Melanie has been a project manager since 1991. Aside from her AgilePM Practitioner status, her background includes professional qualifications such as PRINCE2 and MSP as well as Scrum Master and SAFe4. However, it is her practical experience in delivering Agile environments at team and organisational levels that sets her apart. Her ability to listen to organisational needs, benchmark against both waterfall and alternative project methods then deliver an agile environment that matches client needs is what makes Melanie stand apart from others.

The top benefits of taking the Agile Project Management course and passing the Agile Practitioner qualification are:

• to evidence your skills in Agile Project Management
• learn and adopt the latest techniques in leadership
• deliver projects and business strategy faster and cheaper
• improve your CV or resume with a current certification
• get paid more for doing the same job
• speed up your search for a new and better job
• join the fastest growing project approach in the market today
• learn how to use Agile in a waterfall environment
• helps you speak to the business and control IT
• learn from other leaders that join the London Agile courses
• understand how to recover failing projects
• access a comprehensive methodology taking you from start to finish

The full AgilePM Foundation and Practitioner course runs for 4 days and takes delegates through the 8 Agile principles. The first 3 days focus on the groundwork and concepts of Agile and culminate with the Foundation exam in the 3rd day. Practitioners then stay on to take the 4th day where skills in applying the Agile method to practical environments. Delegates take the Agile Practitioner exam at the end of the 4th day. Melanie Franklin runs her courses with high intensity and practical examples drawn from her active Agile consulting work with clients so delegates always find direct application to their own work.

There are many techniques that Melanie teaches on the Agile course but here are the main ones:

MoSCoW

Timebox

Minimum viable product

Done

Stand-up

Delivery plan

Estimating

Kanban

Modelling

Stakeholder engagement

As with all best practice methods there are key principles. There are 8 for Agile which define the approach:

• focus on the business need
• deliver on time
• collaborate
• never compromise on quality
• build incrementally from firm foundations
• develop iteratively
• communicate continuously and clearly
• demonstrate control

Certainly not – most people coming onto the Agile courses in London are from a general project management and consulting back ground. They are seeking ways in which they can enhance project delivery and benefit realisation by having the Business and IT work closer together.

Melanie Franklin pioneered the combination of Agile and Change through her book Agile Change Management. Seeing the benefits of taking behavioural and leadership skills into the structured project management environment, she took the short-term characteristics of Agile Project Management and combined them with the medium term objectives of Change Management. 95% of delegates taking an Agile Project Management course with Melanie also take the Change Management Practitioner course as they also see the benefits of combining the two subjects.

The Agile Project Management approach came through the APMG and DSDM Atern with the support of the Scrum Alliance. This was subsequently picked up by Axelos to run alongside their PRINCE2 certification. This gives the Agile Project Management qualification a global recognition.

Melanie Franklin runs her open scheduled courses in London and delegates from anywhere in the world can attend. Clients also ask her to run Agile courses at their offices around the world. So far she has delivered Agile throughout England, Scotland, Ireland as well as Denmark, Germany and Holland. Further afield she has run courses in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, USA and Australia.