ALE2013, the last day

ALE2013 finished with the most fantastic day. It started with some minutes of wakeup gymnastics. After the speakers introduced their talks, attendees chose between talks on lean startup, continuous improvement, offers and pricing or software design. The offer was very attractive and again we had to choose one talk out of three going on at a time, from the program.

Before lunch the Open Space was ready for discussions proposed and chosen using the Market Place. Very interesting discussions started, some of them continuing during lunch time.

My colleagues from Mozaic Works and the organizing team prepared a surprise for me. For my birthday I was congratulated by more than 120 people who sung “Happy Birthday to you!”. I was really surprised and nervous and hardly succeeded to say some words to thank them.

After lunch, Closing Activities of ALE2013 started with kids and spouses demo. They presented what they build in the three conference days, made us again to dance and have unforgettable moments. I’m sure the “Free Spirit” moment of ALE 2013 will be remembered by all the participants
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrwBEcdd1TI

The last talk in the program, for all the participants who hadn’t yet left, was awesome. Joe Justice told us about how he built with a community of enthusiasts from many countries a car using Scrum, Lean, TDD and agile/lean principles. His vision of changing the world inspired the attendees who supported him with standing ovations. The community he started is called Wikispeed, in case you want to learn more about them.

The day finished again with a self-organized evening. Someone said on twitter that the conference started with “Dinner with a stranger” and ended with “Dinner with friends”.

The event was very appreciated. When everything works smoothly during a conference, it happens due to the organizers, including the Mozaic Works local co-organizers and volunteers. But organizers can only create the right environment for ideas to emerge; it’s the participants who make such a conference be much more interesting. In this case, it was clear that ALE is a big family where people think, play and solve problems together.

If the first ALE unconference was in Berlin, the second in Barcelona, now in Bucharest, what “B….” city will be in the next year?