The economic recession in 2009 hit many organizations hard, forcing them to make difficult budget decisions. Many chose to cut professional development and marketing from the budget, resulting in less attendees and exhibitors than SEPG North America previously had. It was a blessing in disguise. Countless attendees told us, the SEPG Conference staff, that they preferred the smaller size. They said it provided more opportunities to network with speakers, exhibitors, and other attendees—an invaluable part of the conference experience. They also said that the people who did attend despite the recession were the exact type of professionals they wanted to have in their network—serious, committed, with a passion for process as a means to achieve higher performance.

That's why a limited number of registrations will be available for the 2010 conference. Registration will be capped so that we have a similarly sized setting as the 2009 conference, a size that attendees and exhibitors appreciated.

2009 attendees also voted for their favorite sessions. Here are the top ten sessions.

• Achieving Agile High Maturity with Kanban – David Anderson
• Earned Value Explained – Noopur Davis and Darryl Davis
• New Directions in Risk: A Success-Oriented Approach – Audrey Dorofee and Christopher Alberts
• SPI Implementation Barriers: Then, Now, and Future Strategies – Byron Fiman and Stan Rifkin
• The CMMI Guide to the Perplexed – Hillel Glazer
• Baselines and Models: Duh, I Don't Get It! – Diane Mizukami-Williams
• Lessons Learned From Applying An Assurance Focus to CMMI – Margaret Nadworny and Michele Moss
• Pathological Box-Checking: The Dark Side of Process Improvement – Judah Mogilensky
• Eat Your Own Dog Food: Applying the CMMI to the Process Improvement Project – Patrick O'Toole
• Crawl-Walk-Jog-Run: Evolving Measurement Capabilities – David Quinn

 Read daily highlights of the 2009 conference in these newsletters:

• Monday [pdf]
• Tuesday [pdf]
• Wednesday [pdf]
• Thursday [pdf]