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Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 6, 2022

Random Bob Lived Where I Will Never Live

I used to think about earning a Master's degree. Originally, I thought I would study poetry or fiction writing, as two of my professors at Mount Mercy College - Dr. Kathryn Hall and Dr. James McClean - had earned their Master of Fine Arts (MFA) from the Univeristy of Iowa Writers Workshop. When I decided that I teaching, at any level, was not for me, I thought about earning a Master's degree in Non-Fiction Writing as it made the most sense due to beginning my career as a technical writer. However, now if I ever think about earning a Master's degree, it's thinking about earning a Masters of Business Administration.

With the advantage of knowing "now" what my career path has actually been, I regret I didn't graduate from Mount Mercy College with both a degree in Business and a degree in English (or a minor in one of them). While I know that my student teaching experience has ended up shaping who I am, I know that my Minor in Secondary Education was pretty much worthless.

I can also say that whenever I used to think about earning a Master's degree, it was never in the context of leaving Iowa and living in another state. The thought of leaving Iowa was never a serious option for me.

But look at Bob. He started out his education at the University of North Carolina, moved all of his stuff to CA, to earn a Master's degree, and THEN moved back to North Carolina. Kudos to Bob and to anyone else who could do something like that. I have never lived anywhere except Iowa so the idea of living on a coast is something I will never see happen in my life. I'm okay with that, though, as my family and friends are in Iowa.



Friday, October 2, 2020

What I Want to Learn Part IV

I didn't write about it when I should have.

Yesterday was a double shot of anniversaries of two huge events in my career.

First, on October 1, 1998, I started at a new job at a software company called Quintrex Data Systems (QDS), which, by that name, no longer exists. I had my last day at Jordan Systems, a software company which, by the way, also no longer exists, on September 30 and started at QDS the next day. I was very excited to join QDS and, long story short, I stayed for a dozen years. QDS introduced me to a tool called RoboHelp, which I eventually mastered to the extent that I became a RoboHelp Most Valued Professional on 10/17/2002 - or at least that's the date on the certificate that the CEO of QDS gave me. I have that certificate on the bookshelf directly in front of me because I'm proud of that accomplishment. During my time at QDS, I attended a WinWriters conference in Boston, MA, in 2004 and a WinWriters conference in Long Beach, CA, in 2007. In addition to networking with some of my technical writing heroes at both conferences, I was able to see both coasts of America without paying for seeing it. Of course, since Karen went with me, there was her plane ticket so it wasn't free, but I know I would have never gone to both coasts as cheaply as I did.

My brain works in a quirky way because mentioning money is a great transition to the other reason why October 1 is also an anniversary of a second event in my career. It is the 10-year anniversary of being reaching my 12-year anniversary of being a QDS employee and, on that same day, when I tendered my resignation. I had been hired by the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa and had negotiated with that company to have my first day be on Monday, October 18, 2010. 

I know that there is a lot of venom about the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa - look for posts on this blog by the "Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa" label - to read venomous and angry and anguished words about that hellhole. To say that I used to be very angry about the way I was treated and how my time at that company ended after only 177 days or 5 months, 3 weeks, 5 days, is accurate. I also have realized that I had to be hired at the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa in order to arrive at my current employer. To fully appreciate my time at the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa, I had to learn that it's okay to have a career with mistakes and errors. Upon reflection, leaving QDS to join the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa was an awful mistake - I can't wax poetic and say, "Oh, it wasn't so bad." I have to be honest: calling a former employer a "hellhole" is the correct adjective. Trust me.

At the same time, I love to write about the "what if I had chosen B instead of A" episodes in my life. In my journal, for example, I have tackled the following scenarios more than once:
  • what if Karen and I had never had a New Year's Eve party on 12/31/1994? It was at that party when I learned from one of our college friends that he had a job at a great company in downtown Cedar Rapids and that I should send my resume to his manager. That company was Network Data Processing (NDP) and it was my first job as a technical writer. 
  • what if I had never left QDS and had never been hired by the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa?
I don't know what else would be different in my life other than I firmly believe I would not be in my current job situation if I had never been hired by the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa. There's no scenario in which I still end up being hired at Pearson in April 2011 without leaving QDS. There's no scenario in which I learn as much as I have about content reuse and *true* technical writing at Pearson in order to be hired by my current employer. While yesterday's anniversary involves the Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa and is not an anniversary of a "good" point in my career, I still need to remember that God has a plan for me. Spending time in that Unnamed Hellhole in southern Iowa certainly would NOT have been MY plan!

What I Want to Learn Part III

When I was in college, I thought I wanted to be a high school English teacher. I thought I would graduate in May 1992, start a new teaching job in August 1992, and then, I would be an English teacher for the next 40 years. I'd retire when I was 62, and that would be that. Instead,
  1. I despised student teaching
  2. I was not a consistently awesome teacher
  3. I did not have have students who wanted to learn. 

Thus, I graduated from college in May 1992 without a job and, eventually, found a position at ACT in Iowa City doing data entry for FAFSA (financial aid) forms. Eventually, I transitioned to a software tester position within ACT, which gave me the credentials to be hired at my first technical writing job, which I will address in Part IV - stay tuned!

I believe that if I would have known then what I know now, I would have been a Computer Science minor, despite my hatred, and well-documented on this blog, for math. If I would not have chosen Computer Science because of my hatred for math, I hope that I would have chosen to earn a Business minor. The reason I would like to take those two classes in Part I and Part II of this series is because I have had to learn a lot about "business" in a trial-by-fire manner. I have had to learn that there are many aspects to a business, many of which I *still* don't comprehend entirely.

I am jealous of the education Alex is getting at UNI as a MIS major. His major is a cross-section of business and computer science. I don't believe a MIS major existed when I began college in Fall 1988 and, frankly, even if it did, I would not have chosen it because I thought I wanted to be a high school English teacher - that was my path forward into a long and rewarding career. If I could do my career all over again, I would have been a MIS / English double major with a minor in Computer Science.

When I saw those two courses in Part I and Part II, I felt a familiar twinge of lost opportunities that I never would have done anyways, but I still feel the twinge. Sometimes twinges are marked by an anniversary.

What I Want to Learn Part II

Business Analysis for the IT Professional
The business analyst role has evolved from that of a business procedure analyst to that of a business liaison between the non-technical user community and the technical solution providers. This course provides proactive, introductory coverage of the knowledge and skills essential to business analysts today and the foreseeable future.

Delivery Method
This IT Business Skills Series course does not follow the intensive hands-on lab methodology that is used in our traditional system administrator or developer classes. Our IT Business Skills classes have less of a hands-on component and more of a lecture/presentation style delivery.

About ONLC
Our Business Analyst course has been approved by the IIBA and it conforms to the BABOK v3 (Business Analysis Body of Knowledge). ONLC Training Centers is approved by IIBA as one of their Endorsed Education Providers.

Duration
4 days

Who should attend
• New business analysts
• Experienced business analysts looking to update their skills and understanding of their role
• Project managers who incorporate business analysis roles in their projects
• Managers that have business analysts on their staff
• Individuals with a general understanding of database concepts and programming and systems development

Career changers should have either IT or business domain expertise in their chosen field before attending this course to gain the maximum benefit from this course.

PDU Credits
Our Registered Education Provider (REP) number is: 3452
This course is worth: 28 PDU's

What you will accomplish
• Describe the relation between projects and processes
• Describe three major project development methodologies
• Discuss the basics of enterprise analysis and its impact on project selection
• Learn the communications processes and how they can impact project requirements
• Determine each participant’s communications style (BEST profile) and how that understanding can help in eliciting requirements
• Gather and document user requirements using the following techniques
§ Interviews
§ Collaborative sessions
§ Prototyping
§ Using the Work Breakdown Structure
§ Use case basics
§ Business process analysis
• Modeling the business
• Fundamentals of Process Modeling
• Requirements validation through Data Modeling
• Testing fundamentals and quality assurance

Course Outline

1 Overview
1.1     BA Responsibilities
1.2     Communications
1.2.1     Information distribution
1.2.2     Communications styles
1.3     Documentation strategy

2 Requirements Gathering
2.1     Levels of requirements on a project
2.2     Identifying needs vs. wants
2.3     Techniques for gathering requirements
2.3.1     Interviewing
2.3.2     Prototyping
2.3.3     Use Cases
2.3.4     Collaborative Workshops
2.3.5     Work Breakdown Structure
2.3.6     Business Process Analysis
2.3.7     Use Cases
2.4     Ranking requirements

3 Modeling
3.1     Business Process Analysis
3.1.1     Business Process Improvements (BPI)
3.1.2     Business Process Reengineering (BPR)
3.2     Data Modeling
3.2.1     Fundamentals
3.2.2     Entity Relationship Diagrams

4 Fundamentals of testing
4.1     Testing strategy
4.2     Ensure project quality and quality of the product
4.3     Test scripts

5 Templates
5.1     Software/Product Requirements Outline
5.2     Use Case Template
5.3     Test Plan Template

6 Practical Application Sessions
6.1     Determine your own Communication Style
6.2     Interview a project sponsor
6.3     Develop Use Cases and a Use Case Diagram
6.4     Gather requirements while developing a Work Breakdown Structure
6.5     Create a Business Process model
6.6     Design and facilitate a Requirements-Gathering session
6.7     Develop a high-level Requirements Document
6.8     Develop an Entity Relationship Diagram
6.9     Create a Project Test Plan

XBAITP ONLINE


© 2020, ONLC Training Centers 800-288-8221

What I Want to Learn Part I

Business Process Analysis and Management

Oveview

In this 4-day Business Process Analysis and Management course you will be equipped with the knowledge and skill sets to excel as a Business Process Analyst. This course fully prepares you for the Business Analysis certification examinations by the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA); the Association of Business Process Management Professionals International (ABPMP); and the Project Management Institute (PMI).

Prerequisites
While not required, it is suggested that individuals take our Business Analysis course prior to attending this class or have similar Business Analysis experience on the job.

Delivery method
This Business Skills Series course does not follow the intensive hands-on lab methodology that is used in our traditional IT skills classes. Our IT Business Skills classes have less of a hands-on component and more of a lecture/presentation style delivery

Who should attend
•      Business Process Analysts
•      Business Process Managers
•      Process Architect
•      Business Analysts
•      Business Systems Analysts
•      Project Managers
•      Quality Performance Managers
•      Business Process Improvement specialists
•      Business Process Innovation specialists
•      IT/IS specialists
•      Change Management specialists
•      Information Technology Infrastructure Library specialists
•      Lean, Scrum, and Six Sigma practitioners
•      Product Managers
•      Team Leaders
•      Trainers

PDU Credits
Our Registered Education Provider (REP) number is: 3452
This course is worth: 28 PDU's
 
What you will accomplish
  • Assess the effectiveness of current business processes and operational processes
  • Understand the role and responsibilities of a business analyst
  • Plan and implement Business Analysis best practices using project management life cycles (e.g., waterfall/cascade, incremental, and agile).
  • Understand and apply the Business Analysis Core Concept Model (BACCM) framework for business analysis to your organization’s business processes
  • Identify, evaluate, and prioritize opportunities to improve business processes by following a systematic 10-step business improvement process
  • Develop, create, and gain approval for the Business Process Management Case
  • Master the knowledge and skills to map and model business processes at the enterprise-wide level as well as detailed workflow level
  • Assess and select business process performance controls, metrics and targets
  • Practice/apply a Framework for Process Improvement for your organization
  • Identify and define complex business process steps using various modeling techniques and metrics such as:
  • ANSI, Swim Lane, gap analysis, Business Process Diagrams, Unified Modeling Language (UML) system, SIPOC, and Value Stream Maps, Cause-and-Effect Diagrams, Pareto Diagrams, Business Process Flow Charts and Modeling, Cross- functional Process Map, McKinsey 7 S Framework, etc., etc.
  • Demonstrate the knowledge and skills of systems modeling, process, and data modeling
  • Apply and implement best-practice business process modelling t techniques to transform business processes
  • Evaluate solution effectiveness of business processes
  • Contribute to the achievement of breakthrough organizational performance
  • Enable a process-centered organizational culture
Course Outline - Business Process Analysis/Management

Module 1: Introduction and Overview of Business Analysis
1.1     What are “Business Processes?” and “What is a “Business Process Analysis?”
1.2     What are the roles and responsibilities of a “Business Process Analyst”?
1.3     What are the credible industry-wide certification options for a business analyst?
1.4     What are some of the “business processes” in our organization?
1.5     What the current business processes in our organization that appear to have “gaps” (e.g., out-of-control processes) or low process performance?
1.6     What current business processes in our organization need improvement to achieve better outcomes (e.g., ROI) for our organization?

Module 2: Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring [Initiate Phase]
2.1     Assess the effectiveness of current business processes and operational processes to determine “gaps,” “out-of-control, ”need for improvement,” etc.
2.2     Evaluate and prioritize potential incremental improvements (in business processes, etc.)
2.3     Apply the relevant information (e.g., metrics-driven) elicited in the fact gathering process to create and analyze process models (Voice of the Business)
2.4     Identify and actively engage key stakeholders (seeking the Voice of the Customer [VOC]). Determine the perceptions and views of stakeholders
2.5     Initiate a business process analysis effort with clear objectives and an agreed-upon goals
2.6     Decompose complex processes into lower level tasks and sub-processes using a decomposition model and diagram
2.7     Complete estimates for: costs and deliver a realistic budget
2.8     time commitments and deliver a practical schedule
2.9     process improvement scope and deliver a scope model
of realistic requirements  

Module 3: Elicitation and Collaboration [Scope and Design Phase]
3.1     Develop a Stakeholder Requirements Matrix based upon the deliberate steps of stakeholder identification, analysis, and buy-in commitment
3.2     Build a strategy for active involvement/participation of stakeholders in assessing, improving, and sustaining business processes improvement
3.3     Using elicitation techniques, acquire business process improvement requirements from stakeholders (Voice of the Customer) through:
Group-based collaboration: Brainstorming, Focus Groups, Requirements Workshops, collaborative games
3.4     Individual elicitation: Interviews, Observation, Survey/Questionnaire
3.5     Research: Document Analysis, Interface Analysis, Benchmarking, Prototyping, and Market Analysis
3.6     Identify and document business process(es) scope while alleviating scope creep
3.7     Discover how to clarify and validate the current state (i.e., “status quo”) of the business process before jumping to possible “future state” solutions

Module 4: Life Cycle Management
4.1     Verify, validate, and monitor document business rules analysis for different types of projects or process improvement initiatives
4.2     Initiate a process analysis effort with a scope statement, vision statement, mission statement, and strategic objectives for the business process improvement initiatives or project(s)
4.3     Identify opportunities to improve business processes by following a systematic
10-step business improvement process
4.4     Efficiently and effectively manage and streamline backlogs and item tracking
4.5     Document, disseminate, review, and archive lessons learned

Module 5: Strategy Analysis [Improve and Control Phase]
5.1     Identify your organization’s Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), Dashboard, Balance Scorecard, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) and other pertinent metrics for analyzing the current state (status quo)
5.2     Conduct a business capability analysis, decision analysis, a financial analysis, and a risk analysis
5.3     Identify realistic triggers for initiating business process analysis
5.4     Systematically implement the selected improved processes for real time execution/implementation in the organization
5.5     Determine a “Process Business Case” that is a good fit for our organization
5.6     Create an effective business process analysis plan and business model canvas

Module 6: Requirements Analysis and Design Definition
6.1     Apply process modeling techniques and decision modelling techniques
6.2     Complete thorough sequence diagrams
6.3     Conduct business rules analyses
6.4     Compile user stories, use case, roles and permissions
6.5     Analyze and compile data dictionary, data modelling, data flow diagrams, and data mining
6.6     Conduct cost-benefit and other metrics to identify and estimate the potential value that could be realized for each planned process improvement

Module 7: Process Performance Measurement and Assessment
7.1     Assess and select business process performance controls, metrics and targets:
Ø     Learn how to use/apply a robust tool kit of quality assessment and control tools, such as: Cause and Effect Diagrams; Control Charts; Flow-Charting; Histogram; Pareto Chart and Pareto Analysis; Run Charts; Scatter Diagrams; Statistical Sampling; Inspection
Ø     Understand how to use Root Cause Analysis (RCA) and Statistical Process Control (SPS) to analyze business processes to determine whether each process is “in-control” or “out-of-control” (and the “special” causes for an out-of-control process).
Ø     Create a Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, Customers (SIPOC) model and SIPOC process diagram/map for your organization
7.2     Identify and define complex business process steps using various modeling techniques such as:
Business Process Diagrams, Value Stream Maps, Swim Lane, etc.
7.3     Apply the knowledge and skills to estimate process time and cycle time
7.4     Gain the required level of competencies to follow the basic steps in improving business process performance
7.5     Identify and document business process(es) scope while alleviating scope creep
7.6     Develop and apply a Framework for Process Improvement for your organization. 

Module 8: Solution Evaluation and Process Transformation
8.1     Effectively apply best-practice business process modelling and improvement techniques for targeted (problematic) business processes (i.e., out-of-control)
8.2     For process gaps or deficiencies, conduct a thorough Root-Cause Analysis
8.3     For solution evaluation, determine acceptance and evaluation criteria along with pertinent metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPI)
8.4     Identify agreed-upon and required business process changes, detail the impacts of each business process change initiative, and develop a transition plan and backlog of less prioritized business process changes
8.5     Submit for approval a very detailed business process plan for the implementation of the business process solution initiative or project
8.6     Evaluate solution effectiveness of planned business process improvements
8.7     Determine Return on Investment (ROI), cost-benefit analysis, internal rate of return, and other metrics to document process improvements
8.8     Encourage design of new business directions and business processes
8.9     Implement the achievement of breakthrough or transformational organizational performance
8.10     Enable and sustain a process-centered organizational culture

XBABPA ONLINE




© 2020, ONLC Training Centers 800-288-8221

Thursday, September 24, 2020

Interesting Education Path I'm Not Going on

Information Accessibility Design and Policy (IADP) Online Professional Certificate College of Applied Health Sciences University of Illinois

More information, including registration for IADP Certificate Program: http://iadp.ahs.illinois.edu

First Course starts on 19 October, 2020 (Registration closes on 12 October @ noon Central Time).

Overview

The IADP program serves website/web application developers/designers, content creators in education and industry, information technology specialists, and disability service providers learn the principles of accessible information architecture and universal design used in education, healthcare, and employment settings. Students will also learn the federal and state legal mandates governing information accessibility and their relationship to the civil rights of people with disabilities, as well as technology accessibility standards, design techniques that adhere to those standards, and tools that support validation and evidence of compliance to those standards. The IADP professional certificate program consists of 3 online 8 week courses that can be completed in one academic year, and the certificate is available to undergraduate, graduate, degree or non-degree seeking students.

Approved by the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP) for CAEC Professional Development Credit.

Monday, March 31, 2014

More Common Core

Sometimes, it's the comments that make a web page about Common Core education standards worth reading.