Dr. Alistair Cockburn, one of the original creators of the Manifesto for Agile Software Development was voted one of the "The All-Time Top 150 i-Technology Heroes" in 2007, for his pioneering work in use cases and agile software development. An internationally renowned IT strategist and author of the Jolt award-winning books "Agile Software Development" and "Writing Effective Use Cases", he is an expert on agile development, use cases, process design, project management, and object-oriented design. In 2001 he co-authored the Agile Manifesto, in 2003 he created the Agile Development Conference, in 2005 he co-founded the Agile Project Leadership Network, in 2010 he co-founded the International Consortium for Agile. Many of his articles, talks, poems and blog are online at http://alistair.cockburn.us.

Anthony Borton

Anthony Borton is an ALM trainer and consultant for Enhance ALM, an Australian based company specializing in helping organizations successfully adopt ALM best practices. He is a Microsoft MVP for Visual Studio ALM as well as a Microsoft Certified Trainer. Anthony is an engaging speaker with experience presenting at conferences around the world including Microsoft TechEd in the United States, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. He is the author of eight TFS 2012 training courses and delivers the most comprehensive range of TFS courses in the world today. Anthony was Australia’s first Professional Scrum Developer (.NET) Trainer and has completed over 58 Microsoft certification exams. He was one of the first people in the world to earn the new Microsoft Certified Solution Developer: Application Lifecycle Management certification. You can find out more about his courses at http://www.alm-training.com

Ben is the Director of Program Management for Visual Studio Test and Lab Management, driving the product roadmap for all of the quality focused tools and products in the Visual Studio product line. He joined Microsoft just one year ago in the India Development Center. He has over 22 years of experience in the software industry with much of the past decade being spent in cloud computing and cloud enabling technologies. He started an India Developer Center for Runaware, a cloud hosting company, where he was CTO and VP of Engineering. In the past he has also been an Architect at Citrix and ViewSoft working on application servers for the Internet and enterprises, and a software developer on projects ranging from real time embedded systems and robotics control to LOB apps. Ben was granted a patent for UI remoting algorithms. He is passionate about technology, development practices and music. He spends most of his spare time with his wife and two year old son.

Brian is a Principal Technical Evangelist for Microsoft specializing in Visual Studio and application lifecycle management. Brian has presented at conferences all over the world and has managed several early adopter programs for emerging Microsoft technologies. Brian is a regular personality on MSDN’s Channel 9 web site, and is co-host of the popular show This Week on Channel 9. Brian has also co-authored several books on software development, including Professional Application Lifecycle Management with Visual Studio 2012 and Professional Team Foundation Server 2012.

David is a Microsoft Certified Trainer at TechnologyOne, one of Australia's largest ISV's. Over the past 15 years, David has been working with development teams in many large organisations within Australia and the UK in a range of industries such as Government, Banking and Finance. Most recently David has been promoting software craftsmanship and the adoption of agile development methodologies within TechnologyOne to streamline and continually improve their application life-cycle management processes.

Edwin is well known in the NZ IT scene for his passion and energy for improving how we deliver software. He has been individually responsible for training hundreds of people and countless organisations in the application of Agile practices.

Edwin’s company Clarus was acquired by Assurity Consulting last year. He now runs Education business unit which offers one of the most comprehensive range of Agile training and coaching services in the southern hemisphere. 

Scott is the CEO of Adscale Laboratories Ltd, a Christchurch based development house that creates the technology platform for Adscale GmbH, a leading European online advertising marketplace. Today Adscale's marketplace reaches 45 million German internet users and delivers 300 million ad impressions per day.

An exponent of Agile methodologies and XP practices, Scott has helped grow Adscale from a greenfields startup in 2007 to its current development operation of 35 colleagues spread across 4 Scrum teams. Scott's enthusiasm for collaborative workplaces has triggered a new-found interest in applying Agile principals to organisational governance.

Scott is a seasoned IT professional with 20 years experience working with tech startup companies. Prior to Adscale Scott was a Product Manager at Syft Technologies Ltd and before that spent 5 years as Technical Director of a U.K. based telecommunications startup.

Gareth Evans

Gareth is a senior consultant with Assurit Consulting and has over 15 years’ experience in the IT industry, including more than a decade in London where he first put his degree in Economics to use as a software developer. He gained experience in the banking industry on numerous large IT projects from front office investment banking to wholesale banking compliance as both a developer and team leader.

During his time in the UK, Gareth also gained an MSc in Computing Science, including a thesis on evolutionary algorithms. His last UK role as an Agile Software Coach at BBC Worldwide allowed him to specialise in Kanban and Lean while participating in a highly successful case study as a member of the first team at BBC WW (and BBC) to transition to Kanban. "I believe it will be one of the most significant papers in Software Engineering this decade" - David Anderson.

Gareth is a Certified Scaled Agile Framework Program Consultant (SPC), Cognitive Edge Advanced Practitioner, Scrum Master (CSM) and an Advanced Kanban for Software Engineering practitioner trained by David Anderson. Gareth is a speaker at both NZ and international Agile/Lean events including LSSC and Agile Australia.

Jeff makes use of over 18 years experience with a wide variety of products from on-line aircraft parts ordering to electronic medical records to help organizations improve the way they work.  Where many development processes focus on delivery speed and efficiency, Jeff balances those concerns with the need for building products that deliver exceptional value and marketplace success.

Jeff currently works as a co-founder and principle consultant for Comakers LLC.  He’s an agile process coach, product design coach, and instructor.  Current articles, essays, and presentations can be found at www.AgileProductDesign.com  His writing appears in StickyMinds.com, Better Software Magazine, IEEE Software, Alistair Cockburn’s Book Crystal Clear, and his forthcoming book User Story Mapping from O’Reilly press.  Jeff’s a Certified Scrum Trainer, and winner of the Agile Alliance’s 2007 Gordon Pask Award for contributions to Agile Development. 

Kate is the People Development Coach for PayGlobal. Specialising in learning and development, she is driven to see individuals and teams thrive and to achieve optimal results for the business. Kate is passionate about the benefits of Agile and is committed to the development, promotion and continuous improvement of Agile HR practice.

Leon is a Developer and Certified Scrum Master at Statistics New Zealand, a government department and New Zealand’s national statistical office. Statistics New Zealand is a major source of official statistics and leader of the official statistics system.
Leon has also been a co-organizer of the Christchurch Agile Professionals Network helping organize sessions about Agile Practices and Lean Software Development in the Christchurch area.

Leonie is Manager, Service Development & Deployment, at the Information Management and Communications Technology Unit at Christchurch City Council, a position which she has held since November 2009. During this time, she has lead a sizeable team of developers to roll out many projects and has also lead the adoption of Agile Development at the Council. This has been a particularly challenging time in Christchurch as everyone knows, with over 11,000 earthquakes being recorded since the first in September 2010.

Leonie first introduced Scrum 12 months ago as part of replacing the Council's outdated Consent Management system. Consulting Agile coaches were first engaged to help with practical implementation which gave Leonie more time to focus on building an Agile culture across team leaders and staff alike. The first system release, which provides online lodgement of consent applications, went live in October just 6 months after the first Scrum sprint began. The completed new Building Consents system is planned to go live by April 2013, which will be soon followed by a new Resource Consenting system. These substantial projects have involved mass data migration and many new business processes with a significant number of integrations being required to work in with other council systems. Scrum has been highly instrumental in ensuring that benefits were delivered early to a business unit tackling increasing levels of complexity and much larger volumes of consents.

In November 2012, Leonie received the national 2012 ALGIM Excellence In Leadership Award in recognition of these achievements. She describes the award as a tribute to her staff and a reflection of the character and strong team culture which has grown at the Council in response to the consequences of dealing with the many different outcomes of the city enduring a major natural disaster.

Mike describes himself as an advocate for continuous improvement and Agile delivery. He is a man who walks the talk. An Agile coach who’s in it for more than just a trendy label, in fact he’s the opposite of trendy labels. A Scrum Master with practical experience to share.
Mike first saw the light of Agile 8 years ago while working as a senior project manager at the BBC and since moving to NZ he has brought light, productivity and effective Agile processes to a range of government and private sector clients.

Martin Kearns

Martin Kearns is the National Capability Lead for Agile services at SMS MT. An experienced technology professional, Martin has over 18 years of industry experience. Martin is leading the development of an enterprise Agile capability within SMS to support the business strategies of a diverse set of clients. He is a pioneer in the field of Scrum, being one of the first three Scrum Coaches to be certified in the world.

Martin's forte is in the coaching of individuals and organisations to improve their application of the Agile process and to build high performance teams. He has an infectious passion for Agile and is heavily involved with the community. He co-authored the CSC Whitepaper, is part of the coaching board for the Scrum Alliance, and is a CSC/CSP Examiner. Martin has a strong technical background moving over into a more consultant role after moving to Australia, where is love and passion for Agile practice began.

Owen Evans, Xero's Chief Architect, has been with the company for more than 5 years and seen it grow from a seed of a company to one that's taking on the world. His day to day role sees him ingrained in the process of releasing software in a timely manner while maintaining a high bar of quality and design. He's been preaching the benefits of agile for far too long and can't believe we still have to have the discussion.

Rashina Hoda

Dr. Rashina Hoda leads the Software Engineering Processes Tools and Applications (SEPTA) research group in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at The University of Auckland where she teaches an industry-based course on Agile and Lean software development. She received her PhD in Computer Science from Victoria University of Wellington, NZ and a Bachelors in Computer Science from Louisiana State University, USA. Her research has been published in the IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, Empirical Software Engineering, Information and Software Technology Journals, and in XP20xx, Agile20xx, ICSE, OOPSLA, EuroPLoP conferences. Rashina serves as the Research Chair for the Agile India conference and enjoys presenting the "voice of Agile research" to practitioners and academics alike. www.rashina.com

Rob is a founding trainer with Scrum.org. He is one of only a handful of trainers worldwide who are qualified and experienced enough to be able to teach the entire Scrum.org curriculum of courses. He is currently an Agile coach. Rob has run both technical and Scrum training extensively throughout SE Asia.
Rob is also one of the few Accredited Kanban Trainers (AKT's) with David Andersons Lean Kanban University. This means that he can teach Accredited Kanban Practioner Training. With over 15 years of software development experience he has a history of leading change in large organisations. Rob has helped several companies transition to Kanban & Scrum and improve their software development lifecycle using solid ALM practices. Rob is a regular presenter at industry events such as Agile Dev West, Tech-Ed, Code Camp and various conferences worldwide.

Todd likes to deliver software - regularly, reliably and with minimal fuss. He works as a consultant, coach or simply as part of a delivery team. As a consultant his work is heavily inflected by work of the Don Reinertsen's work on flow whether it be using waterfall, scrum or kanban techniques. As a coach or in development, his technical practices are centered around the trinity of continuous delivery, test-driven development and pairing and is always looking for tooling to best support this. Most recently, he has been researching the application of hypermedia/REST architectural styles.

Damian Brady

Damian is a Solution Architect who runs the Brisbane office for SSW, one of Australia’s leading Microsoft consultancies.

A developer and trainer with a wide skillset, his consulting work varies from developing web apps in ASP.NET MVC and JavaScript to training and mentoring developers in Scrum and TFS.  He loves working with development teams to get the most out of Scrum and ensure project success. He’s also the co-author and co-presenter of SSW’s "Enterprise MVC" course which sold out in 4 Australian cities.

Damian is very active in the Australian software development community, running both the Brisbane .Net User Group and the annual DeveloperDeveloperDeveloper Brisbane conference.  When he’s not in Brisbane, he can often be found speaking at user groups or running training courses all around the country.

Michael Whitehead

Michael has spent close to twenty years in the data world, and is CEO and co-founder of WhereScape, a globally successful data warehouse software company.  His introduction to the agile world was driven by customers as they requested help in applying these principles to their data world.   Michael has presented in the USA, Europe and New Zealand on the topics of agile data warehousing, agile business intelligence and data warehouse automation.