Agile Coach Camp U.S. - Saturday (#accus)

I missed the Friday session. I worked a full day in Des Moines and then drove 11 hours (and into an earlier time zone) overnight. I only arrived this morning at about 4:30 or so and got parked and checked in. I slept from a little after 5 until 7, and then got up and headed to the conference after falling down some stairs and finally finding the conference site.

Even tired, slightly battered, and a little frustrated, I had a wonderful day.

I was pleased to meet up with many great coaches, devs, managers, and non-IT people here. I even have some new "new best friends."

The morning sessions involved growing learning cultures, integrating project teams, and systems thinking. They were had great questions, wonderful discussions, and prankish humor. It was a great morning.

I had intended to participate in the afternoon sessions, but the first one (on complacence, coincidentally) I missed to talk about other passions of mine with some of my coaching friends of old, and some brand new ones. We talked about coaching psychology, whether our coaching was necessarily agile, and how to avoid "going native."

Entirely without any intention to do so, I missed all of the afternoon sessions. It was a really great time, though, and the contacts are very important to me.

Tomorrow I'm running two sessions of the three time slots available, so I guess I can't miss much.

In the morning we're cataloging pair programming patterns, and in the last session of the day we're playtesting an agile version of Eno's "Oblique Strategies."

There is a lot of interest in a new site/blog for posting and analyzing code, in the strategies deck, in Agile In A Flash, and in the new pair programming work that Jim Hood and I are starting to work on. I have great stuff to do and need to get cracking.

I'm hoping to move one of my sessions so I can join George Dinwiddie and friends in a talk about metrics, but we'll see in the morning. I even had a minute or two with Lisa Crispin.

I can recommend ACCUS for everyone in the business or in its periphery as a great meeting of minds. I'm tired, and yet it has kept me energized all day.