Professional Challenge- Attend IT/IS Professional Meeting #2

The second professional meeting I attended was with Phoenix Scrum Users group again.  It was held at Infusionsoft in Chandler on March 20th.  The meeting was a question and answer session with three product owners from three different sized companies.  The panel consisted of:

• Jeff Schinella with Axosoft
• SarahJane Isom with Infusionsoft 
• Josey Borman with Pearson

One question asked was why the product owners liked their job and where they worked.  Their responses included:

• Schinella-  Axosoft has a relaxed atmosphere that allows employees to express their ideas freely
• Isom- She likes to change peoples' lives and Infusionsoft gives her that opportunity with their 60,000+ users.  She loves to learn about each one of her clients and what their companies are all about, especially the small, start-up companies. 
• Borman- Her job has given her the opportunity to show her strengths.  She also enjoys working with her peers.  One of the negatives about her job is gaining trust on risky decisions.  

The second question was in reference to the acronym AKA (Authority Knowledge Availability) and which word held the most importance in their job.

• Borman- Having an authoritative presence and being available to your team was most important.  Knowledge is important but that is something that can be learned overtime. 
• Isom- Availability is  most important.  When a team can't meet and collaborate freely and easily, they are more productive.  It's better to have your team all together so that when their is a problem, everyone can gather around to fix the problem rather than having to schedule a meeting and wait. 
• Axosoft- Authority is most important.  Availability is very important but in his small company, it isn't a challenge.  Communication and collaboration is easy.  However, too much communication and conversations can become a problem. 

It was very interesting to hear the thoughts and opinions from individuals from three extremely different companies.  Each person has distinct challenges that they have to deal with but many of them they also share.  It was encouraging to see three people that truly enjoy their jobs and the problems that come with them.