This past week I attended my first online conference, Automation Guild 2018. I’m not going to lie, I was skeptical as to how and online conference would be, as the conferences I’ve attended in the past were obviously in person and sometimes challenging if there were two workshops occurring at the same time, that I wanted to attend.  Well, I can tell you I was not let down and in fact, I was beyond impressed! Joe Colantonio the founder of Automation Guild as well as Test Talks, was as cool as the other side of the pillow, in navigating through a few technical difficulties, to deliver the best testing conference I’ve attended in a very long time!

I highly recommend this conference for the beginner to the expert. Here are the five reasons that you should still join Automation Guild 2018!

1.   All-Star Presenters

The presenters were an A List roster of Automation gurus from across the world. These are notable experts in their fields, presenting, teaching and sharing information from frameworks, coding languages, AI, Rest API’s, coding interviews for automation developers, DevOps, automation patterns, etc . Check out the presenters:

Day 1: Gil Tayar, Richard Bradshaw, Leo Laskin, Titus Fortner, Jeff “Cheezy” Morgan, Jane Mareth, Shashikant Jagtap, and Rountable with Angie Jones, Ali Khalid & Oren Rubin

Day 2: Manoj Kumar, Mark Winteringham, Eran Kinsbruner, Corina Pip, Lisa Crispin, Ash Coleman, Michelle XIE, and Roundtable with Paul Grizzaffi, Meaghan Lewis

Day 3: Toyer Mamoojee, T.J Maher, Bria Grangard, Mark Fink, Paul Grossman, Satyajit Malugu, Mike Talks, and Roundtable with Jason Arbon, Greg Paskal

2.   Beyond Reasonably Priced

Let’s be real for a moment. Not every job is going to flip the bill for a conference that could run you into the thousands of dollars, not counting airfare and hotel. Automation Guild is a beyond reasonably priced at $197, that I’m sure your place of employment would flip the bill for. If they cannot or won’t, it’s worthwhile to invest in yourself, and purchase the presentations yourself.

3.   Convenience

I attended this conference from home. Right from the couch, laptop in hand and streamed content to my TV from my iPad. Worked like a charm!

4.   You Keep the Content

Automation Guild makes available the transcripts of each presentation, the presentation videos and the Q&A videos with the presenters. That’s right, you receive access to the Guild Conferences site and all its content/videos for up to a year after the conference is over, affording you the opportunity to download it to your own device(s) where it can be kept for as long as you wish. These serve as good points of reference as you begin or continue growing your automation skillset.

5.   Automation Guild Slack Channel

In addition, to the priceless presentations and dialogue that occurred during the conference, I was really blown away by the willingness to by the members of the Slack channel in sharing their expertise, advice, and answer questions. This includes the presenters, many of whom made and continue to make themselves available after the conclusion of the conference. And yes, the Automation Guild Slack Channel remains open for attendees and presenters!

In conclusion, we are learning something new each day and when we go to conferences, it’s to continue to learn, no matter where we are in our career. Although early in my automation career, Automation Guild 2018 provided me a plethora of information, resources and education that was well worth the price of admission. Although the conference has concluded, all the aforementioned materials are still available for purchase by going to https://guildconferences.com/shop/

Thank you to Joe Colantonio, the presenters and the testing community that participated, for a fun filled three days of what Joe I’m sure would refer to as “Automation Awesomeness!”