Performance Analysis and Tuning Course For a Storage Manufacturer
A manufacturer of RAID disk systems turned to LTS for help with a performance analysis and tuning course. They had already created a course for their analysis tool, but they only had one instructor teaching all their courses. He was needed to teach their core installation and administration courses. In the past, the course had not been well received by the students, who rated it poorly in evaluations.
What the company needed
Initially, the manufacturer needed someone to learn their RAID system and teach the performance and analysis course to supplement the existing trainers and raise its value to customers and employees.
The LTS answer
We attended their week-long course in installation and configuration of the system, in order to understand the basics of how it worked and how to make configuration changes. We then spent two weeks studying the existing course materials and developing a teaching strategy. We spent a significant part of the time in the lab, using the software. We also interviewed the performance engineers to gain their insight into the tool. During the fourth week after taking on the engagement, we taught the two-day course, raising the student evaluations of the course to the "very good" level.
The LTS solution
Over time, the organization grew, but they retained LTS to teach the performance analysis and tuning course. Although they added instructors who could teach the course well, it was not offered as often as their core curriculum, so they continued to use LTS to supplement the rest of the training group.
When it came time to release the next version of the performance tool, the manufacturer used LTS to rewrite the course, rather than taking a developer away from another task. We spent extensive time in the lab, learning and testing the new version to completely restructure and rewrite the course.
Over time, the course consistently received high ratings from the students. As one European systems analyst put it: "I always begin a course expecting to rate it as two [on a one - five scale]. I had no choice but to give this course fours and fives."
