Excelon Delivers custom training, both on-site at your location and public. We specialize in software testing and systems improvement, but also offer courses in requirements, developer-testing, technical debt, project management, line management, sales, and related subjects.

Our training is different because it involves actually doing the work, through simulation, while observing how the nature of the work changes. These exercises are supported through lecture and conversation; we actively engage the audience in figuring out not the book answer, but what ideas will actually work for them in the field. Then we follow-up the conversation with exercises that give students the chance to try out the solution.

Our classes combine an actual keyboard and mouse, physical objects, visual images, conversations, videos, and printed handouts in a way designed to reach a variety of learning styles, and we include enough exercises to move the ideas from theoretical to practical.

Here is a selection of our most popular workshops and sessions:

Software Testing Reloaded is a one-day, deep dive into Exploratory Testing and test theory by doing

Agile Quality Training is a half to one-day course focused on how the whole nature of Quality changes in an Agile Environment for all team members, with a focus on testing. The half-day version simulates the planning and execution aspects of an Agile Project, while the full-day includes lecture, walkthroughs, and hands-on doing of software testing with an Agile Approach.

We also run half to full-day Improvement Workshops, where we conduct an analysis of the organization’s strategy and opportunities, then break into small groups to discuss and plan real, concrete improvement ideas.  Our consultants mediate but can also lead some of these sessions.  While some sessions are general, at other times we have discussed a specific theme, such as Technical Debt or Reducing the Cost of Software Testing.

Agile Immersion is a combined consulting and training assignment, from one to ten weeks. We’ll take a look at the actual work backlog, slice it into small elements, actually perform Agile Training with your current work in progress inventory, and stick around long enough to see the results.  We can perform this at any stage of the journey, from “What is this Agile thing?” to “We’ve been doing Agile Method X for two years now and want to try something new; what have you got?”

Pair Testing is similar to Agile Immersion, but limited in scope to doing testing.  Our consultant will teach testing by doing the work, which will improve the team while improving velocity.  The engagement ends with a brief retrospective and optional consulting report.