Benefits of Business Agility in a Post-Covid World

According to multiple articles, Organizations that are being agile have been able to pivot much more easily during the Covid era than Organizations who are not Agile. 

What’s Been Your Product Owner Journey?

Being a Product Owner is an integral part of any Agile Organization. Everyone’s journey to the Product Owner role (Accountabilities) is very different. Some come from the business side of the Organization, some from technology, and some from a variety of different backgrounds. Whether you were recruited into a Product Owner role or transitioned from product management, the Product Owner is one of the most critical roles in Scrum. As one of the top 20 growing jobs in the US, now is the ideal time to get your Product Owner or Advanced certifications! 

Join Braintrust President Kate Megaw, CST, to learn about Product Owner career paths and hear from Product Owners about their Product Owner journey. Come prepared with questions on how you can develop your Product Owner career! 

What’s Been Your Scrum Master Journey?

Like any path worth traveling, the Scrum Master career path is anything but linear. Maybe you started as a Project Manager and transitioned into a Scrum Master role. Or maybe you’re not technical and hesitant to start #YourAgileJourney, despite wanting to be a Scrum Master. Join Braintrust President Kate Megaw CST, to hear stories about Scrum Master career paths, learn about speed bumps encountered along the way, and discuss the benefits of advanced certifications.

Do We Even Need a Product Owner?

“Do we really need a single Product Owner?” “I didn’t realize Product Owners had such an important role!” In this session led by Kate Megaw, Braintrust President and CST, and Anu Smalley, CST, we’ll take a deep dive into the Product Owner role to reinforce the importance of having a designated Product Owner.

We’ll introduce a Product Owner Action Plan and explore the four characteristics of a Product Owner and how to balance them effectively.

Do We Build, Borrow, or Buy a Product Owner?

Last month, we discussed the importance of having a Product Owner in your Organization. In this webinar, we will explore different ways of filling the roll of Product Owner. Braintrust President Kate Megaw, CST will lead you through a custom flow chart to determine whether you build, buy, or borrow a Product Owner.

Certified Scrum Masters outside of software? Is that even a thing?

Join Braintrust President Kate Megaw, CST as she explores the role of Scrum Masters in non-software environments. She’ll look at the skillset needed for a Scrum Master and gives examples of Certified Scrum Masters who are in advertising, HR, librarians, and parents. “Can I be a CSM and not work in software? Do I need to have a technical background to have my Scrum Master Certification?” Come prepared with questions on how becoming a CSM will benefit both you and your organization!

Build, Buy, or Borrow? How to Approach Finding a Well-Trained Scrum Master

April 16

1-2 p.m. CST

Last month, we discussed the overwhelming need for a Scrum Master in your Organization. In this webinar, we will explore different ways of filling the roll of Scrum Master. Cathy Simpson, CST will lead you through a custom flow chart to determine whether you build, buy, or borrow a Scrum Master.

Register here!

Do You Truly Understand Your Core Customers?

Join Braintrust President Kate Megaw as she explores Personas & Empathy maps as a way to truly understand your customers.

This will be more workshop than webinar so active participation will be needed! We will be in Zoom Breakout Rooms and using MURAL templates to create Braintrust Customer Personas and then do Empathy Maps for those Customer Segments.

So, if you’ve ever wondered what a persona is, or how to do an empathy Map, please join us and learn first-hand!

Do We Even Need a Scrum Master?

“We don’t need a Scrum Master, do we?” or “What do Scrum Masters do, anyway?” You may have heard these questions in the past, or even posed them yourself. In this session led by Cathy Simpson, CST, we’ll dive into the nitty gritty of the Scrum Master role to illuminate the true value of having a Scrum Master.

We’ll introduce a Scrum Master checklist and explore the different ways a Scrum Master can impact their organization through facilitation, mentoring, training and coaching (hint: it’s not just the engineers!).

What in the World are Accountabilities? How to Avoid Chaos on Your Scrum Team

We used to talk about the “roles” in Scrum, but since the 2020 Scrum Guide, the word “accountabilities” has been introduced. But what exactly does that mean?

In this session led by Ben Floyd, Agile Coach, we’ll take a deep dive into the three Scrum Accountabilities—Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Developer. You’ll leave with a better understanding of who exactly is responsible for what, helping avoid chaos on your Team!

How to Build a Culture of Accountability

Watch as Braintrust President Kate Megaw and Braintrust Agile Coach Ben Floyd explore the link between Empowerment and High Performing Teams. Together, we examine ways to increase Employee Engagement and talk about how Accountability is the essential link between empowerment & engagement!

Signs and Impact of Psychological Safety in the Workplace

With all the chaos that is going on in the world, we feel the timing is right to talk about the psychological safety in the workplace. We will touch on what motivates us, and explore signs of psychological danger or safety in the workplace. Our goal is to open the conversation and bring awareness to its importance, signs, and impacts.

This webinar will be led by Digital Transformation Lead and Agile Coach David Lokietz. He’s been in technology for 30+ years. He has a passion for helping grow high performing individuals and teams. During these crazy times he wanted to share the importance of psychological safety as well as the impact on individuals, teams and their organizations.

Leadership for High Performance Teams

Has your team’s performance plateaued? Do they struggle to collaborate? Do you have the leadership skills to help the team improve? Identifying your team’s strengths and dysfunctions is one step in the right direction. Our coaches Jeff and Bill will help you discover Agile leadership mindsets and behaviors that can be used to promote continuous team cohesion and collaboration. We’ll share some key tools for how to collaborate as a leadership team in developing a positive work environment to promote desired team behaviors.

Where are you on #YourAgileJourney?

Kick off the new year by planning out #YourAgileJourney. Join our panelists, Braintrust Agile Advisors Allyson Bowers, Kristyn Bara, and Scott Dunbar, and Braintrust President Kate Megaw, as they discuss in detail the different Agile paths to certification. Explore with them the personality traits that fit best with each certification journey. Come prepared to ask the Agile Advisors any questions, learn different ways to earn SEUs and PDUS, and get the latest information on Agile certification paths.

2020 Retrospectives Webinar

Wow—2020 was a doozie for most of us. Let’s take an opportunity to STOP (Stop, Take a breath, Observe what happened in 2020, Plan for 2021)….

Most of us are familiar with team or departmental retrospectives. So let’s take an opportunity to explore personal & organization-wide retrospectives.

Let’s explore personal retrospective techniques for us to explore what we might want to do differently in 2021.

Let’s look at techniques that we could use as an organization so that we can become more Agile as an organization in 2021.

Join us with your Post-It notes and pen for this 90-minute workshop session!

Diving into the Changes of the Scrum Guide

Join the Braintrust Trainers and Coaches on a deep dive into the new Scrum Guide changes and how they will affect you.

Come ask questions and hear their insights!

#YourAgileJourney….What is the Real Value of Certifications?

Join Kate Megaw (President of The Braintrust Group) & Howard (Co-CEO and Chief Product Officer of Scrum Alliance) for a discussion on the latest certification paths from the Scrum Alliance.

There continues to be debate around the “Value of Certifications,” so Kate & Howard will address why certifications are important to #YourAgileJourney, and answer any questions you may have.

Are You A Cook or a Chef? 4 Reasons Why You Need to Step Up #YourAgileJourney

Are you following recipes or are you creating recipes – in our case, are we blindly following other’s frameworks or co-creating our own frameworks and processes?

In this online webinar, Miljan Bajic, CEC, CST, will share why we need to further develop our skills and how to keep up with the increasing complexity in our work environment.

Holding People Accountable…. Without Micromanaging Them!

Our goal in Agile is self-managing, self-organizing teams, accountable teams. So how do we help team get there?

Join Ben Floyd to explore 6 Strategies for Holding People Accountable…. Without Micromanaging Them!

Business Agility—Let’s Go!

Hosted by Kate Megaw and Ben Floyd

Now more than ever, companies and organizations are needing to be Agile to adapt to the rapid changes around us. While the mindset and actions should be engrained in any strong organization, the term “Business Agility” is still somewhat new. That’s where this session comes in!

This session will explore the Principles of Business Agility. We will also explore the benefits of Business Agility, and how you can use them to help your organization inspect and adapt rapidly in these uncertain times.

What the Heck is Business Agility?

We’ll examine the definition of Business Agility and go over the 10 principles of Business Agility you can bring back to your organization to help them go, “Oh, I get it!”

Business Agility: What is it? Who Needs it? Does my Organization’s Culture Support it?

Inspecting & Adapting to Online Virtual Training: The First 90 days

August 13, 12 p.m. CDT

Are you hosting a lot of meetings online? Are you having meetings over 1 hour? 2 hours? All day online? Calling all Scrum Masters, Product Owners and Agile Leaders, come join us and learn 15 useful, practical tips for hosting an online meeting. Come hear the lessons we have learned at Braintrust from being online during our first 90 days hosting meetings online nearly every day and take away these 15 pragmatic tips to get the most out of your online virtual meetings!

Register here.

Let’s Continue the Conversation – Women of Color in Agile

‘Women don’t need to find a voice, they have a voice, and they need to feel empowered to use it, and people need to be encouraged to listen. ‘ – Meghan Markle


Join Anu, Kate, Shika and Camelia as they share their stories of their Agile journey.

Come share your stories and let’s continue to make our voices matter.

Voices of Agile Open Forum August

Tuesday, August 4

2 p.m. – 4 p.m. CDT

Braintrust will be hosting our second Voices of Agile open forum August 4, from 2-4pm (CDT), facilitated by Braintrust Trainer and Coach, Anu Smalley. We invite you to join us and add your voice to the conversation.

We want to generate conversation with people of color in our industry regarding issues of representation and other pertinent topics related to bringing Agile into underrepresented communities.

Register here! 

Agile Leadership – Does Gender Matter?

In this webinar, hosted by Braintrust Certified Agile Leadership Educator Kate Megaw, CST, and Anu Smalley, CST, this session is not about Gender Bashing. It is about Gender parity, more particularly the data around gender parity in leadership.

It will explore the facts around parity and what we can all do to help make it less of an issue.

Shifting the Mindset—An Agile Leadership Approach to Growth Webinar

In this webinar, hosted by Braintrust Certified Agile Leadership Educator Kate Megaw, CST, and Anu Smalley, CST, we will explore the mindset shift required for Agile Leaders.

We will explore the concept of a Leader as a Coach, and will differentiate between Mentoring and Coaching.

Engaging with Your Agile Community Webinar

More now than ever, it’s key that we continue to find new ways to connect with each other and continue our Agile learning.

Join this Lean Coffee-style discussion which will have a participant-driven agenda. Hope to see you there to chat through how to engage and stay engaged in the Agile community.

Agile for the Rest of Us Webinar

So much we read and hear focuses on Agile for Software Development Teams. Well what about the rest of us?

In partnership with Elaine Morley, Certified Scrum Master (CSM) and L&D Professional, this workshop will introduce you to basic Agile standards and principles and talk about examples where Agile has been used outside of software.

Virtual Onboarding: Hits, Misses and Key Insights

In the last few months we have embraced a new way of working. Have onboarding programs innovated to follow suit? How is virtual onboarding done at your company or on your team?

Join this panel discussion to learn and share about what has been a hit, what hasn’t gone so well and a few key insights.

Virtual Agile Team Kickoff or Reset

In this session hosted by Anu Smalley, CST, you will learn 6 things you need to do to kick off a new Agile team or reset an existing Scrum Team virtually.

Spend time with your fellow attendees creating a team launch plan that you can use with your teams.

How to Create A Great Virtual Meeting Experience

Have you been wondering what more you can do to create an engaging and fun virtual learning experience? Braintrust Team Members Bill and Tanya will lead you through this hands-on webinar and show you different ways to keep your team engaged and entertained. 

Agile Beyond IT

What is Agile, and how can different departments and companies benefit from it?

Whether you are in education, marketing, HR, etc., join us to explore how an Agile approach can give you a market advantage!

From Chaos to Calm—Taming Your To Do List

Are you struggling to get from chaos to calm? Join Braintrust President Kate Megaw as she explores some of the personal organization tools you can use to help you move from reactive mode to proactive mode. Come armed with Post-Its and a pen!

Agile and WFH Teams Panel Discussion

In light of current events, COVID-19 is forcing many teams to move to embrace distributed and #suddenyremote work.

In this panel session, we’ll learn how a few companies are adapting to the new environment and consider a few challenges they are facing along the way.

How to Be Agile at Home

Hosted by Kate Megaw, CST

When everything feels crazy, it’s good to use Agile methods to bring structure to your life.

Join us for a discussion with the Braintrust Team on how they’re adopting Agile at home with their families.

Virtual Class Roundtable with Braintrust Trainers

Have you been wondering if a Braintrust Virtual Class is right for you?

Join us for a discussion with Braintrust Trainers as they give you an inside peek on how Braintrust Virtual Classes run, share their highlights and struggles, and answer questions from the audience!

Tips on How to Work Remotely

Presented by Ben Floyd, CSP

Join us for a discussion with Braintrust Trainer Ben Floyd for tips on how to work remotely. We will go over everything from how to create your own Kanban Board to how to keep your kids or partner out of your hair during conference calls! You’ll earn 1 free SEU/PDU for listening in!

How Scrum Teams Work Remotely

Presented by Ben Floyd, CSP

With the sudden disruption in our daily lives, how can a Scrum Team work together remotely?

Join us for a discussion about the characteristics of a Scrum Team that will succeed in these challenging times.

Sharing the Agile Mindset

Presented by Bill Schaller, CSP

Steps to Fantastic Facilitation!

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP

Do you think you’re already a strong facilitator? Are you familiar with the five facilitative listening techniques?

This webinar explores facilitation for CSMs, CSPOs, and everyone within an organization!

Retrospectives That Don’t Suck!

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP

Is your team wanting to skip retrospectives because they don’t see the purpose? Does your retrospective turn into a major bitching session? This webinar explores different retrospective suggestions for individuals, teams, and organizations! 

Webinar: Introduction to Business Agility

Presented by Rikki Schwartz | President of The Center for Agile Leadership

“Business Agility”—we’re hearing that expression more these days. This webinar takes a look at the following questions: What is Business Agility? Who is it for? What are the values? 

Bringing a Product to Market—A Case Study for Braintrust On Demand

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP

Webinar: Creating Psychological Safety in Technical Teams

Presented by Erick Fleming, CSM, CSD, MCSD, JCD | Certified Scrum Development Leader 

Learn the concepts and importance of psychological safety, plus tips on creating it in technical teams. Join us at Braintrust with Coach and Trainer, Erick Fleming.

Webinar: Tips and Tricks For Scrum Tools

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP, CAL | President

Are you struggling to size your backlog, having trouble getting through your to-do list each day, or struggling with writing good user stories? Here are some helpful tips for utilizing Scrum tools. 

Webinar: Introverts in an Agile Environment

Presented by Rikki Schwartz | The Center For Agile Leadership® President

Join to learn how to differentiate introverts from extroverts (it’s harder than it seems!), how introverts work and think, and how to harness the power that they quietly possess.

Webinar: How to Measure the Health of Your Scrum Team

Presented by Ben Floyd, CSP

Listen to this discussion on how to measure the health of your Scrum Team using 10 separate measurements that give teams a way to track performance, improvements, and regressions over time.

Webinar: Intro to Dev Ops – What It Is and What it Isn’t

Presented by Erick Fleming, CSM, CSD, MCSD, JCD | Certified Scrum Development Leader

This webinar provides a brief overview of DevOps and how it is helping organizations deliver value to customers in a safe, reliable, and quick fashion. 

Webinar: Transparency isn’t just for Teams

Presented by Brian Rabon, CST, PMP | 

This webinar explores dream statements for your organization and looks at tools such as corporate scorecards, holding team members accountable to one number, and 90-day targets.

Webinar: Effective Participation with Stakeholders

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP | Braintrust President

This webinar will explore ways to identify your stakeholders, facilitate stakeholder discussions, and involve stakeholders so they support an effective iterative delivery. 

Webinar: A State of Being—What Does Agile Really Mean?

Presented by Tom Mellor, CST

We’ll take a critical look at what Agility should mean, and the types of supporting patterns and anti-patterns that we should look for in an organization that claims to be Agile. 

Webinar: Scrum vs. Kanban – How Does an Agile Team Choose?

Presented by Brett Palmer, CST, PMP 

Brett Palmer will use real-life examples from his own extensive Agile experience to discuss the differences between Scrum and Kanban to help you and your Agile team decide which is better suited for you.

Webinar: The 4 Ps of Product Management

Presented by Anu Smalley, CST

Agile Product Management has provided techniques, patterns, and mindsets that have proven useful in organizations. This webinar will go over the 4 Ps of Product Management.

Webinar: Certification Maintenance, Renewals, and SEUs

Presented by Braintrust President Kate Megaw and Global Certification Manager TJay Gerber

Review the new certification renewal, requirements, and fees that went into effect on February 4, 2019. 

Webinar: Raving Retrospectives

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP | Braintrust President

There is something in this session for everyone; from beginners with no retrospective experience, to experienced coaches wanting to expand their “toolbox!”

Webinar: Fantastic Feedback – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly!

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP | Braintrust President

This webinar explores giving and receiving personal feedback and feedback for teams. We will look at appreciation, coaching, and evaluation as feedback techniques for individuals.

Webinar: Test-Driven Development (TDD) for the Non-technical

Presented by Erick Fleming, CSM, CSD, MCSD, JCD | Certified Scrum Development Leader

In this webinar, you will gain an understanding of TDD, including the pros/cons and strategies for adopting the practice. 

Express Webinar: Scrum@Scale Essentials

Presented by Steven Martin

Scrum@Scale focuses on the organization as a whole. In this webinar, you will learn the various components of the Scrum@Scale framework, such as scaled roles, scaled events, and enterprise artifacts. 

Webinar: Take Control of Your Technical Debt

Webinar: The Authentic Self and Leadership Style

Presented by Anu Smalley, CST | Certified Scrum Trainer & Agile Coach

In this in-depth webinar, you will learn more about the “authentic leadership” approach to management and hear our recommended steps towards improving your leadership style to be a more Agile leader.

Concrete Actions I Can Take To Influence My Organizational Culture

Presented by Brian Rabon, CST, PMP | Braintrust CEO

This webinar explores the ways that authentic, value-driven, cultures make the difference between doing Agile and BEING Agile. Learn specifically what you can do to influence the culture of your organization.

Enhancing Team Collaboration and Performance

Presented by Bill Schaller, CSP, CSM, CSPO, CAL

In this webinar, we look at Royal Rumble, Crisis Junkie and Bobble Head teams to understand the nature of teams gone awry.

How Do I Show Real Progress on an Agile Project

Presented by Fred Mastropasqua, CST, CS@ST, CSP, PMI-ACP

Join us in this webinar as we break down real world examples of showing a project’s status and giving updates on an Agile project.

How to Facilitate a Meeting Even You Want to Attend

Presented by Kate Megaw, CST, PMP | Braintrust President

Listen as Braintrust President, Kate Megaw reviews her favorite techniques for running more efficient, more effective meetings.