Experiential Workshops
I conduct experiential or interactive workshops for clients and through public classes, giving participants the opportunity to learn by doing. Any of my workshops can be custom-designed to fit a client's needs, and I would be happy to design a new offering to meet your requirements. For example, if your team needs help developing a test strategy or plan, I can design a workshop where that is the deliverable.
Each workshop goes beyond the standard processes you can learn from a book, providing opportunities to experience, observe and discuss life-like project interactions related to testing in the safe environment of a classroom where everyone is learning.
See Speaking also, for other ready-made presentations or workshops I could conduct at your company or event.
Inspiring Testing - Test Leadership Workshop
This workshop is for testers, test managers, test leads—anyone who wants to become a leader or a more effective leader. We’ll examine the key focus areas for test leaders, and work together to identify and practice the skills and personal qualities essential for exceptional test leadership.
Determining Business Risks for Testing
In this workshop we’ll examine strategies for identifying the stakeholders who own different business risks. We’ll discuss the kinds of questions to ask and look at sample questions for different contexts. Finally, we’ll practice conducting a risk assessment workshop with stakeholders.
The Design Behind the Plan - Advanced Test Strategy
In this hands-on workshop we’re going to set aside the standard big document and focus on the important aspects of a test strategy: thinking strategically, and communicating the strategy effectively. Working together on real testing problems, we’ll explore what’s essential in a strategy and how to develop it using lightweight media.
Mind, Map and Strategy: Using a mindmap to develop and communicate your test strategy
In this popular workshop, we will walk through an example to illustrate how a mindmap can be used effectively for a test strategy, and then participants will spend the bulk of the session developing and presenting their own mind-mapped strategies, and learning from other participants mindmaps.
Mastering the Power of Heuristics in Testing
Variously defined as “fallible methods for solving problems” (Bach & Bolton) or “rules of thumb”, heuristics are essential tools for thinking test practitioners. If you aren’t aware that you are operating with a heuristic model, it can become an unchallenged assumption. But if you consciously use a model as a heuristic, then you are in a better position to see its weaknesses and potential failure points in a given situation.
In this workshop, we will explore the use of heuristics in problem solving and software testing. Working in groups, participants will have opportunities to design heuristics to solve particular problems, apply them to problem solutions, then critique their models and share their conclusions with other groups.
See brief review. Extensive review here.
Delivering Difficult Messages
A passion for the truth is essential for a tester. But the truths we uncover in the exercise of our craft can be bad news to our co-workers or to people who hold more power in the hierarchy than we do. In this workshop, we will practice delivering difficult messages and addressing the fallout, building relevant skills and knowledge along the way. We will explore the factors that can inhibit us in delivering a message, as well as those that might influence a recipient’s reactions.
Right-sizing Test Documentation
Most organizations can no longer afford project time for testers to write a full slate of IEEE 829 documents. These heavyweight documents are often of low value, too dense for stakeholders to read and with only minimal project-specific content. In this session, participants will work together to explore and practice how to optimize test documentation for each project, focusing on both information needs and format alternatives such as mindmaps and diagrams.
Shaping the Future - Your Testing Career
Where do you want to go in software testing? Definable skills are essential, but so are more nebulous skills and personal qualities, like collaboration, empathy and courage. In this workshop we’ll work together to explore where you want to go and the skills and personal qualities you want to develop. We’ll examine many resources and activities that can help you do this. Finally, you’ll build a roadmap to the future you want to make for yourself in software testing.