Software Testing e-learning

One of the best ways to stretch your training dollars - whether you are paying for training personally or from corporate accounts - is to consider e-learning.

Not only does e-learning cost less than live public or in-house training, it is a great solution for people who don't have the time to devote 7 or 8 hours (or 2 - 5 days) for training.

Studies have shown that e-learning is just as effective in getting the information across as live training. I think it may be even more effective because you can repeat material as needed. You can't do that in a live class.

It's also a great way to make sure everyone gets the same training no matter where they live.

And...for those training managers concerned about any trainer behavior (jokes, comments, etc.), e-learning is safe. No profanity, no inappropriate remarks, etc.

I have found that the key for effective e-learning is to interact with the instructor. That's why I offer teleconference sessions for my e-learning participants. You get the chance to ask questions and interact with me. Of course, I am always reachable by e-mail and try my best to answer questions by phone.

These are just a few of the benefits of e-learning. If you want to learn more about my e-learning courses (I have 13 of them now, including an ISTQB foundation level course), just visit http://www.riceconsulting.com/training/e-learning.htm.

To experience free demos of any of my courses, just visit http://www.softwaretestingtrainingonline.com/moodle and select the demo section. You can login as a guest.

To buy a course, just visit www.mysoftwaretesting.com. We have a sale on right now!

Riceconsulting.com banned from Google

Well, the saga continues. Because of the redirects on my site, then my subsequent removal of the malicious links, I have been banned from Google. I'm not upset at Google - I understand their need for maintaining integrity in the search results.

It is frustrating to go from the #1 listed site for "software testing consulting" and the #4 site for "software testing training" to not even being in the search results at all.

So, if you are looking for me on the web, I hope this post helps you to find me.

I have gone through the steps to request re-inclusion and hope to be back in there soon.

ISTQB Software Testing Certification Training

I'm in Dallas this week working on a project that I can't talk about. Well, I could but then...OK, you know the line.

Funny thing. I was here last week and my car got pummelled with quarter-sized hail. About $1,500 in damage. Just got it estimated for repair on Monday. I hadn't been here two hours last night when another hail storm was heading my way. So...I dragged myself out into the rain and moved by already hail damaged car under the hotel entrance. Guess what? Nothing happened. Yea! All you people at the Hampton Inn owe me thanks for keeping the hail away.

I'm happy to announce that I have submitted my Foundation Level Course in Software Testing for accreditation. You can read the press release here.

Hopefully before long, I'll be able to display the ISTQB logo and really get out there promoting the course. My goal is to get as many people certified as possible.

Why?

I think everyone in the field of software testing has an opinion about certifications. I don't believe there is a single "right" perspective. What appeals to one person may not appeal to someone else.

I am CSTE #2, which means I was there at the start. I was a designer of the certification. I am now an officer of the ASTQB, which means I now support wholly the ISTQB program. A big reason I am behind the ISTQB program is because it is vendor-neutral. It's true that people (including me) will make money conducting training courses. But if I wasn't presenting this course, I would be presenting something else. However, no one company "owns" the certification. No vendor can just change the program. In fact, there are many training providers which gives you more options.

Training is not required to sit for the exam. However, I really believes it helps because you get immersion in the terminology and philosophy of the ISTQB syllabus.

Do test certifications help your career? It depends on your situation and your goals.

I know some test managers that could care less about people who are certified and I know others that are certain that having a certification increases their test team's image in the organization. Some people find great value in using test certification as setting a baseline of software testing terminology and practice in an organization. My belief is that having a certification is one way to stand out in your career.

I have personally had clients tell me the deciding factor in using my services was because I held a certification.

There have been debates on this topic, so there are views on all sides.

I have some really cool things in the works that I can't reveal just yet regarding ISTQB test certification training. I'll just say that I'm very excited about doing some things that no one else is doing in software testing!

If you want to get training in ISTQB Foundation Level Software Testing, call me at 405-691-8075, or contact me through my web site to discuss.

Have a great one!

Randy

Making Software Testing Training Green

It's tough sometimes to break out of a mold. That's where we seem to be where training is concerned. Traditional classroom testing has the opportunity to be engaging, but too often it isn't. You have to work at it.

So when I start talking about e-learning, people get concerned about the interaction aspects. And interaction is important! It can be achieved with e-learning.

There are other considerations, such as environmental concerns. With e-learning:

• You eliminate travel, therefore reducing fuel used in airplanes and cars


• You eliminate the big books, therefore reducing the amount of trees used for paper


• You reduce or eliminate the need for a physical facility to heat or cool for a class of 15 or more peopleBut even above the environmental impact, you can save big money and get training that is just as effective as live training!

Then, there are time and cost concerns. E-learning can be scaled up much faster and broader that live on-site training. For example, with my e-learning courses, it is possible to train you entire worldwide test organization in one week for a small fraction of live in-person training.

I like the time-shifted approach. In fact, I believe on-demand content is essential to make e-learning effective. It's just too difficult to co-ordinate everyone's schedule to be connected at the same time. Plus, you eliminate many of the concurreny and performance issues of having many people accessing the same content at the same time. (On the launch of Oprah's new online training event with author Eckhart Tolle, author of "The New Earth", 500,000 people tried to access the event. "Tried" is the key word.)

While you won't have this type of load, you can still have problems with load.

My entire attitude toward training changed after 9/11. It was tough for anyone in the training business for some time because so many people were on travel restrictions. Many conferences were cancelled.

If fuel costs continue to soar, travel costs will also rise. E-learning just makes sense on a variety of levels.

If you want to learn more, check out my e-learning offerings in software testing, IEEE standards and user requiremnts here.

Speaking of green, here is my favorite fishing spot.
It is Bear Lake, close to Cuchara, Colorado.

That's why I say that a bad day of fishing is better than a good day at work!

What Makes Software Testing Training Effective - Part 2

Today I did something that many of my friends have advised me to do for many years. I had my head examined. Really.

I had a brain MRI performed because I have tinnitus in my left ear and in order to rule out a tumor, I had to get this done to get life insurance.

The funny thing is that there was power surge about 10 minutes into the process and they had to "re-boot" the MRI machine. I told them not to worry. "It's not you, it's me! I'm a tester."

To add on to my last post about software test training effectiveness, I was thinking about something I've been intending to post for some time.

That is, to learn in small doses is more effective than trying to train in large chunks. Now, this is just the opposite to how many people think. They want to cram as much information as possible into a training day. The problem is that people start to suffer from information overload.

One of my mentors, Fred Smith, said that, "The best mentoring is intensity in a narrow field...learn, practice and assimilate." He used the example of how he used to dramatically improve the performance of salespeople by teaching just few simple techniques repetitively. Then, the people would go out and try them. When they came back, they all had glowing success stories.

It also reminds me of a friend who is a great guitarist who told me the secret to playing fast is to play slow.

So, for software testers, I suggest in really drilling down into one technique. In one of my intermediate testing courses, I spend two days just teaching and practicing pairwise testing. We spend about three hours on learning how to find the right size orthogonal array. We spend a hour on how to use some of the pairwise tools that are free. I guarantee you one thing. When the workshop is over (it's really not fair to call it a class), people know all about pairwise testing.

By the way, if you would like a taste of this class, attend my Tuesday half-day tutorial at StarEast in about a month.

You will find that some people want to just breeze through the material quickly. These people just want to cut to the chase. They are likely to get impatient when the class wants to discuss questions and observations - you know, where learning actually occurs! I like to set expectations by letting the class know that the goal is not to get through all the slides. It's to internalize the information. So, I encourage people to enjoy the journey!

Remember, another way to make training stick is to take it in sips instead of gulps!

Software Testing Training - What Makes it Effective?

Man, it's been busy here in the office today, but I love it!

I've been thinking a lot about really what makes training "stick", especially in software testing and software quality. Actually, I've been thinking along these lines for several years.

It was a defining moment when back in 1998, I re-designed my testing courses to be "hands-on" computer-based. Then, in 2001 I attended an AYE conference and that put another spin on things for me. (BTW, I highly recommend that conference!) It caused me to add many more experiential activities to my training.

So, why doesn't training "stick"?

Well, besides the basic things like:

You get out what you put into it.
Learn, then apply.
etc...

1) I have observed that my very best training experience, both as trainer and trainee, is when stretching happens. When training doesn't stretch you, it's easy to just coast along and not change anything.

I think learning should result in some form of change. If it doesn't result in change, then has anything been accomplished? After all, there should be some form of improvement seen.

But, back to stretching...

Stretching happens when you have to think long and hard about how to solve a problem. It happens when the case study software messes up and then you have to troubleshoot, learn, test, try again, fail, try again and FINALLY get it right.

Some people complain that the case study should have been more trouble-free. Then, they don't believe that I designed it that way!

Training sticks when people fully understand WHY certain things are done WHEN they are done. Unfortunately, too many trainers focus on the WHAT and HOW, which is great for robots, but not great for transforming people into thinking testers.

So, I'll warn you in advance. If you attend one of my sessions, you will probably be stretched. It's not because I'm mean, it's because I want you to remember.

2) People remember stories more than bullet points. I have had people tell me they didn't remember the bullet points on my slides, but they remembered some of those great project stories. (By the way, my track session at StarEast will be "Testing Disasters and Turnarounds" which will be based on three situations where things went really bad and how some of them were corrected.) You will also hear some good stories in my training sessions.

3) People learn better when things are light. So, I like to use humor tastefully and keep things loose and informal in the sessions I teach.

Here's another take which has a really good example:
http://newsweaver.ie/qualtech/e_article001048145.cfm?x=bcnrJV7,b4V6LhgS

That's it for now. I would like to hear what you think makes training effective!