Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of attending FastFlowConf 2025 in Den Bosch, The Netherlands. It was a day packed with compelling talks, fresh perspectives, and meaningful conversations around building better software—faster, and with more purpose.

As an engineering director at Essent, I’m constantly seeking ways to improve how we build and deliver value. Among the many excellent sessions, three talks stood out to me for their direct relevance to the challenges and opportunities we face in modern product engineering. Each talk addressed a different angle, but together they formed a powerful theme around autonomy, flow, and delivering true value.

From Inside Out to Outside-In – Rich Allen

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Rich Allen’s session focused on a mindset shift that resonated deeply with me: moving from an inside-out way of working—where teams optimize internal processes—to an outside-in approach that centers on user needs.

He introduced User Needs Mapping, a practical framework that helps teams uncover what truly matters to users—both external and internal—and align their work accordingly. What I found especially compelling were the real-world examples that revealed how misalignments create unnecessary complexity, and how bringing clarity around value can unlock better collaboration and autonomy.

This talk was a powerful reminder that internal efficiency means little if it doesn’t lead to external impact. The key is focusing on what users care about and structuring teams and priorities around that.

How Flow Works – James Lewis (Thoughtworks)

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James Lewis delivered a mind-expanding talk that blended Information Theory, Complexity Science, and practical software delivery. He explored the foundations behind practices like small batch sizes, microservices, and team topologies—not just as modern best practices, but as tools to improve the flow of value.

One highlight for me was the insight that flow isn’t just a buzzword—it’s quantifiable, and it’s crucial. James challenged us to think about how work actually works, and how delays, dependencies, and large batch sizes degrade our ability to get valuable software into users’ hands quickly and reliably.

His talk reinforced something we often sense intuitively: when teams can reduce friction and work in smaller, autonomous units, value flows faster and more predictably.

Autonomy, Is That What We Really Want? – Evelyn Van Kelle & Kenny Baas-Schwegler

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Evelyn and Kenny tackled a nuanced but vital topic: autonomy in tech, and the risks of mistaking it for individual independence. They made a strong case that while autonomy is a key motivator (à la Daniel Pink’s Drive), it can sometimes lead to isolation—in code, in teams, and across the organization.

Through examples from various levels—code, team, organization—they showed how our push for autonomy can result in both technical and social disconnects. Their proposed solution: polarity management, a mindset and approach to balance the needs of the individual with the cohesion of the collective.

I appreciated how this talk reframed autonomy not as a binary, but as a tension to manage. In the end, real autonomy flourishes within a shared context, not in a vacuum.

The Bigger Picture: Autonomy, Flow, and Value

While these three talks tackled different layers of software delivery—strategic alignment, system flow, and team dynamics—they all converged on a shared idea:
True autonomy, improved flow, and a relentless focus on value are what create winning engineering cultures.

  • Without understanding user needs, autonomy drifts and effort is wasted.
  • Without flow, even valuable ideas get stuck in queues and dependencies.
  • Without autonomy, teams can’t act on insights quickly enough to make a difference.

FastFlowConf 2025 left me energized and inspired, not just with tools and theory, but with a renewed commitment to help build a culture where autonomy is grounded, flow is nurtured, and value is clear.

Here’s to building better products—and better ways of working—together.