Who is Sander?

Sander Hoogendoorn is an independent software craftsman, architect, programmer, coach, author, and international keynote speaker with more than 30 years of experience in software development.

Throughout his career, he has helped teams and organizations improve their processes, architecture, code, testing, and collaboration. His expertise covers agile software development, continuous delivery, microservices, domain-driven design, software architecture, clean code, and many other technical and organizational challenges.

Sander has worked as a CTO, consultant, and global agile thought leader. He has written several books, including This Is Agile, The Continuous Culture, and Microservices: A Practical Guide, as well as hundreds of articles for international publications. He has also delivered hundreds of keynotes, talks, courses, and university lectures around the world.

Sander is known for his energy, deep technical knowledge, unconventional thinking, and willingness to challenge popular ideas. He does not believe that frameworks, tools, or fashionable terminology solve problems. Instead, he focuses on critical thinking, experimentation, and practical approaches that help teams build better software.

Seven Habits of a (Mostly) Successful Team

What actually makes a software team successful?

After four years of building, breaking, experimenting, and learning at iBOOD, Sander and his colleagues discovered seven habits that helped their teams deliver great software, stay motivated, and continuously improve.

This keynote is not based on another framework or a collection of idealized agile practices. It is an honest account of what worked, what failed, and what the teams would never do again.

Sander will explore how successful teams prioritize pragmatically, reduce unnecessary complexity, take real ownership of their work, communicate relentlessly, organize themselves into small and focused microteams, and deliver software continuously. He will also address something organizations often underestimate: the importance of having fun, and how autonomy, mastery, and purpose influence the quality of a team’s work.

Expect real stories, strong opinions, practical lessons, and no agile theatre. Whether your team is scaling, starting again, or simply trying to manage the chaos of modern software development, this keynote will give you concrete ideas you can take back to your organization.