit: Think Tank Discussion Part III: Presentation of Results
Jeffery Payne, Coveros
2:00 pm to 3:30 pm

Small group representatives will each be given five minutes to present their leadership solutions. Summit participants will vote on which group produced the best solutions.Read more

Wednesday, November 18

DevSecOps Summit
1:00 pm to 4:00 pm

Wednesday, November 18 • 1:00pm-4:00pm ET & Thursday, November 19 • 1:00pm-4:00pm ET

Why is learning about DevSecOps vital to you and your role? In the past few years, security integration within the DevOps pipeline has given rise to the idea of DevSecOps. Once seen as the bottleneck and inhibitor of the development and deployment process, security has become an integral part of the movement towards automation and the removal of manual oversight enforcement. As stated in the DevSecOps Manifesto, “We must adapt our ways to ensure data security and...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS1 Blameless Retrospectives in DevSecOps at Global Healthcare Giants
DJ Schleen, Rally | United Healthcare, Aaron Rinehart, Verica.io
1:00 pm to 1:45 pm

Implementing a scalable DevOps program can seem like an impossible task at times. Add security into the mix and the challenge can appear insurmountable. Organizations around the world have come to realize the potential business impacts of adopting DevSecOps and how it can enable engineers to deliver more value to the market faster. While the prospect of transformation seems alluring, a great number of organizations are still unsure of where to start, what’s involved, how much it will cost and how to achieve success. Discussing our triumphs and tragedies not only bring clarity, but champion...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS2 The Science of Compliance - Early Code to Secure Your Node
Judy Johnson, Onyx Point
1:45 pm to 2:30 pm

We all know that the earlier in the software development process, you start testing, the more money and time you save in the long run. This is the case not only with the coding process, but also with securing your systems. In this talk, we’ll talk about the difference between compliance and security, and how adding compliance is a measurable and repeatable way to make code more secure. We will discuss tools and methodologies for integrating compliance and inserting compliance checking at various places in the development process, starting with a compliant infrastructure, and continuing...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS3 Usability vs. Security: Having Your Cake and Eating It Too
Peter Hesse, 10pearls
2:45 pm to 3:30 pm

In today’s rapidly changing marketplace, the usability of software is paramount to its adoption and success. However, we also recognize the need for solutions to have resiliency and security. How do you successfully navigate the tradeoffs between usability and security? Simple… you don’t! Instead of choosing one or the other, reject the false tradeoff and instead find ways to embrace both security and usability in your DevSecOps processes. Join Peter Hesse as he discusses strategies for getting security and user experience teams to work closely together, enabling the creation of better...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS4 A Modern Approach to Managing and Securing Your Open Source Dependencies
Matthew Arnow, Tidelift
3:30 pm to 4:15 pm

Ninety-two percent of applications contain open source components. Without careful maintenance, organizations open themselves up to exploits from malicious actors. Known vulnerabilities in an open source library can increase risk of compromise despite a development team’s best efforts and intentions. Relying on scanning tools to point out potential issues is not enough if you don’t also have a strategy in place to ensure those issues can be resolved. In this talk we’ll share a modern approach DevSecOps teams can use to better manage and secure their open source dependencies, ensuring...Read more

Thursday, November 19

DevSecOps Summit Session DS5 So Happy Together: Making the Promise of DevSecOps a Reality
Alyssa Miller, Snyk, Ltd.
1:00 pm to 1:45 pm

It may be hard for some to believe, but it’s been over a decade since DevOps was first introduced. It wasn’t very long after that the concept of DevSecOps began to emerge as security practitioners attempted to keep application security practices engaged in software delivery. However, recent surveys show that even in organizations that have adopted a DevSecOps model, security is still often viewed as a bottleneck. This idea of security as an inhibitor can undermine the promise of DevSecOps to deliver a culture of shared responsibility for security. Hacker, former developer, and application...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS6 DevSecOps: Essential Pipeline Tooling To Enable Continuous Security
Richard Mills, Coveros
1:45 pm to 2:30 pm

As we embrace DevOps to optimize our Agility, we need to move away from slow, manually intensive processes into more of a continuous flow of software into production. Whether we are doing true "Continuous Deployment" straight to production or not, we no longer have time for slow, manual, late-lifecycle security assessments to determine if our code is going to put us on the front page of the newspaper (for the wrong reasons). What we need is the visibility to know that our code is secure enough to pass muster every day. What we need is continuous security.

The DevSecOps movement is...Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS7 DevSecOps Culture: Laughing Through the Failures
Chris Romeo, Security Journey
2:45 pm to 3:30 pm

Rolling out DevOps + Security has its series of pitfalls. In this talk, we’ll explore real-world challenges, sprinkling in a bit of humor on behalf of the Internet, and work out the solutions to how to avoid these pain points using security culture. Examples include individuals with a non-collaborative mindset (not playing nice), security tools that provide zero value in the pipeline, old school thinking concerning requirements, the inability to perform threat modeling at DevOps speed, and many more. You’ll experience what can go wrong, to expose how to do things right.Read more

DevSecOps Summit Session DS8 Go Beyond DevSecOps to Continuous Security
Rob Cuddy, HCL, Colin Bell, HCL
3:30 pm to 4:15 pm

Continuous. If you have been around DevOps for any length of time then you have heard this term. As in Continuous Integration, Continuous Build, Continuous Deployment, Continuous Delivery, Continuous Testing, Continuous Planning among others. Now we are living in a time when personal and data privacy matters more than ever, and so one "Continuous" is rising to the forefront: Continuous Security.

But what really IS Continuous Security? Is it simply a notion of running scans and tests as part of a pipeline and reporting vulnerabilities? We think it is much more then that. For years...Read more