The Agile community in Indianapolis is a vibrant and flourishing group of passionate agilists and lean thinkers. They put together an amazing conference that should be on your radar for next year.

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The highlight of the event for me was Hala Saleh’s stage talk: “My Agile is Better Than Your Agile“.

She spoke about the dangers of extremism when promoting ideas. She also made a great case for dropping the judgment and negative connotations that come along with certain “trigger” words in the agile community such as: agile project manager, PMP, #NoEstimates, management, and PM’s.

We state “People over Process”, then turn around and put people in boxes because they have the wrong letters following their name, or because they use the word “hybrid”. 

It’s a message that I needed to hear and that I very much appreciated. It’s inspired me to inspect the way that I engage with others and adapt where needed.

Agile Indy 2015 was also a special event for me professionally. I presented a talk for the first time to the sell out crowd, and had a great time in the process.

I should have been nervous, but the excellent staff of conference volunteers, the venue, and the overall vibe of the event made it a great place to debut my talk:  Help!!! The Scrum Master *IS* the Impediment!

The change in mindset necessary to become a servant leader is incredibly hard for a scrum master who comes from command and control background. As a newly minted Professional Scrum Master (PSM I), I returned to my team excited and ready to get underway with a scrum adoption. Unfortunately, I had not fully grasped the concept of servant leadership. Instead of being a change agent, I was an impediment.

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I also really appreciated one of the nicest – and most humbling – compliments that hit my Twitter feed immediately after the talk.

Comments like this are why I enjoy writing, blogging, and speaking. Becoming a scrum master is a difficult journey. I struggled with it. Given the feedback I’ve been getting, so have many other people.

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