FMAP course map

# Course map

## Orientation and five modules

Foundations of Modern Agile Practice is a free, text-led course of about four hours: an orientation followed by five modules. Every lesson is complete in text. Lesson videos and a course trailer are in production and will be added as each completes caption review. Times are estimates.

**Orientation**

1. **Welcome and How This Works — CORE, 7 minutes.** Who the course serves, how to choose between formats, and the five course principles.
2. **Optional Self-Check Router — optional, 3 minutes.** Six ungraded questions to choose a comfortable pace; nothing is locked or skipped.

**Module 1: The Agile Mindset**

3. **Why Agile Exists — CORE, 8 minutes.** Uncertainty and expensive late learning.
4. **The Four Values — CORE, 9 minutes.** The Manifesto values as contextual trade-offs.
5. **Twelve Principles in Four Clusters — CORE, 9 minutes.** Applying the principles without a scorecard.
6. **Predictive vs Adaptive — CORE, 10 minutes.** Choosing predictive, adaptive, or hybrid delivery from evidence.
7. **The Agile Family Map — optional, 5 minutes.** Common methods and scaling frameworks on one independent map.

**Module 2: Teams, Roles and Rhythm**

8. **Scrum in One Picture — CORE, 9 minutes.** Scrum's empirical loop of transparency, inspection, and adaptation.
9. **The Three Accountabilities — CORE, 11 minutes.** Product Owner, Scrum Master, and Developers.
10. **Events, Artifacts and Commitments — CORE, 12 minutes.** Each event's purpose and each artifact's commitment.
11. **Kanban and Framework Fit — CORE, 10 minutes.** Time-based cadence compared with flow limits.
12. **Psychological Safety and Servant Leadership — CORE, 13 minutes.** Safety as a precondition for truthful inspection.
13. **Durable and Distributed Teams — CORE, 11 minutes.** Working agreements, asynchronous updates, and one visible board.

**Module 3: Delivering Value**

14. **Spaced Recall Warm-up — CORE, 2 minutes.** Retrieve four ideas from Modules 1 and 2.
15. **Outputs vs Outcomes — CORE, 10 minutes.** Produced work compared with changed reality.
16. **Backlogs and User Stories — CORE, 12 minutes.** Value-bearing stories, acceptance criteria, and the Definition of Done.
17. **Prioritization and Slicing — CORE, 10 minutes.** Ordering by value, effort, and risk, then slicing for earlier feedback.
18. **MVP and Validated Learning — CORE, 8 minutes.** A minimum viable product as a learning instrument.

**Module 4: Flow and Continuous Improvement**

19. **Flow Over Velocity — CORE, 9 minutes.** WIP, lead time, cycle time, and throughput without velocity quotas.
20. **Little's Law and WIP Limits — CORE, 12 minutes.** How work in progress shapes lead time.
21. **Boards and Bottlenecks — CORE, 7 minutes.** Modelling real workflow and swarming on bottlenecks.
22. **Retrospectives and Kaizen — CORE, 10 minutes.** One or two owned improvement experiments.
23. **Agile Theater and Zombie Scrum — CORE, 10 minutes.** Diagnosing rituals disconnected from outcomes.

**Module 5: Agile in the Real World**

24. **Spaced Recall Warm-up — CORE, 2 minutes.** Retrieve four ideas about outcomes, stories, flow, and adaptation.
25. **Agile Beyond IT — CORE, 14 minutes.** Tailoring practices to a new domain's work and constraints.
26. **AI as a Team Partner — CORE, 15 minutes.** Delegating preparation while keeping judgment human.
27. **Your First Agile Project — CORE, 35 minutes.** One modest empirical loop, closed with a private reflection.
28. **Wrap and Next Steps — CORE, 10 minutes.** Five principles, five behaviours, and a route for continued learning.

CORE participation is recorded separately from optional study. It records completion of these learning activities; it does not demonstrate mastery or workplace competence. No certificate is currently offered. Read the [reference ledger](fmap-references.md) before treating the course as a basis for a high-stakes decision.