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Welcome to RBCS, Inc.
Dear Reader
,
Greetings,
and welcome to our first summer newsletter for 2013. (Or first winter
newsletter if you're in the Southern Hemisphere.) We have a big newsletter
for you, and we're all about education and skills growth.
First
off, you'll find our congratulations going out to two new US holders of the
ISTQB CTAL-Full certification. This is an elite group of people, and we're
proud to have helped these two RBCS clients join it.
Now,
having a certification is great, but you have to use the skills gained in order
to actually benefit from it. We have a guest article from Judy McKay,
ASTQB President, about how you can do that.
I'm
having a very busy summer, and part of that is heading to India next week for
the Next Generation Testing conference. It's been a few years since I've
been to India, so I'm looking forward to catching up with testing practitioners
there. I've got a jam-packed schedule of tutorials, talks, panels, and a
keynote, so, if you're in India, I hope to see you there. More details are
found below.
Our
free monthly webinar series continues to be a great success, having entered its
fifth year stronger than ever. The linear growth trend has brought us to
1,000 registrations per month. Over the life of the program, we've delivered
over 679 free attendee-days of education on topics relevant to software testers
and test managers. If you are a PMI PMP holder, you can use our program to
keep your certification up-to-date, since attending most webinars earns PMI
PDUs. You can learn more about how to benefit from these webinars in this
newsletter.
I
always enjoy the dynamic natures of the webinars, with lively Q&A at the end
of each. I also like entering into interesting (albeit brief)
discussions on Twitter. I'm going to free up more time in the next months
to get more active on my blog. More details about the Twitter and blog
activity are found here.
As
always, we have our schedule for webinars and training courses available for you
on this newsletter, down the right side. In the newsletter, we highlight a
particularly useful option for time-crunched people needing training: virtual
boot camps. What's a virtual boot camp? Read on!
Finally,
RBCS works hard to be the most customer-centered training and consulting company
in the software and systems testing world. I'm exceptionally proud of our
team, from our trainers and consultants to our mothership staff, who always go
above and beyond for our clients, assuring complete satisfaction and
over-delivery on expectations. It's gratifying when people send us
confirmation of that philosophy in action, and we have a couple quotes
below.
I
hope you enjoy the newsletter, and I hope to see you soon in a training, on a
webinar, in a virtual boot camp, on my blog, or on Twitter.
Regards,
Rex
Black, President
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|
 Are
You Using Your ISTQB Certification?
By
Judy McKay, President, ASTQB
An
ISTQB certification is a nice thing to have. It decorates your office. It tells
your co-workers that you have pursued education and have achieved a level of
knowledge in testing. At the Advanced level, it shows that you have selected an
area of specialization and have demonstrated your knowledge. At the Expert
level, it provides evidence that you have set yourself apart from others-that
you have acquired and demonstrated expertise in a particular area. But,
are you really using your knowledge and expertise? Let's look at how the
benefits of the certification can be used in your regular job and your
career.
At
the Foundation level, you learned solid practices that should provide the basis
for good testing processes. This includes implementing a testing lifecycle that
is supported by internationally recognized testing documentation. It includes
the ability to determine the best testing strategies for a particular project
and to select the most effective techniques for that project. With that
Foundation level certification, you should be able to differentiate between
good, sustainable practices and short-term, short-thinking, ad hoc practices.
Are you starting to feel guilty? Have you found yourself slipping back into your
old habits under the pressure of schedules and lack of management support? Are
you falling for the easy ways of accepting "let's just keep doing what we've
been doing because it's been good enough"? It's time to stop. Right now. Just
stop.
It's
a common problem to leave a conference or a class or a certification adventure
with lots of shiny new ideas and good intentions. And then reality runs over
you. And, you crawl out from under the tires, dust yourself off and realize that
implementing what you learned and know to be a better way isn't necessarily
easy. The status quo is hard to change. It's safe. It's known. And we can do it
without too much effort, at least in the short term. But you did not pursue your
certification to become a follower and to adhere to poor practices. You got your
certification to prove you are an important part of a vitally important
industry. So let's talk about changes.
First
of all, change takes time. If you are working in an organization with tight
schedules and a lot of pressure, change will be difficult. In order to get
support for change, you need to build an understanding that there will be long
term improvements. I know, we are in a short-term business environment these
days and long-term thinking isn't always popular, so maybe we need to break
those long-term changes into short-term, quantifiable goals. Start with the easy
stuff. Here's my order of attack and a rough schedule:
In
the next six months:
- Change
your document templates to ones that are standardized and usable. Take a look at
the IEEE 829-1998 templates and tailor those to suit your needs. At a minimum,
get the Test Plan, Test Summary Report and Test Case documents under control. If
you're using a tool for test management, you can probably configure the fields
in that tool to get the information you need for good test cases and good test
logs.
- Take a
look at your defect tracking system. Are you gathering data no one uses? If so,
get rid of those fields and make everyone happy (some systems won't let you
delete fields that have data, but you may be able to hide them).
- Look at
your defect reporting. What reports are you using and which ones could you or
should you be using? Are you gathering the information you need to calculate
cost of quality? You need to be tracking, at a minimum, when a defect was
introduced and when it was detected. Once you have about six months of that
data, you can do some real cost of quality calculations and that will get some
attention!
To read this article in its
entirety and to see all of McKay's recommendations visit our articles page.
About Judy McKay
Judy McKay is the President
of the American Software Testing Qualifications Board (ASTQB). She has
spent the last 20+ years working in the high tech industry with particular focus
on software quality assurance and software testing. She has managed departments
encompassing all aspects of the software lifecycle including requirements design
and analysis, software development, database design, software quality assurance,
software testing, technical support, professional services, configuration
management, technical publications and software licensing. Her career has
spanned across commercial software companies, aerospace, foreign-owned R&D,
networking and various Internet companies.
Judy has been conducting
training seminars nationwide for ten years. Her informative courses are based on
the real world application of practical data. Her courses cover the spectrum of
software quality assurance, including creating and maintaining a world class
quality assurance team, designing and implementing quality assurance and
effective testing, and creating and implementing useful test documentation and
metrics. She is the author of two books. "Managing the Test People" discusses
building and maintaining an effective quality assurance organization. "A
Software Test Engineer's Handbook" is a soup to nuts testing manual that also
serves as a preparation for the ISTQB Advanced Test Analyst and Advanced
Technical Test Analyst Certification Exams.
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Kudos
to Two More RBCS Clients Joining the Elite Group of ISTQB
Advanced Full Certified Testers
Congratulations to Tom Adams and
Robin Juhl, the most recent of RBCS' clients to achieve the elite status of
ISTQB Advanced Tester FULL (CTFL-FULL). Achieving this level of certification
requires that candidates complete the ISTQB Foundation Level, Advanced Level
Test Analyst, Advanced Level Technical Test Analyst, and the Advanced Level Test
Manager certifications. As of this writing, 38 out of more than 13,500
certifications issued in the United States have achieved this level of
certification. We are honored to provide the study materials to allow
candidates this level of success.
For additional information on
certification or non-certification training provided by RBCS please contact
us. |
World
Conference on Next Generation Testing
Rex Black is the keynote speaker
presenting "Testers of 2015 and Beyond" at the World Conference on Next
Generation Testing in Bangalore, India, July 8 to July 12, 2013. Organized
by Unicom, the first three
days will consist of tutorials presented by world acclaimed testing experts.
Tutorial Training courses take place from Monday to Wednesday from
8:30am-5:00pm. The conference and exhibition takes place over the following 2
days on Thursday and Friday. This conference is expected to have over 100
thought leaders including 25 speakers from over 20 countries and 500
attendees.
For additional information regarding this event,
visit http://www.nextgentesting.org/program. |
Complimentary
Webinars
Did you miss
the complimentary webinar June 11, 2013 "The Seven Deadly Sins
of Testing"? Check out what you missed!
Webinar attendees
are automatically entered into a drawing to win their choice of one of our green
e-learning courses. Visit our training page to see the complete webinar schedule, or just look on
this email, sign up for a webinar, show up at whichever webinar session is most
convenient, and--who knows--you might be the lucky winner of some valuable free
training. Either way, you're sure to learn
something.
Congratulations Max
Mehrzadeh, an attendee of the June webinar and Chrisa
Repas an attendee of the May webinar, for
being selected as the winners of an e-learning course!
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ISTQB
Virtual Boot Camps
Don't
have the time or the budget to send your team or yourself to an offsite training
or even an onsite training event? Consider the option of Virtual Boot
Camp training. RBCS' Virtual Boot Camps take into consideration the limited
time and budget facing many organizations without compromising the excellence of
our training services.
Virtual
Boot Camps include access to the corresponding e-learning course where available
and an option to purchase hard copy materials where available. Courses are
live and 6 hours in length and are accessed via GotoWebinar. After
registering you will receive a confirmation email containing instructions
regarding joining the webinar.
Certification and Non-Certification
Virtual Boot Camps are available and posted on our training page with links
for registration. In addition, specially scheduled private boot camps can
be arranged for your organization or training can be customized and
written specifically for your organization. Contact
us for privately scheduled or customized training.
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People
are Talking about RBCS
"Staff,
course materials, and instructors are always superb. A+++ customer
service."
-Anonymous
attendee of a public delivery of the ISTQB Advanced Technical Test Analyst
course
"Had
a great time. I learned a ton of concepts, processes, etc, that I look
forward to applying."
-Anonymous
attendee of a public delivery of the ISTQB Advanced Test
Manager course |
Green
Tip
When you book air travel, choose a nonstop
flight instead of one with layovers. Taking off and landing burns the most fuel,
so cutting down on the stops also cuts down on CO2
emissions.
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Complimentary Webinars
Earn 1.5 PDUs
for select webinars. Attendance of the live webinar is required to
earn PDUs.
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E-Learning Courses
Earn 22.5 PDUs for this course
US$ 899
ISTQB Test Engineering
Foundation en Español
Gana 22.5 PDU al término de este
curso
US$ 899
ISTQB Test
Engineering Foundation Level E-Learning,
ISTQB?????????????
???????22.5 PDU
US$
899
ISTQB Advanced Test
Analyst
(compatible for
2012 syllabus)
US$ 999
ISTQB Advanced Technical Test
Analyst
(compatible
for 2012 syllabus)
US$ 999
ISTQB Advanced Test
Manager
(compatible for 2012 syllabus)
Earn 32.5 PDUs for this
course
US$ 999
ISTQB Advanced Level -
FULL
(compatible
for 2012 syllabus)
US$ 2,697
Requirements Engineering
Foundation
(an IREB,
IIBA and IBAQB exam preparation course)
Earn 18 CDUs for this course
US$
799
Managing the Testing
Process
US$
499
Assessing Your Test
Team
US$ 499
Pragmatic Software
Testing
US$
449
Risk Based
Testing
US$
449
US$ 499
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ISTQB Certified Tester Virtual Boot
Camps
Earn 22.5
PDUs
US$
449
July 24, 2013
11 am to 5 pm CDT
October 25, 2013
11 am to 5 pm CDT
January 7, 2014
11 am to 5 pm
CST
(updated
for 2012 syllabus)
Earn
32.5 PDUs
US$
599
September 13, 2013
11 am to 5 pm
CDT
December 10, 2013
11 am to 5 pm
CST
(updated for 2012 syllabus)
US$ 599
August 6, 2013
11 am to 5 pm CDT
November 6, 2013
11 am to 5 pm CST
February 12, 2014
11 am to 5 pm CST
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Non-Certification
Virtual Workshops
Earn
3 PDUs for attendance of these workshops
US$
199
US$
199
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Certification
Public Courses
Test Engineering
Foundation Level
Earn
22.5 PDUs for this course
US$
2,000
September 30 -
October 3, 2013
Phoenix, AZ
October 7-10, 2013
Tampa, FL
October 28-31, 2013
San
Antonio, TX
December 9-12, 2013 Toronto, Canada
 Advanced Test
Manager
(Accredited
to 2012 syllabus by ASTQB December 2012)
Earn 32.5 PDUs for this
course
US$ 2,650
July 29 - August 2, 2013
San Diego, CA
August 5-9, 2013
Atlanta, GA
October 21-25, 2013 Charlotte, NC
December 2-6, 2013
Newark, NJ
(Accredited
to 2012 syllabus by ASTQB December 2012)
US$ 2,250
August 5-8,
2013
Indianapolis,
IN
October 7-10,
2013 Toronto, Canada
October 7-10,
2013
Newark, NJ
December 2-5,
2013
San Antonio,
TX
December 9-12,
2013
McLean, VA
 Advanced Technical Test
Analyst
(Accredited to 2012
syllabus by ASTQB January 2013)
US$ 2,250
September 9-11,
2013
McLean, VA
November 18-20,
2013
McLean, VA
(an IREB,
IIBA and IBAQB exam preparation course)
Earn 18
CDUs for this course
US$
2,500
Contact
RBCS to schedule
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