Greetings, I’m Simon Roberts, president of Dancing Cloud Services, LLC. I founded the company in 2004, after I had spent nine years with Sun Microsystems, Inc. as a senior instructor and course developer. While I was with Sun, I lead the introduction of Java training by Sun in the U.K. teaching their first Java class in December 1995 at their training center in Camberley west of London. I built Sun’s first five-day Java programming class and developed Sun’s original Java certification exams in 1998.

Before joining Sun in 1995, I worked as both a software engineer, specializing in industrial control systems, and a teacher, as a part-time member of a local University’s staff in my then-home-town of Cambridge, England.

Since leaving Sun, I’ve been privileged to develop and deliver training for clients around the world. I loves traveling and discovering new cultures, and also learning how to teach effectively within those cultures. I’ve been lucky enough to teach in such diverse locations as Bulgaria, Canada, China, Germany, India, Israel, Jordan, and Poland. I speak English and French, along with some German and a rusty hint of Mandarin Chinese.

I firmly believe that training should have an immediate purpose and application, and that the most effective training is usually “on the job” mentoring, helping to remove the immediate roadblocks to productivity that so often plague workers in fast moving environments.

I have experience creating training materials for both classroom and computer-based learning. Some years ago I published several well-received books, but these days it seems that the majority interest is in video training and distance learning. Both require very different approaches and that’s where I’ve been focusing my energies.

When I’m not working with programmers, I’m an F.A.A. certificated flight instructor and commercial pilot with about 2400 hours flight time, more than half of which is flight instruction time, mostly with primary students. I’m also a licensed radio amateur (KF0HCK), and an energetic dancer (Lindy Hop, and Balboa).