Run, don't walk, to this training class!
Yikes. Yet again, I've waited too long to post to my blog. I can't believe it's been 2 months!!
I actually have a real speech-related topic this time, though. Last week, I went to the 5-day course called "Speech Applications: Planning, Voice User Interface Design, and Tuning" held in Seattle. It was taught by Bruce Balentine and David Attwater from EIG, one of our Speech partners (and a TAP participant!).
I was a little worried at the prospect of going to a 5-day class and the mountains of work that awaited me back at the office. But wow, it was totally worth it. Both of the instructors were extremely knowledgable and had a lot of real-world experience and examples to back up what they were saying. Unlike many other technical classes I've taken, the instructors didn't just read from the PowerPoint slides but just used them as a general outline to impart their wisdom to us.
There were a few group exercises which really reinforced what we were learning and actually gave me some great insight into what our customers do with their IVRs since everyone else in the course was working on an IVR for their company or for a client.
The course material was developed by Microsoft, but the class itself doesn't focus exclusively on Microsoft solutions, rather it's a more general intro to ASR, IVR systems and the specific design principles to use based on what we know about human factors and psychology.
I originally signed up for it a year ago, when I was relatively new to the Speech Server team, but I was sick the week of the class, so I was allowed to attend this session to make it up. I wish I had been able to take the class last year - it would have given me more of a technical background to understand the issues and feedback our customers have been reporting through our TAP and Beta programs.
In short, it was a fantastic class and a great use of my time. I'm usually very critical about classes but this one was well worth it.
It may seem expensive, but the things you'll learn about VUI design will translate into $$ saved for your company when more of your customers stick with your well-designed IVR app rather than asking to speak with an agent.
If you have any specific questions about the class, please post them in the comments and I'll try to answer them. The next session is in Chicago next month - check it out! (Really, no one is paying me for this review. It really was *that* good.)
