Arlen Bankston was at the vanguard of the agile movement, and was one of the earliest Certified Scrum Trainers. He was also among the first to explicitly blend lean systems thinking and user experience practices with agile to ensure that organizations took a holistic perspective beyond just the software. He became a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt while leading a Lean-Agile practice for six years, and was a successful entrepreneur helping to build an agile consultancy for fifteen years.