The Agile Facilitator: Catalyzing Collaboration, Delivering Results

An Immersion into Professional Facilitation for Agilists

The Agile Facilitator  is a two and one-half day class (compressed into 2 calendar days) for experienced Agilists who wish to dramatically increase their facilitation skills in general, especially as applied to Agile ceremonies, collaborative events, and other team “moments of truth.” The workshop will focus on professional facilitation skills and techniques as applied specifically within the Agile context.

Who Will Benefit from the Class

  • Beginning ScrumMasters, Agile Project Managers or Iteration Managers well versed in the agile basics and who have experienced an agile team
  • Experienced ScrumMasters, Agile Project Managers or Iteration Managers
  • Agile Coaches who want increased facilitation skills and results
  • Anyone interested in bringing more rigor and structure to their facilitation of Agile ceremonies and other collaborative events

Prerequisites

This is decidedly not a beginning agile class, but also not an advanced one. It is an intermediate course for practitioners with at least 3 months of hands-on agile experience. You should also be grounded in Agile Fundamentals (ICAgile Certified Professional), a Certified ScrumMaster, or equivalent agile training because the course builds directly on your agile team experience.

Outcomes the Class Will Produce

While mastering facilitation skills in the Agile context will require both time and practice, our class will allow you to:

  • Gain an in-depth and practical understanding of a wide array of techniques practiced by professional facilitators.
  • Understand and practice the art of collaborative meeting design, including the importance of smart preparation that will reduce overall cost and increase the effectiveness of your meetings.
  • Practice techniques for skillfully facilitating core Agile meetings and ceremonies with playfulness and a collaborative spirit, while still focused on key deliverables.
  • Gain rich, well-delivered feedback on your growing facilitation skills.
  • Give you ideas for designing meetings in which the team interacts with the team so they can do the heavy-lifting.
  • Understand how to address some of the dysfunctional behaviors you see preventing your team from achieving maximum success.
  • Learn how to define, discuss, and ACHIEVE consensus with the team for faster and better decision making.
  • Come away with your own facilitator self-development plan.

In addition,

  • This class satisfies the Agile Team Facilitator portion of classroom learning for the ICAgile Coaching & Facilitation track.
  • 16 Scrum Alliance SEUs toward the Certified Scrum Professional (CSP) level.
  • 16 PMI PDUs.

Foundational Models

  • ICAgile Team Facilitator learning objectives
  • Core IAF Facilitator Competencies
  • ACI’s Agile Coaching Competency Model

Certifications

  • The Agile Facilitator is accredited by the International Consortium for Agile (ICAgile) as fulfilling all Learning Objectives in the Team Facilitation track. To receive the ICAgile Continuing Education Certification, you must not miss more than 1 hour of class. Learn more at ICAgile.
  • The Agile Facilitator is also approved by the Scrum Alliance and yields 16 SEUs toward your Certified Scrum Professional (CSP) or to support your existing Scrum Alliance certifications, such as the CSM. Learn more at the Scrum Alliance.
  • Any learning in Agile is typically acceptable to the Project Management Institute as continuing education. The Agile Facilitator yields 16 PDUs that you can claim toward your PMI-ACP or to support your existing PMI certifications, such as the PMP. Learn more at the PMI.

Logistics

Length: Two and one-half days (compressed into 2 calendar days)

Hours: Day 1:  9 am to 8 pm.  Day 2:  9 am to 5 pm.

Morning beverages, lunch, an afternoon snack  and dinner on Day 1 are provided.