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Four disciplines, one delivery process, and years of friction nobody talks about openly. This month we do.
A product manager, a product owner, a business analyst, and an architect sit in the same meeting. They walk out with four different ideas of what just got decided. Sometimes that's a misunderstanding. Sometimes it's a turf war. Telling the difference is the hard part.
This month, four experts confront that tension head-on in a live, moderated conversation where disagreement is welcome and the audience gets to weigh in.
They'll unpack what product management, business analysis, project management, and architecture each genuinely contribute, how they collide across both waterfall and Agile delivery, and why mistaking a role for a discipline quietly undermines even good teams.
YOU'LL LEAVE WITH
- A sharper read on what each discipline genuinely contributes across both waterfall and Agile delivery
- Language for the colleague who doesn't see your value yet, and for the one actively resisting it
- A clear sense of why mistaking a role for a discipline quietly undermines even good teams
- A Monday-morning approach to finding common ground where today it feels adversarial
EVENT DETAILS
📅 Wednesday, September 23, 2026
⏰ 6:30–7:00 PM Networking and bylaws vote | 7:00–8:00 PM Panel
📍 KC Digital Drive, 710 Central St, Kansas City, MO 64105
🎟 Free to attend, registration is required
MEMBERSHIP VOTE
We'll open the evening with a vote on proposed changes to the chapter bylaws. Voting is open to IIBA members present in the room, and the changes pass by majority of those in attendance. Proposed bylaws are available for review here.
THE PANEL
Stephanie Miracle — Product Manager
Stephanie leads adoption work for the FedNow Service, the Federal Reserve's near real-time payment and settlement service. Her product only moves when institutions outside her own choose to say yes, which makes her clear about the difference between shipping something and having it matter. She spent more than a decade improving data quality and digital banking experiences at financial institutions before joining the Fed.
Tim Rutherford, PhD — Product Owner
Tim brings 34 years in enterprise technology spanning support, sales, development, and product leadership, including roles at RSA (Archer) and the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. He holds a PhD in product management, so he has both the field scars and the theory behind what belongs on a roadmap and who gets to put it there. He serves on the IIBA Kansas City board. Self-described product zealot.
Jeremy Stephens — Architect
Jeremy is President of Fluent Consultants, a business-first technology firm supporting growing organizations nationwide. With more than 20 years leading complex technology initiatives, he sits where strategy meets what can actually be built, and has limited patience for solutions that look clean in a slide deck and come apart in delivery.
Machelle Thompson — Business Analyst
Machelle is a Senior Business Systems Analyst at Honeywell, where she leads a team of analysts and advocates for strong business analysis practice. She has spent 25 years being the person who finds the requirement nobody thought to ask about. She serves on the IIBA Kansas City board and is pursuing her CBAP certification.
