Rogue Eastside Pub & Pilot Brewery

NOTE: Partaking in beer and/or blogging is neither expected nor required. We're just looking for an excuse to get the broader Portland startup and tech community together.

Back in the before times — when blogging was far more prevalent — the Portland startup community used to gather every Friday afternoon under the pretense of discussing blogging and often WordPress. When it was really just an excuse to see one another. And welcome both new transplants and visitors alike to Portland.

Every Friday, Beer and Blog was the best place to meet and chat with the Portland tech community — as a community — whether you happened to blog or not.

With WordCamp US 2024 — which is being held in Portland, this year — coming to a conclusion on Friday, September 20, 2024, it seemed like an opportune time to bask in a little nostalgia and gather for another Beer and Blog. Just for old time's sake.

So take off work a bit early and head down to Rogue in SE Portland (formerly known as The Green Dragon). You deserve it. Go spend some time getting acquainted with the Portland tech community you're one event away from getting to know and love. Or reconnect with folks whom you haven't seen in a long long time.

In celebration of PNW Climate Week, join us for a renewable energy and climate tech mixer! Climate Curious, the Technology Association of Oregon, and the Association of Energy Services Professionals NW Chapter are hosting a summer get together at Rogue Eastside Pub on Thursday, July 11th from 5:30 - 7:30 pm.

​Grab a pint under the tent for an informal opportunity to discuss our evolving energy and tech scene here in Portland and across Oregon while building ideas and sharing perspectives with folks passionate about climate tech. Attendees will have ample opportunity to engage in constructive dialogue about local climate tech projects and startups and build connections.

There's still time to submit a proposal to present at PNSQC 2020. And, to help you get inspired, we are hosting the second annual Pitchfest to give you quick feedback on ideas.

What is a Pitchfest? Speaking at PNSQC 2020 is your chance to share your software quality expertise and experience on trends, process improvement and technology solutions. The Pitchfest is your chance to quickly propose and iterate on an idea before submitting it.

Why show up for a Pitchfest? - You have an idea for a paper, but don't know "if it's good enough" - You have the germ of an idea and want to refine it before writing a proposal - You're curious what ideas other people have - You have questions about the overall paper/presenter/speaking "thing" - You want to have appetizers and something to drink while networking with software quality professionals

Appetizers will be provided by PNSQC. We are meeting in the "Barrel Room" (ask at the bar if you can't find it).

Even if you can't attend the Pitchfest, check out the program committee's "wish list" for topics. Remember, proposals for papers must be received by April 15th, 2020 at 11:59 PM PDT.

Here is the URL to submit a proposal https://www.pnsqc.org/2020-conference/call-proposals/

Here is the link to the "wish list" https://www.pnsqc.org/a-pnsqc-wish-list-topics-to-inspire-your-vision-for-quality/

PNSQC’s mission statement is to enable knowledge exchange to produce higher quality software. The event is free and open to all interested.

Please RSVP on our Beer and Blog Reunion Roll Call!

The erstwhile Beer and Blog community is getting together for a "reunion" and to welcome anyone else who wants to connect with such folks at our old haunt, the place formerly known as Green Dragon. If you can't make it on this date, try 17 January 2020 instead. We will also try to have a virtual connection for folks that can't make it FTF if the tech gods be willing...stay tuned to @beerandblog on Twitter for details.

Please RSVP on our Beer and Blog Reunion Roll Call!

The erstwhile Beer and Blog community is getting together for a "reunion" and to welcome anyone else who wants to connect with such folks at our old haunt, the place formerly known as Green Dragon. If you can't make it on this date, try 24 January 2020 instead. We will also try to have a virtual connection for folks that can't make it FTF if the tech gods be willing...stay tuned to @beerandblog on Twitter for details.

We're finishing out 2018 having collectively presented roughly 85 human-centered events. Let's celebrate with a Human-centered Community Gathering!

We’ll be joining Portland’s human-centered groups who are passionate about HCD principles and how they can change the way we work and live. You can RSVP with one of the groups listed below or the Count Me In button, here. This is an informal event so signing up is more about getting you a reminder in your email when you need it.

You’ll have an opportunity to:

• Share insights with folks across the many fields that intersect in HCD in Portland
• Shape this community by giving feedback on a few ideas we have been working on for 2019 on how to bring the human-centered communities closer together.

Some of the groups that will be there include:

• Design Thinking For Social Impact
• OpenIDEO - Portland Chapter
• PDX Design Research Group
• Portland Accessibility and User Experience Meetup
• Portland Community Design Thinkers
• Service Design PDX

We support introverts, extroverts, and everyone in-between at this event. Don’t be shy, or do — either way, join the fun and help shape our community!

This event is sponsored by PDXHCD. Want to know more about the human centered disciplines in Portland? Take a look at the event calendar at pdxhcd.org.

RSVP: https://www.meetup.com/AgilePDX-User-Group-Portland-Metro/events/256215771/

Join us for a beer (or beverage of your choice) and a snack at the Rogue Eastside Pub to discuss "Flat Army" by Dan Pontefract. He says he has the strategy to solve the challenges of unhappy and uncommitted employees, and it's based on empowerment:

"Your people are your most valuable asset, and if you want them to excel (and your profits to soar), you'll need to abandon your traditional command-and-control management style and adopt a collaborative, open leadership approach―one that engages and empowers your people. While this isn't a particularly new idea, many leaders, while they may pay lip service to it, don't really understand what it means. And most of those who do get it lack the skills for putting it into practice. In Flat Army you'll find powerful leadership models and tools that help you challenge yourself and overcome your personal obstacles to change, while pushing the boundaries of organizational change to create a culture of collaboration."

Let's discuss the pros and cons of his approached and compare it to our real-world experiences and experiments.

We look forward to your creative insights!

Tip: It's worth reading some online book reviews for critical perspectives.

Join us for a beer (or beverage of your choice) and a snack at the Rogue Eastside Pub to discuss Patrick Lencioni's book "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team". If you work with teams and team success, this book may be an interesting addition to your library.

Lencioni tells the story of a troubled Silicon Valley firm and the new CEO faced with uniting and guiding a team of leaders with the aim of making the company a success. Through this business fable, Lencioni highlights the common dysfunctions that he claims can cripple any team: absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, and inattention to results. He offers ways to assess a team and provides actionable steps on how to overcome each of the 5 dysfunctions.

Food for thought:

• This book tells the tale of a CEO refashioning the dynamic of an executive committee. Do fables apply to everyone?
• Is Lencioni right? Does he name the most important dysfunctions that challenge the teams you work with?
• What can we learn from this representative tale about development teams? Where can we add our own wisdom to Lencioni's model?

We look forward to learning what Agile mindsets bring to the table! Tip: It's worth reading some online book reviews for critical perspectives.

Please visit our Meetup link to RSVP:

https://www.meetup.com/AgilePDX-User-Group-Portland-Metro/events/253824910/

Chad Dickerson (Former CEO of Etsy) says: "If you only have one book on product management, this is the one."

He is talking about the book 'INSPIRED: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love' by Marty Cagan. This book, now as a second edition, provides stories and information on how companies release a technology product that does not simply deliver a solution - but something customer love and rave about.

Review the book description to see if this is something you want to dive into, and join fellow product and development agile readers for a discussion. Oh, and for the listeners of the modern "reading" age, this book is available in audio.

Need more inspiration? Jeff Patton says of the book: "When I was a product leader, I experienced a fair bit of accidental successes and puzzling failures. Marty's writing has helped me understand how product managers and product organizations really should work. I wish I'd had this book years ago."

Visit our Meetup link to RSVP to the gathering. Thanks!

This time we dive into the people side of Agile. Best practices are necessary and valuable, and will build your foundation for success. But what if your team's agile journey to greatness is stagnating?

Let's read Gil Broza's The Human Side of Agile and talk about how we can foster our teams to excellence. Join us to discuss concrete takeaways to tackle these kinds of "soft" problems that can be so hard to overcome. We hope to see you there and hear your insights about this book!

Join the IndieWeb and Micro.blog communities for an evening of demos and discussions!

Thanks to Okta for sponsoring the first round of drinks!

Agile Estimating and Planning deserves a second discussion. Planning and estimating projects and their costs is here to stay in our business lives, often viewed as a necessary chore. Mike Cohn's book articulates the common mistakes that come along with creating a "project plan" - and provides practices and tools to better assess and solve business problems by iteratively planning, sizing, communicating, and executing - built on agile principles. We invite you to pick a chapter in the book that is especially interesting to you to read, and provide your insights to the group.

Join the IndieWeb and Micro.blog communities for an evening of demos and discussions!

Join the Agile Practitioners' Bookclub as we kick off 2018 with Mike Cohn's Agile Estimating & Planning! Planning is a reality for businesses. As Agile practitioners, we can use Cohn's insights to help our teams and businesses succeed! We'll be at Rogue Eastside in the Barrel Room again. Join us for some beer and conversation, won't you?

It's been a fun year getting this little book club started!

We'll wrap up the year with a holiday read: The Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision Making and maybe a year-end retrospective with some participatory decision making about what to focus on in the new year?

There are several editions of The Facilitator's Guide - they appear to get more expensive as they get more current. Me, I'm planning on reading the original, because it's a) cheaper! and b) has many, many great things said about it. Feel free to bring the copy you want - they all seem good!

Hope to see you for one last read in 2017!

We've reached out to gather 16 human-centered Portland groups into one event!

Happy Holidays! What a year! We have so much to be thankful for and so much more to look forward to in 2018. Let’s celebrate!

Human-centered meetups across Portland are joining together for drinks and networking before the holidays. Come connect with people around Portland who are passionate about human-centered principles and how it can change the way we work and live.

Come give feedback on a few ideas we have been working on for 2018 on how to bring the human-centered communities closer together.

See you there!

note: We will be reading the 2nd edition put out by Pragmatic Programmers. It is much improved from the 1st edition, even though that one was great too!

While the kickoff, launch or liftoff of a team is the first thing we do, we don't always take the time to do it well, heck, we OFTEN don't do it well. Why is that?

In Liftoff we will learn how to "launch a team with attention and intention" planning and designing our liftoff through simple and powerful steps. We'll learn about Agile chartering and how it all comes together to bring about a sense of clarity and purpose that helps teams find a clear path through the fog of the unknown that often weighs down on new teams.

We encourage you to read the book with a specific project in mind. We'll talk about it over beers and tots and we even have wall space to try our hand at Agile chartering should the mood strike us!

See you there!

Come join us again at Rogue Eastside for a discussion of Lyssa Adkins' great book, Coaching Agile Teams. We'll be looking at Part II of the book - and exploring the various stances a coach takes to the team , be it coach, facilitator, teacher, mentor. If you are familiar with the Agile Coaching Competency Framework from ACI, this book is the root of that. We look forward to having you at the discussion where we'll dig into the different stances a coach takes and over a pint we'll try out an exercise to learn more about the areas where we are collectively strong, and the areas we could stand to learn more about!

Reading: User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product - Jeff Patton

All you have to do is read a few of the Amazon reviews to know that this book is something different. Patton succinctly illustrates the power of the story mapping process and leaves you going - yeah, that! It's a short read, but for me, I was left wanting to share what I learned. You will too! We're meeting in the Barrel Room at Rogue Eastside. It's a Monday night - little different for a meet up, but should give us a quiet space to talk and play around with some story mapping! Do join us :)

Join us to chat about all things Java!

VanderHouwen is forming a Java Developer meetup on the east side at Rogue Brewery. Join Andrew and Joe on the 4th Thursday monthly for happy hour.
We’d like to purchase a couple of beers (or soft drinks) and talk about what you, as a Developer, want to see in a software meetup as we build our community.

We want to build a user group for YOU so please join us on Thursday the 27th to kick things off!

VanderHouwen is forming a Java Developer meetup on the east side at Rogue Brewery. Join Andrew and Joe on the 4th Thursday monthly for happy hour.

For this initial meetup, we’d like to purchase a couple of beers (or soft drinks) and talk about what you, as a Developer, want to see in a software meetup. We can book industry speakers for future events (and would welcome volunteers) or, have any format you wish. We want to build a user group for YOU so please join this Thursday to kick things off!