6th Agile Month – April 2018

6th Agile Month is right behind the corner! During this Agile Month, we have four Certified Courses, three Advanced Trainings and the 3rd Agile Serbia Conference!

For the first time, we are organizing a 3-day Certified Scrum Master Course – Extended!  Also, in cooperation with our Certified Scrum Trainer, Petri Heiramo, we are organizing Certified Scrum Master Course and Certified Scrum Product Owner Course. Together with two Agile Coaches, Olaf Lewitz and Christine Neidhardt, we are organizing Certified Agile Leadership Course. All the participants can get an internationally recognized certificate, issued by the Scrum Alliance.

In this Agile Month, for the first time, we are organizing Agile Retrospective Masterclass with Marc Loffler! Our Agile Coach, Zoran Vujkov, will deliver two one-day Training from Continuing Agile Education program: Agile Requirements & User Stories and Agile Planning & Estimating.

The final event in this Agile Month will be the 3rd Agile Serbia Conference! This is the biggest Agile & IT event in the Balkan region, and it will be held on the 27th of April 2018. Renowned experts from “Agile, Leadership & Developers” world will be waiting for you, on three stages and at the Coaching Corner. The keynote speaker will be Bob Hartman, known as “Agile Bob”! The applications are in progress, more information you can find on this link.

Being humane is always noble

Being generous is always a very noble thing, and that has been proven by our employees. Instead of organizing an expensive New Year’s party, at the initiative of our Puzzle buddies, we decided to organize a charity pool tournament in our new office space. Our tournament was held on the 27th of December, and we had a blast! The winning party decided to donate the money that we raised to the Institute of Neonatology in Belgrade.

“Once I received the proposal from our development team about the charity tournament, I was delighted to share the info with my colleagues. We were thrilled to accept the idea. The whole concept of helping someone out really feels great, and we are definitely planning on doing this again”, said our Social and Networking Manager, Tamara Vuckovic. The sum of money that we raised is not really that much, but the initiative is great. We are always open to individual initiatives coming from our employees, especially when helping others who are in need. Our donation arrived at the Institute of Neonatology just a couple of days after the tournament.

Take a look at our fun night below. We want to thank our employees for their generosity – we are very proud of each and every one of our Puzzle Pieces!

Let’s do the retrospective of 2017!

It is the end of 2017 and the moment to do the retrospective of a year that is almost behind us. For Puzzle Software, it is a year worth to remember. Why? Because, once again, we did a lot of stuff!

First, the most important aspect of our company – our people. Every month we grow and have new pieces of our puzzle. Also, this year we have launched new projects, and one of them is a start-up we are currently working on. It is an event activation application that will engage and connect event organizers, moderators, lecturers, and visitors in an innovative way. We can already claim its usefulness, especially to business people. In order to develop this start-up, we need reinforcement, and in that sense we are also expanding the team.

Let’s move on to another field of our business – Agile Education. We can proudly say that Agile Serbia Conference definitely has become the biggest Agile event in the region. The second one was organized on the 26th of May 2017. This time, there were over 500 attendees from 12 countries across Europe and 16 great international speakers! The keynote was Dr Alistair Cockburn – a signatory of the Agile Manifesto, and one of the “All-Time Top 150 i-Technology Heroes”. Furthermore, we successfully organized two Agile Months – May and November 2017. For the first time, in Southeastern Europe, we organized Certified Agile Leadership Course! The course has proved to be very interesting to the leaders of companies or teams who want to implement agile transformation, or to work on the personal development and development of their team and organization.

As you know, we are also well-known for IT outsourcing services. Regarding that field, in this year we expanded our pool with two new clients. Recently, we have started an Agile transformation in United Cloud company.

At the moment, we are celebrating great year and expecting even better one!

Let’s do the retrospective of 2017!

5th Agile Month is DONE!

We are proud to say that 5th Agile Month has officially over! During this Agile Month we had three Certified Courses and one Advanced Training!

More than 100 people were certificated after the 5th Agile Month, as Scrum Master, Product Owner and Agile Leader!

For the first time in the region, in cooperation with Scrum Alliance and two Agile Coaches – Olaf Lewitz and Christine Neidhardt, we organized Certified Agile Leadership Course. On this course attendees learned the secrets to nurture Agile organizations and how to work on self-development to become an effective Agile Leader. This course was interactive and attendees had a lot of exercises. Almost all participants stated that they received knowledge from this course about visualisation maps and certain techniques like check-in and delegation poker.

We organized two Certified Scrum Master Course and one Certified Scrum Product Owner Course with our Certified Scrum Trainer – Petri Heiramo.

Also, we had one Advanced Training – Scrum Master Practices and Techniques, with our experienced Agile Coach – Zoran Vujkov.

Our mission is to enhance Agile community in Serbia and the region. That is why we always strive to innovate and organize as many educational events and other Agile gatherings as it is possible. We hope that you will find your place in the next Agile Month – April 2018 and on the 3rd Agile Serbia Conference.

Autumn Agile Month – November 2017 has officially started!

We are proud to say that 5th Agile Month has officially started! During this Agile Month we have three Certified Courses and one Advanced Training!

For the first time, in cooperation with Scrum Alliance and two Agile Coaches – Olaf Lewitz and Christine Neidhardt, we are organizing Certified Agile Leadership Course. On this course attendees will learn the secrets to nurture Agile organizations and how to work on self-development to become an effective Agile Leader. This course is about getting the most out of your leadership skills, in any role. We provide additional opportunity for Agile Certification, and expand Agile community in Serbia and the region.

Together with our Certified Scrum Trainer – Petri Heiramo, we are organizing Certified Scrum Product Owner Course and two Certified Scrum Master Courses.

Hence, more than 100 people will obtain Agile certificates after the 5th Agile Month!

Beside this Certified Courses, Puzzle Software is organizing Advanced Scrum Training – Scrum Master Practices and Techniques with our experienced Agile Coach Zoran Vujkov.

In this Agile Month – November 2017 we will continue to provide the best education in the field of Agile Development!

Our “Spring 2017 Agile Month” is officially done! Let’s do a retrospective

We are proud to say that spring Agile Month – May 2017 is officially over! It was a great experience for everyone and an amazing chance to learn and connect with the experts from the IT world.
More than 70 Scrum Masters and Scrum Product Owners were certified during the 4th Agile Month, thanks to the Certified Scrum Trainer – Petri Heiramo. Beside the aforementioned courses, Puzzle Software organized two Advanced Agile Trainings. These were “Agile Requirements and User Stories” and “Scrum Anti-Patterns and repairing guide” trainings with Zoran Vujkov, our experienced Agile Coach. We are honored to say that during this Agile Month we organized a special Advanced Agile Training. It was the „Advanced Agile Master Class” with Dr Alistair Cockburn, who is one of the creators of the Agile approach. Participants at this course all got the Level B certificate „Heart of Agile“.

 

2nd Agile Serbia Conference as a final event of the Agile Month

The final event was the 2nd Agile Serbia Conference. More than 500 participants from 12 different countries and 16 speaker from around the world met in Belgrade, on the 26th of May! The conference program was organized on three stages: EPIC (main stage), DEV (stage for discussion) and EXE (stage for workshops). This time, the novelty was the Coaching Corner. There, participants had a chance to informally chat with 8 great coaches. It was very refreshing to see that there were more than 30 sessions in the Coaching Corner. This indicated that the participants recognized the importance of sharing experiences and challenges in Agile Development within the community.

The Conference has caught up with the largest Agile events and conferences in Europe. It was not only because of the number of participants, but also because of the spectacular topics and speakers. The attendees were very positive about the organization and content of the conference. Furthermore, they ranked it as one of the best IT and Agile conferences in Europe! One of the speakers, Angel Medinilla said: “This is one of the greatest conferences on Agile I’ve ever visited as a speaker. So many people, such a good organization!”

All facts indicate that the Agile Community in Serbia and around the region is becoming bigger by the day!
We will continue our mission – to provide the best education in the field of Agile Development. Therefore, we hope you will find your place at our next events!

Student Organization Omikron – our new partner!

It is not a secret that we highly value the desire for education. We gladly cooperate with educational institutions and organizations, especially with universities and schools. Puzzle Software and Faculty of Mathematics (University of Belgrade) have been partners for the last three years. This Faculty is among the most prestigious ones in Serbia. Furthermore, it is giving us the best experts in the field of software development. This time, we are honored to announce that Puzzle Software became a partner with Omikron! This student organization is founded exactly by students who are currently studying at the Faculty of Mathematics. It is founded with the aim of writing and implementing projects to further develop their skills and upgrade their knowledge.

MatHackaton by Omikron

We would like to inform you that, on the 13th and 14th of May, Omikron is organizing MathHackaton in cooperation with StratIT Center and the Faculty of Mathematics. MathHackaton is a competition for university and high school students. The teams are faced with the challenge to find the fastest way to develop a software that functions. We have recognized the importance of this competition and dedication of these young professionals in the field of software development. Therefore, we strongly encourage you to participate in this challenge and build your knowledge and team spirit! This is a great opportunity for you, not only to compete, but also because you will have an amazing chance to meet new people from your field of study and to bond with them. Registration is free and it is open until the 6th of May. So, hurry up!

We found our role in sharing our knowledge and many years of experience in the field of Agile Software Development with those students, considering the efficiency of those topics for their own evolving.  Consequently, we decided to reward the best MathHackaton team with tickets for the 2nd Agile Serbia Conference. This event will enable them to learn from the best world’s Agile & IT experts!

We are sure that all the participants will have an amazing time during this competition and we are looking forward to the future cooperation with Omikron! ☺

4th Agile Month – What to expect in May

Agile Month became a real brand in IT world, and everyone knows it is about the Agile education. We are preparing the 4th one, and it will be this May 2017. Certified Scrum Master and Scrum Product Owner Courses will be realized in cooperation with our Certified Scrum Trainer, Petri Heiramo. All the participants can get an internationally recognized certificate, issued by Scrum Alliance.

Advanced Agile Trainings will bring some novelties. Our Agile Coach, Zoran Vujkov, will deliver three different one-day Advanced Agile Trianings: Agile Requirements & User Stories, Scrum Anti-patterns & Repairing Guide, and the Introduction to Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe). Besides that, a creator of Agile, Dr Alistair Cockburn will hold his two-day Advanced Agile Master Class – certified training for those with Agile experience.

It is our pleasure to announce that Dr Alistair Cockburn is also the keynote speaker at the 2nd Agile Serbia Conference that will take place in Madlenianum, Belgrade, on the 26th of May 2017. This time the topic of the Conference is “Agile & Developers”. The registration is in progress, and more information you can find on the Conference page.

Our 2016 in review

How prosperous year is behind us! In 2016, we accomplished so many things worth mentioning. The first and the most important thing for us are new pieces of our puzzle – new people in Puzzle Software team! We are growing every year and we are very proud of that fact.

In sense of Agile education, the biggest achievement was the 1st Agile Serbia Conference, organized on the 23rd April 2016. With more than 400 attendees, international speakers and great lectures, we have built a new brand and one of the biggest Agile & IT events around the region. Furthermore, we successfully completed 2 Agile Months – one in April, and the other in November. Recently, we started with one Agile transformation, expanded the range of our services regarding Agile education, and founded the Agile Coaching Club.

In the sense of software development, we are oriented towards new projects, and uprising Start-up Corner. Currently, we are working on a start-up project that will change the future of in-game advertising.

Our plan for 2017 is to continue with boosting new ideas of our employees, their willingness for additional education, to organize even better 2nd Agile Serbia Conference, and 4th Agile Month in May 2017, and to grow in all areas of our business. All challenges accepted!

3rd Agile Month successfully realized

AGILE MONTH – NOV 2016 has been a great success. Both, the Certified Scrum Courses, and the Advanced Agile Trainings were fully attended. In addition to Agile Requirements & User Stories, and Agile Planning & Estimating, we organized a new training – Collaborative Exploratory and Unit Testing, delivered by LIewellyn Falco.

Traditionally, there were two FREE Agile Gatherings. The first one was a meet-up, held before the Agile Month. It was organized as an interactive discussion moderated by our Agile Coach, Zoran Vujkov. The second was a Scrum workshop with our Certified Scrum Trainer, Petri Heiramo, during the Agile Month.

We are proud to say that the feedback of the participants was great, and we met their expectations!