The Empire State Building-the tallest building in the world for over forty years-took just 13½ months to build. Amazing as this may seem today, it was not remarkable at the time; most skyscrapers were built in about a year. How did they do that? In those days, cash flow was more important than cost, and schedule routinely trumped scope. The paradigm was the inverse of Parkinson's Law-work should contract to fit the time allotted. Today, Parkinson's Law is alive and well in current scheduling approaches that break work down into tasks, estimate the tasks, and sum up the result. This approach invites work on each task to expand to fit the estimated time. Mary Poppendieck will show why you should not ask, "How long will this take?", but ask instead, "What can be done by this date?" You will learn how to accomplish more with less by applying cash flow thinking and turning Parkinson's Law upside down.

Agile methods put a great deal of emphasis on trust, empowerment, and collaboration. Agile moves us away from command and control project management toward an approach designed to harness the passion, creativity, and enthusiasm of the team. A successful transition to agile project management hinges largely on how well traditional project managers are able to adopt new ways of thinking about project structure and control. Building on the principles of PMI® and the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), Mike will explore how a PMP can adapt their knowledge and experience to become an effective agile project leader. Mike will tackle the hidden assumptions behind the PMBOK and explore a more agile approach to managing time, cost, and scope. He will take an in-depth look at the PMI Processes and Knowledge areas and explore how to adapt them to agile projects.

"Are you done yet?" The answer to this question may sink your career, your team, and your project. If you respond with a "yes," you may be forced to take on additional work you can't handle. If you say "no," you may be branded as someone who can't get things done. Mitch Lacey notes that this innocent question is asked countless times on almost every software project. Establishing an upfront, common understanding of "done" can save teams and businesses countless hours of rework, process-thrash, unclear communication, and hidden work. Mitch describes what a "done list" is, how it adds value, and the value it communicates to stakeholders. Mitch takes you through an exercise on how to establish a common understanding of done and provides an exercise that you can use with your project teams.

Although the Agile Manifesto has worked well to help many organizations change the way they build software, the agile movement is now suffering from some backsliding, lots of overselling, and a resulting backlash. Brian Marick believes that is partly because the Agile Manifesto is almost entirely focused outwardly—it talks to the business about how the development team will work with it. What it does not talk about is how the team must work within itself and with the code. Even though those omissions were appropriate then, now more is needed. Teams starting agile need to know that more discipline is required of them, and that discipline is fruitless without a strong emphasis on skills. Teams need to recognize that success is not just fulfilling requirements. It is also increasing productivity and decreasing the consequences of mistakes.