Aug 30
30m 35s
In this BONUS episode, we explore the upcoming Agile Tour Vienna 2025 (get your ticket now!) with three passionate organizers who are bringing together the Austrian agile community for a day of learning, networking, and innovation. Join us as we dive into what makes this community-driven event special, the challenges facing today's agile practitioners, and why local connections matter more than ever in our evolving professional landscape.
"For me, it's really about creating an event from the community for the community. So at the Agile Tour Vienna we really pay a lot of attention that the contributions are made by community members." - Sabina Lammert
The foundation of Agile Tour Vienna lies in its commitment to authentic community engagement. Unlike corporate-led conferences focused on sales and marketing, this event prioritizes genuine knowledge sharing and peer-to-peer learning. The organizers emphasize creating space for meaningful conversations, where participants don't just consume content but actively contribute to discussions and support one another with real-world challenges. This approach fosters an intimate atmosphere where attendees leave with valuable professional connections and practical insights they can immediately apply.
"This local aspect is very important, but then it needs to be enhanced by bringing in ideas from people from the outside world." - Robert Ruzitschka
Agile Tour Vienna strikes a unique balance between showcasing local Austrian talent and bringing in internationally renowned speakers. The event features a carefully curated mix of practical experiences from Vienna-based practitioners working directly with teams and companies, combined with keynotes from global thought leaders. This blend creates opportunities for attendees to understand both the local context of agile implementation and broader industry trends, making the learning experience both immediately relevant and strategically valuable.
"We make sure we have a good diversity within the speakers. We also take care that we have a good mix, because for me, agile started with the engineering practices." - Richard Brenner
The 2025 program demonstrates attention to creating a comprehensive learning experience. The organizers ensure language accessibility by maintaining at least one English track throughout the day while also offering German sessions. The content spans from technical engineering practices to team coaching and business strategy, reflecting agile's evolution across organizational levels. The event takes place in a stunning castle location (Auersperg Palace) that enhances the intimate, family-like atmosphere the organizers work hard to cultivate.
"Agile Tour Vienna is never aiming to go big, but to stay small and familiar. By the end of the day, you know new people." - Sabina Lammert
This year's highlights include keynotes from Dave Farley on engineering excellence and Mirella Muse on product operations, plus an innovative Comic Agile storytelling workshop. The organizers deliberately limit attendance to maintain the conference's intimate character, ensuring meaningful networking opportunities rather than overwhelming crowds. Additional touches like a professional barista bar and ample space for informal conversations between sessions create an environment where genuine professional relationships can develop.
"The biggest challenge is that we go from concept-based agility to context-based agility. Companies realize the world is complex. There is no one framework to rule them all." - Richard Brenner
The agile community faces a significant evolution as the methodology matures from underground movement to established practice. Organizations are moving away from rigid framework implementations toward contextual problem-solving approaches. This shift requires practitioners to focus on solving real business issues rather than introducing agile for its own sake. The challenge lies in maintaining agile's core values while adapting to diverse organizational contexts and avoiding the trap of seeking simple solutions for complex problems.
"It's not about winning over something. It's about using common sense, getting into interaction and trying to find sometimes complex solutions for complex problems." - Sabina Lammert
Rather than declaring agile "dead," the community must refocus on value-based working and continuous adaptation. The real challenge involves empowering people to constantly reevaluate situations and embrace the reality that today's solutions may not work in three weeks or three years. This requires normalizing the inspect-and-adapt mindset as standard practice rather than exception, moving beyond method-focused thinking toward principle-driven decision making.
"In times of crisis, people tend to fall back to old patterns of behavior. We need to keep the ideas that made us work in a specific way alive." - Robert Ruzitschka
Economic and political uncertainties create pressure to abandon agile practices in favor of traditional command-and-control approaches. Community events like Agile Tour Vienna play a crucial role in maintaining momentum for collaborative, adaptive working methods. The discipline required for agile practices - continuous integration, experimental approaches, market-driven feedback collection - represents a more sophisticated and ultimately more sustainable way of working than traditional project management approaches.
The discussion revealed an important distinction about discipline in agile environments. Agile teams demonstrate remarkable discipline through practices like continuous integration, experimental product development, and systematic feedback collection. This represents a more humane form of discipline that acknowledges complexity and enables adaptation, contrasting sharply with the rigid discipline of following predetermined plans regardless of changing circumstances.
About Robert Ruzitschka, Sabina Lammert, and Richard Brenner
Robert Ruzitschka is a Senior Principal Engineer at Raiffeisen Bank International and leads a team of Engineering Coaches. You can connect with Robert Ruzitschka on LinkedIn.
Sabina Lammert is Founder and Agile Coach of Leadventure and supports Teams and organizations to improve their way of collaboration. You can connect with Sabina Lammert on LinkedIn.
Richard Brenner is a previous guest, he started as Software Engineer and is now working as Agile Coach helping clients to adopt agile ways of working. You can connect with Richard Brenner on LinkedIn.