In the Yahoo group supporting Cem Kaner\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Black Box Software Testing course, Anil Soni has been describing experiences organising and leading internal training, using the BBST course materials. One point in particular caught my attention:<\/p>\n
> The major challenge is to have all the testers together in the same time
\n> needed for the group interaction. <\/p>\n
In a recent role, I had trouble getting all of my testers together for study sessions. Often, the testers felt uncomfortable stopping work to come to a study session. At times, work was a genuine priority. At other times, the things testers were working on could wait an hour or two, but it was difficult for the tester to make that decision. <\/p>\n
Sometimes I would have to make the decision for them. That is, tell them “This is more important than the work you are doing right now”. I could do this because I had management support for creating a learning environment.<\/p>\n
Organisationally though, we were sending mixed messages. The project manager expressed the opinion \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not running a school here\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. The development manager countered with \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We absolutely are\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. These two statements captured the tension between getting today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s job done now, and ensuring that tomorrow\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s work can be done better or more efficiently. In one statement, is the view that employees should always be working on something that directly contributes business value. In the other statement, the view that it is vital that time be set aside during work hours expressly for improving the skills of staff and for reflection on past experience.<\/p>\n
At this point, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really want to enter into the philosophical debate around whether organisations should be learning organisations are not. However, if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve decided that it is important that your staff learn and improve here are a few things that I would consider.<\/p>\n
On this last point, in one team, a thousand dollar self-education budget was available to each employee per year. They were free to spend this on anything that they wished. However, in a year and a half, almost none of the team had made use of that budget. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one example of a feedback mechanism, triggered by the question \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Why haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t you used your training budget?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Regular team meetings, where each team member presented some recent learning were another. <\/p>\n
The dominant work culture is about appearing to be busy, and doing \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcreal work\u00e2\u20ac\u2122. Despite support at the highest level, if other management levels don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t support the company\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s learning objectives, employees will be quite nervous about spending time on tasks that their close managers may consider trivialities. This is a significant cultural change, and the forces of history will be working powerfully against you.<\/p>\n