Effective Problem Solving Workshop for Leaders and Managers

Mumbai | 8th June, 2019 | Saturday

Effective Problem Solving Workshop for Leaders

Full Day Hands-On Workshop with Ajay Balamurugadas

Who should attend?

Anyone working as a Lead or Manager.
Anyone expecting a promotion to Lead or Managerial position.
Anyone who finds Leadership fascinating and want to get better at it.
Anyone who is a good leader(in his/her own view) but wants to get it validated.
Test Leads, Test Managers looking for the solutions to common Test Leadership problems.

Why one should attend ?

Congratulations !!!

Based on your performance for the last year, we are happy to promote you.

Your designation effective today is Team Lead / Team Manager.

If you have been recently promoted to Team Lead / Team Manager, the change is immense. You have team members who look up to you for guidance, conflict resolution, work allocation and help in managing priorities in addition to being the face of the team to the stakeholders.

While you are still figuring out the responsibilities and day to day tasks, you receive a resignation email from one of your team members.

What do you do when your manager is on leave? What would you do when other stakeholders start complaining about the star performer

of your team who was your peer a few days ago and now reports to you. How will you handle this situation?

Your team is constantly working hard but the other team(s) is/are not sticking to the schedule.

Your team members have spent their last three weekends at office. There is no time to even take a compensatory leave. You can sense the symptoms of burnout and you receive an email requesting support for the upcoming weekend as well. The project is crucial to everyone.

What do you do?

These are just few examples of common problems when you manage teams.

Welcome to Effective Problem Solving Workshop for Leaders and Managers,
where we will talk about many such problems and their solution.

We will focus on one of the key and most neglected agents of problems – THE PEOPLE

What can you expect:

Problem definition, problem identification, traditional ways of solving problems
Models and techniques to analyse and solve problems
Tools to solve problems and how tools generate new problems
Common traps in problem solving and common problems in testing
Multiple exercises for reflection, group exercises, debrief after each exercise
Takeaways discussion and feedback

Event Schedule & Outline

10:00 AM to 6:00 PM on 8th June, 2019 | Mumbai

Hey, I have a problem! (60 mins)

• How do we identify problems

• Is that the burning problem – Solo exercise

• Why problems are necessary

• What problems teach us

How we usually solve problems (60 mins)

• Common models for problem analysis

• Common techniques to solve problems

• Factors of a problem

• Group exercise

Tools to our rescue (60 mins)

• Simplistic tools to solve problems

• Why tools don’t solve problems without creating new problems

• Group discussion about common problems and tools

Oops, we are trapped! (75 mins)

• Common traps in problem solving

• Group exercise: Simulation of real time situations

• How do we unblock ourselves

Common Problems in Testing (60 mins)

• The Test Estimation Problem

• The Test Coverage Problem

• Applying Gamestorming ideas to solve the testing problems – Group exercise

More Problems(30 mins)

• The New Manager Syndrome

• Team morale issues

• Lack of direction

Summary: (60 mins)

• Takeaways

• Q&A

• Feedback

About Workshop Speaker

Test Professional & Leader with 12+ Years of Industry Experience. A graduate of Problem Solving Leadership, BBST Courses by AST, Rapid Software Testing, Rapid Testing Intensive workshop, Lean Software Testing Workshop, Ajay Balamurugadas doesn’t hesitate to spend on his learning. Starting his career as a software tester, he continues to be a hands-on software tester along with training new testers, meeting testers in person, presenting at conferences, conducting workshops and sharing his thoughts through his blog and tweets.

Ajay started with testing standalone desktop applications and soon moved on to web applications and mobile applications. His journey was boosted by co-founding Weekend Testing (www.weekendtesting.com), Test Maniac (www.testmaniac.com). His short books(bit.ly/booksaj) are popular with many testers for the practical and ready to use tips.

He considers being inducted into ‘Bach Brothers’ Testing Legion of Merit’, presenting keynote at CAST 2015 (http://.bit.ly/ajkeynote) and attending Problem Solving Leadership workshop by Jerry Weinberg and Esther Derby to be his big achievements till date. He is also happy at the number of testers who have been influenced positively by his interactions.

Know more at https://about.me/ajay184f | https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajaybalamurugadas

Hear from past attendees

I attended ‘A Hands on Workshop on Problem Solving’ by Ajay Balamurugadas and Jyothi Rangaiah, in 2018 in Bangalore. Test managers, experienced testers, engineering graduates and programmers attended the workshop. I appreciate the foundation on which the workshop is designed and its simple and effective. Actively listen to your partner(whose problem is to be solved), start a conversation, immerse yourself to build a shared understanding of ‘The Problem’. Engage with your partner and start discussing what different solutions might / should work. Prioritize and choose the best ones to try out. Remember, each problem has a solution and a solution may lead to a different problem and hence different mindsets, techniques and heuristics were suggested to generate ideas. I highly recommend this workshop by Ajay, to anyone who wants to effectively solve individual, team, work group related problems.

Sandeep Garg

Associate Consultant QA BRIDGETREE

I want to Thank Ajay for doing the workshop on “Problem Solving”. It is really helpful in coming up with key points(the approaches) to focus on while dealing with a problem.

And I have used the ‘Word’ & ‘Time’ approach. First found the time which is suitable for and then used the appropriate word for discussion to shot-out the problems in the team.

Parmesh Mishra

Software Engineer (QA) at Avish Websoft

Limited Seats! Avail offers while you can.

Early Bird Tickets(With Taxes)- INR 4444 /-

For regular tickets(With Taxes)- INR 4999 /-

Venue Details

91springboard 74 Techno Park, Andheri East

74/II, “C” Cross Road, Opp Gate No 2, MIDC 400 093, Seepz, Andheri East, Mumbai, Maharashtra

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Do I need to carry Laptop?
Answer: Not necessarily. It will help if you can make a lot of notes even without a laptop.

2. Any other prerequisites?
Answer: NA

3. Directions to the Venue?
Answer: http://bit.ly/2WvdINk

4. Food will be provided by the Organizer?
Answer: Yes. It is included in your Workshop Pass along with Tea/Coffee.

5. I have few queries, how do I contact organizer/speaker?
Answer: Please email at [email protected]

6. Will I get any post-workshop guidance?
Answer: Yes, our speaker is friendly and love to help Testers. You can freely contact him for any guidance.

7. Any Group Discount?
Answer: Flat discount of 10% on each ticket when a group of 3 or more people register in one transaction?

8. I want to attend but unable to pay participation fee?
Answer: Please drop us an email stating about the problem and how badly you want to attend this and we may help 🙂

9. Will I receive any material after the workshop?
Answer: Yes, you will receive notes/cheat-sheet.

10. I want to attend this. Can this be in my City / Company?
Answer: Yes, we can explore the possibility. Please drop us an email at [email protected] or [email protected]

11. Intended audience and prerequisite knowledge.
This workshop is aimed at software testers and developers who want to learn more about
solving problems – especially the ones dealing with people, more efficiently. Some prior experience of managing teams can be helpful. At the same time, those who aspire to be the
next team lead/manager will also find this workshop very useful.

12. After this course
After completing this problem solving workshop, you’ll know why solving problems is a separate skill that can be mastered with conscious practice, what to look for in a problem and nip problems in the bud. You will leave the workshop with a collection of models, techniques, tools,experiences and resources for further study and experimentation, handy to help you solve problems at your workplace. Do not be surprised if your team members appreciate the new leader/manager in you.

About 'The Test Tribe'

We are India’s Fastest Growing Testing Community formed by bunch of Passionate and Like-minded Software Testers with a goal to add their two cents to help the Testing craft get the glory it deserves. We especially want to change the way Testing is seen in India by encouraging Testers from this part of world to have continuous focus on Learning and Innovation. We aim to create offline and online platforms where Testers can “Collaborate, Learn and Grow.” Yup, that’s our motto too.