What is APLN?
The Agile Project Leadership Network (APLN) is a national organization whose purpose and mission is to connect, develop and support great project leaders.  This is accomplished by writing about, practicing, and evangelizing the movement towards fast, flexible, customer value driven approaches to leading projects of many types.  You can learn more about the national organization here:
http://apln.org/aboutus.html .

What is APLN Chicago? 
APLN Chicago (http://aplnchicago.org/), is the local chapter which seeks to extend the work of the national organization into the greater Chicago area.  Through regular meetings, discussions and networking opportunities, APLN Chicago is bringing together Agile project leaders of all experience levels.

Where are the meetings held? 
The location of APLN Chicago meetings changes each time.  We are seeking to balance location and the needs of the Agile community.  Our first meeting was downtown.  The second near O’Hare.  Our third meeting is catering to the north suburban community.
The fourth meeting will either be in the western suburbs, and in the summer, we'll restart the cycle by seeking another downtown venue.

What happens at the meetings? 
One of our key goals was to make every APLN Chicago meeting a rewarding experience for the attendees.  Since our members are traveling from all over the Chicago area, we wanted to allow some leeway in our start time, thus allowing for latecomers while
still providing value for thosewho don’t get stuck in traffic.   As
such, we decided that each meeting will begin with a combined dinner/social networking session.  The cost of the meal is included in your admission fee.  Following dinner, there is a formal presentation on a topic of interest to the Agile community.  The formal presentation is followed by an OpenSpace event, where every attendee has the opportunity to propose and lead discussion topics of their own choosing, or participate in one of several parallel discussion topics proposed by other attendees.  

Who can benefit?
Our goal is to provide opportunities to learn, discuss and debate for everyone in an Agile Leadership role. We try to provide different discussion tracks at every meeting, with OpenSpace topics that will appeal to Line Managers running alongside topics that will appeal to Product Owners alongside topics that appeal to Practitioners. So bring your colleagues, and take part in discussions at all levels!