Bruce Feiler: Agile programming — for your family

Bruce Feiler has a radical idea: To deal with the stress of modern family life, go agile. Inspired by agile software programming, Feiler introduces family practices which encourage flexibility, bottom-up idea flow, constant feedback and accountability. One surprising feature: Kids pick their own punishments.

Bruce Feiler is the author of “Council of Dads,” and the writer/presenter of the PBS miniseries “Walking the Bible.”

WHY YOU SHOULD LISTEN TO HIM?

Bruce Feiler is the author of nine books, including Walking the Bible, Abraham, and America’s Prophet. He is also the writer/presenter of the PBS miniseries Walking the Bible. His book The Council of Dads tells the uplifting story of how friendship and community can help one survive life’s greatest challenges. Most recently Feiler published The Secrets of Happy Families, in which he calls for a new approach to family dynamics, inspired by cutting-edge techniques gathered from experts in the disciplines of science, business, sports and the military.

Feiler’s early books involve immersing himself in different cultures and bringing other worlds vividly to life. These include Learning to Bow, an account of the year he spent teaching in rural Japan; Looking for Class, about life inside Oxford and Cambridge; and Under the Big Top, which depicts the year he spent performing as a clown in the Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. Circus.

Walking the Bible describes his perilous, 10,000-mile journey retracing the Five Books of Moses through the desert. The book was hailed as an “instant classic” by the Washington Postand “thoughtful, informed, and perceptive” by the New York Times.