Aubrey Wade
A Boundary Pushing, Positive Disrupting, Way Maker - I make good trouble
Memphis, Tennessee, United States
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Aubrey Wade is a seasoned consulting professional, speaker, coach, and blogger with a passion for transforming workplace relationships and driving positive change. Based in Memphis, TN, she specializes in helping organizations improve processes, build strong teams, and guide C-suite leaders in driving company-wide transformation. With a hands-on, results-driven approach, Aubrey isn’t afraid to challenge the status quo to help companies reach their full potential.
Armed with a degree in Psychology and over 20 years of experience in technology, Aubrey has successfully partnered with multiple Fortune 300 companies to enhance team dynamics, streamline processes, and deliver consistent, successful releases. Her expertise spans organizational transformation, enterprise reporting, and optimizing performance at all levels.
Outside of her consulting work, Aubrey is a devoted wife, sister, and mother to three daughters, and she enjoys speaking and teaching across the country. Her greatest passion is helping people grow — starting with herself — through personal development, professional coaching, and leadership guidance.
Area of Expertise
Topics
Human Code: Using the Enneagram to Optimize Team Performance
What if I told you anyone could get the best dynamics and products out of their teams with by discovering the secrets within yourself? What if you knew the vices prone to trigger your ugly side? Or the great parts of your personality that could help your career or your team?
Each of us can do this: We all fall into a particular number on the Enneagram and no number is better than the other. During this session, we will take the Enneagram assessment and break down the results in detail not just for your personal benefit, but for how you interact with others. We walk through each number, the motives, triggers, vices and virtues, and how each number impacts each other.
When people discover these items as a team, and bring the vulnerability to the forefront, something beautiful happens with their team dynamics and a new realm of possibility unlocks. This is only possible when we understand our numbers, and accept each other's.
In this session, I will explain how I used the enneagram to build my professional career, help teams in trouble build better tomorrows. I also dig into the incredible science behind the Enneagram.
Attendees will get a thorough understanding of the Enneagram, an in depth look at each number, create a "go-forward plan" for themselves and learn how to bring this back for themselves to optimize their team's performance in their own organizations.
The information we explore in this session will inevitably lead to MUCH discussion with the attendees. Because I normally do this as a 3 or 5 hour workshop, It would be very easy to break this down into 2 sessions: first session as an individual session then a part two specifically focused to Leaders to HOW they can apply this in becoming better leaders, how to guide and serve their people and focus on their specific needs to create detailed plans of action. I've given this several times and each time, feedback is EXTREMELY positive, always asking for more information.
I will have a presentation, in PowerPoint. And a handout available virtually.
Learning Outcomes:
● What is the Enneagram
● What is your number and how does it naturally react and work with others
● Understand your number’s Vices and Virtues and motivators
● How can the enneagram HELP technical teams and you to be better
● Understand how you can use the knowledge of your number to YOUR benefit!
Presentation History:
● In Spring of 2019, I led the Scrum Master group of ALSAC St. Jude thru the Enneagram self-discovery track.
● I presented this at Music City Tech 2019 in Nashville: https://musiccitytech.com/speakers/
○ The feedback received was outstanding! Only two people didn’t give me a 4 or 5 (on a 1-5 scale); both complained that it wasn’t a 3-hour conference.
● In Fall of 2019, for Dev Ops staff of AutoZone, we performed individual sessions for self-discovery work.
● November 2019, I was invited to a retreat and provided a ½ day workshop for team building and relationship management for the staff of ALSAC/St. Jude’s Regional staff.
● In early 2020, before COVID, I facilitated a team leadership workshop for the Memphis Junior League.
● Summer of 2020, one of the law firms in Memphis hosted an extended (virtual) lunch and learn Enneagram team assessment workshop – Was reviewed as extremely beneficial and a lot of fun!
● Feb 2021: Guest speaker (virtually) for the Agile 20 group out of London, UK
○ https://youtu.be/NoONM9sIhEI
● March 2021: Guest speaker (virtually) for the Memphis DevOps monthly luncheon from the Memphis Technology
The 3 legged stool: AI Won’t Fix Your Agile Problems
Agile frameworks promise adaptability and speed — but even in the AI and digital age, many teams struggle with unclear roles, brittle dependencies, and communication breakdowns that slow delivery and burn people out. The 3‑legged stool is more than a metaphor— it’s a simple systems model for understanding why agile teams succeed or fail. When roles, collaboration, and communication are balanced, teams are stable and productive. When one “leg” is overloaded, ignored, or missing, the system wobbles — no matter how good your AI is or good the tooling or framework looks on paper.
In this session, we’ll explore how the 3‑legged stool analogy can be used as a practical diagnostic and alignment tool across modern agile environments. Drawing on real-world experience working with teams navigating today’s increased complexity — remote work, hybrid structures, and constant delivery pressure — you’ll see how this model helps surface hidden constraints, clarify ownership, and manage dependencies more effectively.
Rather than prescribing yet another framework, this talk focuses on how to create shared understanding between engineers, product, and leadership — so teams can make better decisions inside the frameworks they already use.
Whether you’re building software, coaching teams, or leading transformation efforts, you’ll leave with a lightweight model you can immediately apply to improve team health, delivery flow, and long-term sustainability.
I never give the same talk twice and this has quickly turned into my most requested presentation. It's turned into a "state of the employee" in the workplace since AI has been pushed by leaders across the board.
Attendees will takeaway understanding of what employees are facing on dev teams, how to have productive conversations with leaders and how to make positive and sustaining change to help the longevity of their org and teams.
Each time I present this, I update it with the latest and best information available.
Previous online presentation: (not this talk) https://youtu.be/NoONM9sIhEI
How to Modernize Without Burning Down the House
Sometimes engineering teams are stuck between two bad options: maintain aging systems that can’t keep up with modern demands, or attempt risky, expensive “rip‑and‑replace” rewrites that rarely deliver as promised. Whether you’re supporting 25‑year‑old legacy code, scaling a startup built on its original architecture, or navigating a hybrid environment where new services collide with monoliths, the result is often the same—growing tech debt, slower delivery, and constant friction between product goals and engineering reality.
This session focuses on a third path.
Drawing on real-world consulting experience helping teams modernize under tight constraints, this talk presents practical, incremental strategies for evolving software systems without massive rewrites or blank‑check transformations. You’ll learn how successful teams stabilize legacy platforms, introduce modern practices, and create forward momentum—while still shipping features.
Rather than abstract theory, this talk emphasizes decision-making frameworks, architectural patterns, and sequencing strategies you can apply immediately, regardless of company size or tech stack. Attendees will walk away with concrete approaches to modernize safely, reduce risk, and regain engineering velocity—right where they are today.
After this session, attendees will be able to:
Identify which tech debt is worth paying down vs. which can be strategically contained
Apply incremental modernization patterns that coexist with legacy systems
Balance short‑term delivery pressure with long‑term architectural health
Avoid common failure modes of large-scale rewrites
Create a pragmatic modernization roadmap aligned with business constraints
Note: This talk can also be tailored into an interactive workshop where attendees will work through actionable plans for their next steps.
Target Audience: Leaders, Managers, and decision-makers navigating complex technical landscapes and wanting to find sustainable ways forward.
404: Motivation Not Found - Troubleshooting a 'Case of the 'Mondays' in the AI Age
Across industries, leaders are grappling with a new kind of workforce fatigue—employees navigating an environment where digital acceleration, AI integration, and continuous context-switching have created a persistent cognitive drain. What what we call a “Case of the Mondays” has evolved into a week-long cycle of depleted attention, fragmented focus, and declining intrinsic motivation.
This isn’t a personality problem. It’s a systems problem.
In 2025, teams operate inside Anthro-Complex systems—dynamic, unpredictable human-technology ecosystems where motivation, performance, and collaboration are shaped by the interplay between people, AI tools, workflows, and organizational culture. When the system becomes misaligned, engagement drops, quality suffers, and teams struggle to maintain momentum.
The Leadership Challenge:
How do we activate human motivation in environments increasingly mediated by AI, automation, and digital workflows?
How do we design team experiences that sustain energy and performance—regardless of whether teams are remote, hybrid, on-site, or distributed across time zones?
What This Session Covers
In this session, we’ll examine why teams are struggling in 2025 through an human-centric framework, looking at the employees (as humans), technical, and environmental forces that disrupt motivation. Drawing on 20+ years of working with teams—including remote, hybrid, and operationally fragmented groups—I’ll share practical approaches for building high-functioning, AI-empowered teams.
We’ll translate complexity into clarity: identifying the core systemic blockers and the interventions that actually work.
Attendees Will Walk Away With:
- Motivation Techniques for any type of team, especially in the AI age
- Evidence-based methods that leverage cognitive science
- Behavioral triggers
- Human-AI partnership models to reignite engagement—even in teams experiencing digital overload or low morale.
A curated set of tech-integrated tools and frameworks that work across remote, hybrid, and in-person environments, including:
- AI-supported workflow optimization
- Digital rituals that strengthen team cohesion
- Automation strategies that reduce cognitive friction
Dysfunction Diagnostics in Complex Systems
Anthro-Complex strategies for identifying and addressing:
- Toxic micro-cultures
- Misaligned incentives
- Collaboration breakdowns
- AI misuse or tool fatigue
You’ll learn how to intervene not just at the individual level but at the system level where dysfunction originates.
Productive Leadership Conversations
- Frameworks for engaging senior leaders in productive, data-driven discussions about:
- Team well-being
- Resource needs
- AI adoption impacts
- Sustainable performance models
These strategies help leaders advocate for their teams with clarity, confidence, and a systems-level view.
By the End of This Session:
You’ll walk away with actionable, tech-forward methods to energize your teams, elevate performance, and build healthier human-AI ecosystems. You’ll gain the tools to re-activate even your most disengaged employees and bring renewed momentum, clarity, and capability into your workplace.
Target Audience: People Leaders, managers, HR professionals, team leaders, C-Suite and anyone looking to boost motivation, improve team performance, and address challenges in today’s work environment.
TechBash 2025 Sessionize Event
Michigan Technology Conference 2025 Sessionize Event
TechBash 2024 Sessionize Event
Music City Tech 2019 Sessionize Event
Aubrey Wade
A Boundary Pushing, Positive Disrupting, Way Maker - I make good trouble
Memphis, Tennessee, United States
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