Agile Open Northwest, an alliance of agile practitioners in the US Pacific Northwest region, invite you to our 3rd annual conference Agile Open Northwest 2009 "Agile for Real".

The Northwest has a wealth of practitioners with years of real-world experience with agile methods and self-organizing teams. Agile Open Northwest offers an opportunity to strengthen our community of practice and co-create the future for agile development in our region.

Your hosts designed this event to allow practitioners like you to meet in self-organizing groups where we can share our latest ideas, challenges, hopes, experiences and experiments.

Who: YOU and all members of the local active Agile community (i.e., anyone who's doing any form of Agile - or wishes they could)

What: We invite you to join us in looking at future opportunities for AgilePDX.

When: On our regular meeting date, 3rd Wednesday, August 21

Why: Because "self-organizing" "collaborative" "responding to change"

How: Alicia Lanier (our facilitator) will help us stay on track as we take a couple of hours to look at:

• our draft Purpose and how it influences our decisions

• where we are now and how we got here (3+ meetings at different days, times of day, and geographic locations!)

• what that tells us about where we'd like to be

• what next steps will help us get there

Not one of our usual meetings, but more of an AgilePDX-wide retrospective and continuous improvement event. Please join us in service to the local Agile community. AgilePDX can be the best user group EVER!

Learn to Coach: Tech Managers & Teams is an immersive workshop that breaks down the fundamentals of coaching for managers in startup and technical environments. Over the course of the morning, we'll learn the elements of effective coaching and have time to practice, too!

This isn't your average coaching conversation - it's hands-on, no slides, and really fun (we promise - you get to build things, make stuff, and break stuff!) It's also not a leadership development class! This workshop is about actionable, real-world techniques that you can apply in your daily work immediately.

This course is designed for new and mid-level managers who have teams of 1+ people. It can also be a great tool for HR and people managers who are looking to add coaching skills to their toolboxes.