strategy

Shocker: 40% of workers now have ‘contingent’ jobs, says U.S. Government — from forbes.com by Elaine Pofeldt

Excerpt:

Tucked away in the pages of a new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office is a startling statistic: 40.4% of the U.S. workforce is now made up of contingent workers—that is, people who don’t have what we traditionally consider secure jobs.

There is currently a lot of debate about how contingent workers should be defined. To arrive at the 40.4 %, which the workforce reached in 2010, the report counts the following types of workers as having the alternative work arrangements considered contingent. (The government did some rounding to arrive at its final number, so the numbers below add up to 40.2%).

Agency temps: (1.3%)
On-call workers (people called to work when needed): (3.5%)
Contract company workers (3.0%)
Independent contractors who provide a product or service and find their own customers (12.9%)
Self-employed workers such as shop and restaurant owners, etc. (3.3%)
Standard part-time workers (16.2%).

In contrast, in 2005, 30.6% of workers were contingent. The biggest growth has been among people with part time jobs. They made up just 11.9% of the labor force in 2005. That means there was a 36% increase in just five years.

In the future, employees won’t exist — from techcrunch.com by Tad Milbourn

Excerpt:

Contract work is becoming the new normal. Consider Uber: The ride-sharing startup has 160,000 contractors, but just 2,000 employees. That’s an astonishing ratio of 80 to 1. And when it comes to a focus on contract labor, Uber isn’t alone. Handy, Eaze and Luxe are just a few of the latest entrants into the “1099 Economy.”

Though they get the most attention, it’s not just on-demand companies that employ significant contract workforces. Microsoft has nearly two-thirds as many contractors as full-time employees. Even the simplest business structures, sole proprietorships, have increased their use of contract workers nearly two-fold since 2003.

The unsung heroes of the on-demand economy — from medium.com by Alex Chriss
We need to rethink the notion of entrepreneurship in the on-demand economy and build the tools and infrastructure to support the growing self-employed workforce.

Excerpt:

Enabled by the ubiquitous connectivity and power of smartphones, entrepreneurs are opening shops on Etsy, working as virtual assistants through oDesk, tackling neighborhood jobs on TaskRabbit, or driving on demand with Uber.

This new economy isn’t limited to low-paying gigs either. There are highly skilled professionals with advanced degrees from top 10 schools opting to work for themselves instead of a big firm. Consider the MBAs earning $100-$150 an hour through online consulting firm HourlyNerd or the lawyers making more than that on UpCounsel.

The Handy housecleaner and the UpCounsel attorney share a common characteristic: They’re a business of one.
…
This new wave of entrepreneurs — the self-employed workforce — is accelerating a broad trend we’ve been watching closely for nearly 10 years and started documenting in the year 2007 B.U. –before Uber.

They are part of the massive growth in the number of independent professionals. Full-time jobs with their corporate grab bag of benefits are becoming scarcer by the day. In the near future, working full time for a single company that offers little flexibility or work-life balance will become as outdated as the notion of staying with one company for your entire working life.

New survey: 40% of unemployed have “given up” — from prweb.com
Express Employment Professionals released the results [on May 20th, 2015] of its second annual in-depth poll, “The State of the Unemployed,” revealing that 40 percent of unemployed Americans agree to some extent that they have completely given up looking for work.

Excerpt:

Express Employment Professionals released the results [on May 20th, 2015] of its second annual in-depth poll, “The State of the Unemployed,” revealing that 40 percent of unemployed Americans agree to some extent that they have completely given up looking for work.

That figure, though high, represents a slight improvement from 2014, when 47 percent said they had given up.

The survey of 1,553 jobless Americans age 18 and older was conducted online by Harris Poll on behalf of Express Employment Professionals between April 7 and 29, 2015, and offers a rare look at the background and attitudes of the unemployed, their approach to the job hunt, who they blame for their current situation, and how they are holding up through tough times.

New self-learning systems will reduce reliance on humans during ramp-up — from wtvox.com by Aidan Russell

Excerpt:

Robots are cracking eggs and making ice cream sundaes. These aren’t just party tricks. The way robots learn to do complex tasks is changing and that has profound implications for the future of manufacturing.

The egg-cracking robot comes courtesy of researchers at the University of Maryland and NICTA, an information and computer technology research centre in Australia. Their robotic system learns processes by watching YouTube videos.
…
It’s not difficult to see how systems like this might be utilised to improve automated manufacturing or bring new automation systems to areas of production that haven’t seen much automation yet. An investment in a single robotic system capable of learning a variety of tasks without specialised programming would be attractive to small manufacturers that do short production runs, for example.

A bot that can learn from watching other people could also fine tune its own actions through trial and error, essentially learning from its mistakes. That’s what researchers at Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT) in Finland had in mind when they developed a self-adjusting welding system.

Will humans go the way of horses? — from foreignaffairs.com by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee
Labor in the Second Machine Age

Our mental advantages might be even greater than our physical ones. While we’re clearly now inferior to computers at arithmetic and are getting outpaced in some types of pattern recognition—as evidenced by the triumph of Watson, an artificial-intelligence system created by IBM, over human Jeopardy! champions in 2011—we still have vastly better common sense. We’re also able to formulate goals and then work out how to achieve them. And although there are impressive examples of digital creativity and innovation, including machine-generated music and scientific hypotheses, humans are still better at coming up with useful new ideas in most domains.

It is extraordinarily difficult to get a clear picture of how broadly and quickly technology will encroach on human territory (and a review of past predictions should deter anyone from trying), but it seems unlikely that hardware, software, robots, and artificial intelligence will be able to take over from human labor within the next decade. It is even less likely that people will stop having economic wants that are explicitly interpersonal or social; these will remain, and they will continue to provide demand for human workers.

From DSC:
Stop right there! Hold on! Those of us working in education or training need to be asking ourselves:

What do these MASSIVE trends mean for the way that we are educating, training, and preparing our learners and employees!?!?

This is not our grandfathers’/grandmothers’ economy and way of life! From here on out, people must be able to adapt, to pivot, to change — and they must be able to learn…continually and quickly. They need to be able to know where to go to find information and be able to sort through the content to find out what’s true and relevant. They need to know under what circumstances they learn best.

Finally, becoming familiar with futurism — looking down the pike to see what’s developing, building scenarios, etc. — is now wise counsel for a growing number of people.

Learning Spaces: The importance of having standards

On 06/11/2015, in A/V -- audio/visual, flipping -- inverted learning, IT in HE, leadership, learning spaces, smart classrooms, strategy, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

How to create an AV standards document — from campustechnology.com by Mike Tomei
Defining standards will help prevent audiovisual support headaches and keep your institution on the path to its strategic goals.

Excerpt:

Audiovisual technology is becoming increasingly complex and important in today’s classrooms. And with higher education IT departments being tasked with the design, installation and support of instructional AV systems — areas in which IT staff may or may not have expertise — it’s extremely important to develop, define and enforce AV system design/technical standards on campus.

The easiest way to do so is to create a comprehensive audiovisual design and technical standards document that can be referenced by all the parties involved with classroom AV installations. The goal of this document is to standardize AV installations across the institution, as well as streamline the design and construction process for these systems. A standards document will also help your IT department make progress toward the institution’s audiovisual strategic goals.
…
Many readers from state schools will recognize this scenario: A different audiovisual design consultant and systems integration firm are chosen for each project, based on the lowest bid. You end up with a revolving door of AV professionals installing equipment on your campus. They have very limited knowledge of your existing classroom systems, and what direction you’re trying to go in with new installations. This is a great reason to have an AV standards document written and ready to hand to these individuals at the beginning of a project.

…it’s all the more important to develop an audiovisual design/technical standards document that all parties can rely on.

Why campus infrastructure standards are so important — from blog.infocommblog.org by Greg Brown

Excerpt:

And here’s a excerpt from part one, to help set the scene: “Most colleges and universities have some assemblage of ‘classroom standards.’ Many of them are poorly thought out, incomplete, and not as effective as they could be….For the sake of discussion, I’m going to break standards down into four areas to make their respective advantages and disadvantages easier to illustrate. In actuality, what you have on campus will (ideally) be a mix of all four areas — a combination of four types — compiled as one under the bailiwick of ‘campus standards.’”

The next group of standards I want to talk about I’m calling campus infrastructure standards. What I am referring to here are your building infrastructure items. Where do you need power, conduit, or data? What type of lighting zones or switching do you expect in rooms? Is there a particular lighting system you use or a particular interface your control system requires? What do you need from the building systems in order to build the teaching space? Where do you need it?

Classroom standards: The good, bad, and ugly — from blog.infocommblog.org by Greg Brown

Excerpt (additional emphasis DSC):

In addition, consider some current hot topics like active learning and flipped classrooms — where those terms undoubtedly mean completely different things to everyone at the table — and it’s clear why the responsible campus will want to steal a march and spell out some teaching-space-design ground rules in advance.

…

The four areas I will divide standards into — again, just for the sake of illustration — I call: industry standards, campus infrastructure standards, classroom design standards, and classroom equipment preferences.

Classroom design standards: Spelling out ‘look and feel’ — from blog.infocommblog.org by Greg Brown

Excerpt:

For part three, let’s talk about what I am calling classroom design standards. These are the parts of classroom standards that speak most specifically to the “look and feel” of the teaching space. These are the guidelines that address types of equipment (in general terms), where those items should be located, and how they operate. Here we lay out the look and function of the room from the perspective of an end user. What does an instructor expect in the room and how are they are going to use it?

This information would typically include: How many projectors are there? Do you use monitors instead? What sort of writing surfaces, and how many? Is there a formal instructor’s lectern or console? Where is it? What sort of equipment will it be equipped with? What about podcasting or webcasting?

Also, see:

Revealing statistics highlight campus video boom — from ecampusnews.com by
Survey reveals video plays an increasingly large role in instruction.

Excerpt:

Using video for remote teaching/learning is now commonplace in higher education (66 percent), while flipped classrooms are becoming a widely used form of pedagogy (46 percent).

Seventy percent of institutions use webcasting for various purposes including teaching (47 percent), training (42 percent) and broadcasting live events (42 percent).

Institutions say this is the new priority in higher education — from ecampusnews.com by Ron Bethke; with a shout out to eduwire.com for their comments/posting on this
Survey reveals institutions, like UC Irvine, are putting greater effort into tracking graduates’ success and helping them continue learning through short-term programs.

Excerpt:

The days of warmly wishing graduates farewell and good luck after four years is not a sustaining strategy for colleges and universities, says a new report. Instead, offering online programs to keep graduates coming back to the institution for continuing career education is quickly becoming higher-ed’s newest must-offer.
…
Simply better understanding how graduates are doing isn’t the only way institutions are showing their commitment to lifelong career success. Though only 4 percent of respondents currently offer short-term alternative credentials such as digital badges and short-term certificates for graduates changing careers or looking to learn new skills, 50 percent of responding senior executives plan to add these customizable certificates to their portfolio in the next five years, with another 30 percent planning to offer digital badges in the same time frame.

“Universities and colleges want better ways to connect with alumni for years to come,” said EAB Practice Manager Carla Hickman. “This means offering not just surveys, but also new, intensive learning opportunities that support lifelong achievement and success of students.”

UC Irvine, for example, is currently working on setting up special communities for alumni taking various MOOCs on Coursera, in order to bring more graduates back to learn in more meaningful ways.
…
“[Millennials] are seeking short-format courses and credentials for ‘just-in-time’ and ‘just enough’ education.

From DSC:
Given the pace and far-reaching impact of today’s changes, lifelong learning is now a requirement. Learning new things, staying on top of trends, peering out into the future to see what’s coming down the pike — these are important actions that we all need to take to remain marketable. If we see robots, algorithms, and automation coming into the neighborhood of our particular jobs, then we had better be looking and preparing for something else. At that point, we’ll need to pivot…to adapt…to change.

Speaking of change, the article above reminds me of a potentially more utilized “distribution channel” — or model, if you will — that universities, colleges, and businesses could be moving towards in the future. And that is, that organizations could be moving towards providing streams of relevant, curated, dependable content to learning hubs around the globe. Hubs that feature blended learning where some of the content is beamed in from Subject Matter Experts (such as professors, teachers, trainers, and others) and some of the content is dealt with in a face-to-face manner. The beamed in content could be done synchronously and/or asynchronously. And as people often like to learn with others around a physical location, I could see this type of model taking off.

It would feature smaller, bite-sized chunks of content and investigations into a topic. But the model would have to allow for such a learning provider to be nimble and responsive — always up-to-date. That way they could provide such “just-in-time” and “just enough” learning.

Other words that come to my mind here — both as individuals and as institutions — are the following:

Reinvent
Staying relevant
Surviving
Being responsive

The Internet of Things will give rise to the algorithm economy [Sondergaard @ Gartner]

On 06/02/2015, in 21st century, analytics, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, business, career development, computer science, data related items, emerging technologies, future, game-changing environment, internet, machine-to-machine communications, marketplaces, Near Field Communication (NFC), professional development, programming, strategy, by Daniel Christian

The Internet of Things will give rise to the algorithm economy — from blogs.gartner.com by Peter Sondergaard

Excerpt:

It’s hard to avoid. Almost every CEO’s conversation about how IT is driving innovation inevitably comes back to the potential of big data. But data is inherently dumb. It doesn’t actually do anything unless you know how to use it. And big data is even harder to monetize due to the sheer complexity of it.

Data alone is not going to be the catalyst for the next wave of IT-driven innovation. The next digital gold rush will be focused on how you do something with data, not just what you do with it. This is the promise of the algorithm economy.

…

Algorithms are already all around us. Consider the driver-less car. Google’s proprietary algorithm is the connective tissue that combines the software, data, sensors and physical asset together into a true leap forward in transportation. Consider high frequency trading. It’s a trader’s unique algorithm that drives each decision that generates higher return than their competitors, not the data that it accesses. And while we’re talking about Google, what makes it one of the most valuable brands in the world? It isn’t data; it’s their most closely guarded secret, their algorithms.

A brave new world of opportunities
Where does this ultimately lead? Software that thinks. Software that does. Cognitive software that drives autonomous machine-to-machine interactions. Dare I say artificial intelligence? I dare. I did.

From DSC:
Besides Training/L&D departments and those developing strategy & vision within the corporate world…Provosts Offices take note. Computer Science programs take note. Interested students take note. Those who want to take a right turn in their careers take note.

Alternatives to traditional higher education continue to develop:

Google partners with Udacity to launch Android development nanodegree — from techcrunch.com by Frederic Lardinois

Excerpt:

At its I/O developer conference in San Francisco, Google announced [on 5/28/15] that it has partnered with Udacity to launch a six-course Android development nanodegree.

The idea here is to help developers learn how to write apps for Google’s mobile operating system “the right way” up to the point where they could potentially be hired by Google itself.

Udemy alternatives for selling video courses online — from robcubbon.com

Excerpt:

Udemy is currently the leading online learning platform. Their top 10 instructors all made over $500,000 last year and the top earner makes over $8 million. I make $4000+ each month by selling courses on Udemy.

16 startups poised to disrupt the education market — from inc.com by Ilan Mochari
Colleges and universities are facing new competition for customers–students and their parents–from startups delivering similar goods (knowledge, credentials, prestige) more affordably and efficiently. Here’s a rundown of some of those startups.

.

PayWhatYouWantBootcamp-Jan2015

New MOOC Platform Provides Free IT Certification Courses — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

Ideo U

Yieldr Academy

Lessons Go Where

ClassDo

Udemy

C-Suite TV.com

Simon & Schuster to sell online courses taught by popular authors — from nytimes.com by Alexandra Alter; with thanks to Sidneyeve Matrix for her Tweet on this

Excerpt:

Simon & Schuster is making a push into paid online video, with a new website offering online courses from popular health, finance and self-help authors.

The cost of the first batch of online courses ranges from $25 to $85, and includes workbooks and access to live question-and-answer sessions with three authors: Dr. David B. Agus, the best-selling author of “The End of Illness”; Zhena Muzyka, who wrote the self-help book “Life by the Cup”; and Tosha Silver, the author of the spiritual advice book “Outrageous Openness.” The courses will be available on the authors’ individual websites and on the company’s new site, SimonSays.

.

The real revolution in online education isn’t MOOCs — from hbr.org by Michelle Weise

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Something is clearly wrong when only 11% of business leaders — compared to 96% of chief academic officers — believe that graduates have the requisite skills for the workforce. It’s therefore unlikely that business leaders are following closely what’s going on in higher education. Even the latest hoopla around massive open online courses (MOOCs) amounts to more of the same: academics designing courses that correspond with their own interests rather than the needs of the workforce, but now doing it online.

But there is a new wave of online competency-based learning providers that has absolutely nothing to do with offering free, massive, or open courses. In fact, they’re not even building courses per se, but creating a whole new architecture of learning that has serious implications for businesses and organizations around the world.

It’s called online competency-based education, and it’s going to revolutionize the workforce.
…
The key distinction is the modularization of learning.
…
Here’s why business leaders should care: the resulting stackable credential reveals identifiable skillsets and dispositions that mean something to an employer. As opposed to the black box of the diploma, competencies lead to a more transparent system that highlights student-learning outcomes.

Should your institution consider a nanodegree program? — from by Rebecca Lundberg
Students seeking to build technical skills and credentials are enrolling in nanodegree programs.

Anyone Can Be a Teacher at Skillshare, an Online School — from nytimes.com by Jonah Bromwich
Excerpt:
Skillshare is an online video platform that allows anyone to sign up and teach a class. The company has proved adept at recruiting experts to teach on its website. Aside from Ms. Orlean’s class on creative nonfiction, the website has a class on visual storytelling from the design maven Debbie Millman and a marketing course taught by the entrepreneur Seth Godin. At one point, it even offered screenwriting instruction from James Franco.

Canvas.net

worldacademy.tv

Addendum on 6/3/15:

Disrupting Higher Education — from Campus Technology
Can colleges and universities break out of traditional models and compete with the disruptive forces changing the nature of higher ed?

Excerpts:

Also, traditional colleges and universities have turned away from the growing population of “nonconsumers” who need workforce skills. Only one in five freshmen actually have that residential college experience that we tend to glorify, she said. Close to 71 percent of students are what we now call non-traditional students, but which are fast becoming the norm.

These kinds of students are “overserved” by those bundled services of traditional brick-and-mortar institutions, she said. Many feel underprepared for the workforce, and they’re looking for something different.

“Higher education institutions are now competing with organizations they have never even heard of,” Weise said. “These are organizations that are really getting at the inadequacies of the system…. things like coding boot camps, where you can pay $10,000 to $20,000, spend six to 12 weeks learning to code, and get recruited by places like Google or Facebook and start earning about six figures…. Your shot at getting a job is better than if you went to law school.

“This is just to emphasize that it’s not who you think you’re competing with,” she said.

Per Michelle Weise p. 8 pf 45

IBM-Affiliated Brooklyn School Graduates Its First Students Ahead of Schedule With Both High School & College STEM Degrees — from finance.yahoo.com and the PR Newswire
Young trailblazers pave way for national education model for tens of thousands of students

Excerpt:

BROOKLYN, N.Y., June 2, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Six students from Brooklyn are graduating from P-TECH (Pathways in Technology Early College High School) two years early with both their high school diplomas and college degrees in computer systems technology, fast tracking through the nation’s first school that blends public high school, community college, and work experience into one.

Addendums on 7/1/15:

Boot camp classes may offer a peek at the future of higher ed — from cnbc.com by Bob Sullivan
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
Udacity has abandoned the idea of giving classes away to huge numbers of people in favor of “nanodegrees”—boot-camp style, short-term programs with a laser-like focus on preparing students for a career. Nanodegree subjects include Web developer, Android developer, iOS developer … you get the picture.

What you don’t get is a huge student loan debt. Udacity classes start at $1,200 for a six-month program. The fees have actually helped with online classes’ biggest problem: High dropout rates. Turns out, more people stick with classes if they have to pay for them.

Are small, private online courses the future of higher education in America? — from theweek.com by James Poulos
Excerpt:
Rather than trying to get universities to shape up, we should recognize that the SPOC (Small and Private Online Courses) model will flourish best outside the confines of today’s campus environment. In small, private forums, pioneers who want to pursue wisdom can find a radically alternate education — strikingly contemporary, yet deeply rooted in the ancient practice of conversational exegesis.

Addendum on 7/24/15:

HowZone Collaborative Learning Communities™
Connecting you with people from around the world who are passionate about the same topics as you.

What We Do:
HowZone connects people around topics of shared interest and gives them tools to help each other learn. Beginners get the foundational knowledge they need and experts get special ways to take their expertise as far as they want to go.

Addendums on 7/24/15 — with thanks to Thomas Frey for his posting mentioning these resources

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Addendum 8/7/15:

Addendums on 8/26/15:

Addendum on 10/15/15:

33 websites that will make you a genius — from medium.com

Reflections on “Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader” [educause.com]

On 05/20/2015, in business side of he, career development, colleges, community colleges, creativity, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, IT in HE, leadership, new business models, online learning, strategy, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader — from educause.edu

Excerpts:

Two major changes have helped in defining the strategic IT leader of today and tomorrow. The first is specific to higher education: There has been an evolution in the business of higher education, with institutions needing to adopt new models to stay competitive and focus on outcomes, cost-effectiveness, and responsiveness. The second has been experienced at all levels in society: the pervasive nature and rapid development of technology. Within a higher education context, technology’s expanded presence impacts all areas of an institution. The IT leader occupies a unique position at the center of massive change, making this role both a challenging one and one that will continue to evolve in the coming years. The profession must be ready for both the changes and the opportunities.

Perhaps the greatest opportunity is for the IT leader to demonstrate the value of technology. Technology advances the institutional mission and the business of higher education. Regardless of the size or maturity of your IT organization, we think the concepts discussed here will be relevant and useful. As your IT organization moves to become a significant campus player, understanding the role of the IT leader will increase your institutional impact and enable your organization to truly lead.

Also see:

Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader — from educause.edu

From DSC:
What higher ed institutions need right now are more leaders who are visionary, innovative, creative, and bold — those who understand the strategic value that a variety of technologies can bring to the table. The problem is, many in leadership/executive positions didn’t grow up with the technologies that are being used today (and the new ones that will be launched tomorrow)…so they don’t see the value in pursuing them. They’re not sold on them.

So my advice in filling any senior level position today — as well as in filling open positions on the boards that oversee our institutions of higher education — is to ask:

Is this candidate visionary? Innovative? Creative? Can they think outside the box? Or at minimum, are they open to other visionaries’ perspectives? (This type of person is in direct contrast to the person who seeks to do higher ed the same way that it’s always been done; i.e., a person who simply seeks to maintain the status quo.)
Do they understand that the heat is in the kitchen throughout higher education today? Do they understand that alternatives to traditional higher ed continue to arise on almost a monthly basis? (i.e., this is likely not the same environment as when the candidate went through college.)
If they understand that higher ed is in a major spotlight with an increasingly skeptical society (i.e., that some people think it’s too costly, that others call into question the return on their investments, that others assert that it’s not preparing students for the workplace, etc.), what do they propose to do about it? What are their solutions?
Are they tech-savvy? Do they use technology in how they communicate, how they achieve their daily tasks, in how they stay informed on the higher ed landscape, and/or in other areas such as establishing their online footprints?

Technology is key from here on out — in every area of running a university, college, or community college. Those who use technologies strategically will survive and thrive; those who minimize the value of technology are now a major handicap and a stumbling block for an institution of higher education. Such perspectives might have been acceptable years ago…but they are no longer acceptable as they completely ignore:

The state of the world today, and how increasingly, technology is permeating almost every area of the workplace as well as in the ways that we communicate and connect with each other; in fact, the very ways we live and accomplish things
The changing K-12 student and how technology is increasingly being integrated in that arena
The skills that our graduates will need
The threats to traditional higher education

Discarding the strategic value of technologies is an operational perspective that institutions of higher education simply can no longer afford — the 21st century learner will have other alternatives to choose from.

Avoiding Sweet Briar [2 articles from evoLLLution.com]

On 05/12/2015, in 21st century, change, colleges, faculty, higher education, leadership, liberal arts, strategy, universities, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Avoiding Sweet Briar: Five tips to help institutions become more nimble — from evoLLLution.com by Richard DeMillo

Excerpt:

Educators and administrators who study the demise of institutions like Sweet Briar must wonder what steps might have been taken to avoid a similar fate. Could Sweet Briar have foreseen the problems ahead and taken steps in a different direction? How does a modern college or university remain agile in the harsh and ever-changing marketplace of higher education?

…

There is a disconnect between how a college or university functions and public perception. From research to classroom teaching, and even to administrative duties, faculty are expected to take on too much. As a result, innovation in education—a university’s main product—often takes a back seat.

When institutions become too assured of their central role, they inevitably lose ground to innovators who are better connected to the needs of students.

The shape of things to come: Five changes to move off Sweet Briar’s path — from evoLLLution.com by William G. Tierney

Excerpt:

To many of us, Sweet Briar College’s closure is not a singular example of a mismanaged institution but the proverbial canary in the coalmine. Many of our postsecondary institutions—especially under-endowed small liberal arts colleges—have to start changing or they will close. What needs to happen?

I certainly appreciate those of us who make forlorn calls for the noble aspirations of what academic life might once have been and perhaps one day could become again. At the same time, given the pace of change, if colleges and universities don’t get more with it, they will go out of business.

Addendum on 5/19/15:

Reinventing the Liberal Arts College: Collaborating to Steer Clear of Sweet Briar — from evoLLLution.com by Brian Williams
Excerpt:
Sweet Briar College’s decision to close has given heightened attention to a set of thorny questions that higher education leaders, particularly those in liberal arts colleges, have pondered for some time, revolving around a central theme: “Why do liberal arts colleges need to change their business model and what should that change entail?”As is frequently the case, the answers are much more complicated than the questions. Although similar in many respects as a group, liberal arts colleges are quite diverse in their settings, their financial circumstances, the missions they pursue and how they allocate their resources. As was recently observed in the wake of the closing at Sweet Briar, “every small college’s circumstances are unique, as are the personalities of its leaders, and drawing conclusions based on what happened at other institutions may be of limited value.” [1]

World’s first open online MBA to be launched by MOOC platform Coursera [Murray]

On 05/05/2015, in business, collaboration, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, cost of getting a degree, marketing/social marketing, MBA, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, online learning, strategy, student-related, training / L&D, United States, using teams, vendors, workplace, by Daniel Christian

World’s first open online MBA to be launched by MOOC platform Coursera — from by Seb Murray
The world’s first open digital MBA degree will be launched in a tie-up between Mooc maker Coursera and US b-school the University of Illinois.

Excerpt:

The world’s first open online MBA will launch in 2015 after a landmark decision from a top business school which is expected to pave the way for further digitization of the business degree and disrupt an already shaken education market.

The University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign College of Business has received the seal of approval from its senate to launch the “iMBA”, in collaboration with Coursera, the $300 million-plus Silicon Valley start-up that produces MOOCs and has amassed nearly 13 million users.

Also see:

U. of Illinois to offer a lower-cost M.B.A., thanks to MOOCs — from chronicle.com by Jeff Young

Excerpt:

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign plans to start a low-cost online M.B.A. program in partnership with Coursera, the Silicon Valley-based MOOC provider, hoping to meet its land-grant mission of improving access and also to create a new stream of revenue at a time of shrinking state support for higher education.

Students enrolling in the new online master’s program, dubbed the iMBA, could complete the entire degree for about $20,000 — far less than the approximately $50,000 for the on-campus version or the $100,000 for the university’s executive M.B.A.

Preparing for the Digital University: A review of the history & current state of distance, blended, & online learning [Siemens, Gasevic, Dawson]

On 04/30/2015, in 21st century, adjunct faculty, Australia, blended learning, Canada, change, distance education, education technology, faculty, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, history, hybrid learning, innovation, leadership, learning, learning ecosystem, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, online learning, organizational change, pace of change, pedagogy, research, social learning / networks, strategy, student-related, teaching & learning, teaching online, technology (general), trends, UK, United States, user experience (UX), vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Excerpt:

It is our intent that these reports will serve to introduce academics, administrators, and students to the rich history of technology in education with a particular emphasis of the importance of the human factors: social interaction, well-designed learning experiences, participatory pedagogy, supportive teaching presence, and effective techniques for using technology to support learning.

The world is digitizing and higher education is not immune to this transition. The trend is well underway and seems to be accelerating as top universities create departments and senior leadership positions to explore processes of innovation within the academy. It is our somewhat axiomatic assessment that in order to understand how we should design and develop learning for the future, we need to first take a look at what we already know. Any scientific enterprise that runs forward on only new technology, ignoring the landscape of existing knowledge, will be sub-optimal and likely fail. To build a strong future of digital learning in the academy, we must first take stock of what we know and what has been well researched.

During the process of completing this report, it became clear to us that a society or academic organization is required to facilitate the advancement and adoption of digital learning research. Important areas in need of exploration include faculty development, organizational change, innovative practices and new institutional models, effectiveness of teaching and learning activities, the student experience, increasing success for all students, and state and provincial policies, strategies, and funding models. To address this need, we invite interested academics, administrators, government and industry to contact us to discuss the formation of an organization to advocate for a collaborative and research informed approach to digital learning.

February 2015
George Siemens
Dragan Gasevic
Shane Dawson

Embracing failure to spur success: A new collaborative innovation model [Wilcox & Ray]

On 04/08/2015, in collaboration, consortiums, experimentation, higher education, innovation, leadership, strategy, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Embracing failure to spur success: A new collaborative innovation model — from educause.com by Kim Wilcox and Edward Ray

Excerpt:

The implied message is clear: We’d prefer not to talk about what isn’t working at the postsecondary level.

We’re in a competitive sector, and there is misplaced pressure on all higher education institutions to achieve top placement in U.S. News & World Report and other annual rankings, regardless of whether or not those rankings make any sense. We all feel significant pressure to make sure that our constituents—from board members to faculty to parents to legislators—are happy with the direction of the institution. And we also know that those constituents can be impatient in waiting for substantive change to produce positive results. Honest discourse on new initiatives that seem unproductive or in need of modification is likely to lead to unpleasant conversations that few of us would relish.

This is not the way to foster innovation and improvement in higher education. The best innovators in the world typically follow the mantra that failure is acceptable, helpful, and sometimes even necessary to ultimately achieving an objective. Many of the products we rely on today, from Post-it Notes to pacemakers, resulted from mistakes or failures in the search for other innovations. And just about any founder of a successful Silicon Valley start-up has a track record of ventures that failed.

Successful innovation requires experimentation and learning from failure.

…

At the University of California, Riverside, and Oregon State University, we are engaged in one effort to achieve these goals: the University Innovation Alliance. The UIA is a consortium of eleven major public research universities that are working together to identify new solutions to challenges found throughout the higher education community, and then to share information about failures and successful solutions among institutions.

From DSC:
Some images that are along these lines:

RealEstate-HigherEd-DanielSChristian11-1-13

TheTrimtabInHigherEducation-DanielChristian

You sure you want to blow off what Clayton Christensen has been saying?

On 03/13/2015, in business side of he, change, colleges, disruption, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, reinvent, staying relevant, strategy, surviving, by Daniel Christian

Private Giveaway — from insidehighered.com –by Ry Rivard
Private college in Iowa gives itself to the University of Iowa rather than be forced out of business

Excerpt:

Leaders at the AIB College of Business in Iowa took a look at the future of their small private college and decided to shut down and donate the campus to the University of Iowa.

AIB’s decision, made back in January, is similar in some respects to one made a few weeks later by leaders at Sweet Briar College, a 700-student women’s college in rural Virginia, that announced it plans to close this year.

At AIB, officials figured they would close down before they were forced out of business.

Corinthian Colleges Closing — from huffingtonpost.com

Addendum 5/1/15 re: Corinthian Colleges:

For-Profit Corinthian Colleges Goes Out Of Business – from buzzfeed.com by
Some 16,000 students at Everest Colleges and other schools will be affected.
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
Corinthian Colleges, the embattled for-profit college company, announced Sunday that it is ceasing operations, immediately shuttering all of its 28 remaining campuses. The abrupt closure is unprecedented in size: on Monday, some 16,000 students at Corinthian’s Everest, Heald, and Wyotech College chains, most of them in California, will have no school to attend.

California Attorney General Kamala Harris | Eric Risberg / Via AP Photo

See Bryan Alexander’s list of Queen Sacrifices including Elmhurst College makes a queen sacrifice (3/1/15)

Sweet Briar will close — from insidehighered.com by Scott Jaschik

Excerpt:

Sweet Briar College announced today that it is shutting down at the end of this academic year.

Small colleges close or merge from time to time, more frequently since the economic downturn started in 2008. But the move is unusual in that Sweet Briar still has a $94 million endowment, regional accreditation and some well-respected programs. But college officials said that the trend lines were too unfavorable, and that efforts to consider different strategies didn’t yield any viable options. So the college decided to close now, with some sense of order, rather than dragging out the process for several more years, as it could have done.

Paul G. Rice, board chair, said in an interview that he realized some would ask, “Why don’t you keep going until the lights go out?”

But he said that doing so would be wrong. “We have moral and legal obligations to our students and faculties and to our staff and to our alumnae. If you take up this decision too late, you won’t be able to meet those obligations,” he said. “People will carve up what’s left — it will not be orderly, nor fair.”

Closing with grace — from insidehighered.com by Alice Brown

Excerpt:

The closing of Sweet Briar College will, I expect, have little impact on other small, private, rural colleges with small endowments. Most will keep their heads in the sand, live on in a state of denial and continue to produce strategic plans that say little more than “Hope.”

Addendum on 3/17/15:

Tennessee Temple University To Close After Almost 70 Years — from chattanoogan.com

Excerpt:
Tennessee Temple University, after almost 70 years in operation in Highland Park, is set to close after this semester.

Trustees are set to vote on Tuesday morning to merge Temple with Piedmont International University of Winston-Salem, N.C. Students who are not graduating this semester would have the option to continue their education there. Bryan College in Dayton, Tn., and Shorter College at Rome, Ga., would be other options.
…
The merger with Piedmont will officially take place on April 30, pending the approval of the Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools which is the accrediting body for both universities.

Addendum on 3/19/15:

University that went bankrupt amid tighter federal scrutiny looks to collect money from former students — from insidehighered.com

Addendum on 3/20/15:

Vermont college cuts staff, adjuncts, classes — from bryanalexander.org
Excerpt:
Lyndon State College announced a series of cuts this week, responding to all too common challenges in today’s higher education.

Addendums on 4/6/15:

Harrington College of Design will be closing — from collegehistorygarden.blogspot.com by Ray Brown
Jones International University will close — from collegehistorygarden.blogspot.com by Ray Brown

Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader [Educause & Jisc]

On 03/09/2015, in change, collaboration, communications, future of higher education, higher education, IT in HE, leadership, reinvent, staying relevant, strategy, surviving, using teams, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader. Research report. Jisc and EDUCAUSE, March 2015.

Abstract:

Information technology is so much the fabric of the university that its presence is often not fully recognized. The focus in the IT organization has shifted from a tactical to a strategic perspective. With the demand for IT only growing, understanding how IT leaders can best lead in these efforts is essential.

In early 2014, EDUCAUSE and Jisc came together to address a common concern: Understanding the skills required by technology leaders in higher education was an issue often overlooked and one needing immediate attention. The two organizations convened a working group of 10 leading U.S. and U.K. IT leaders to define a set of desired technology leadership characteristics and capabilities, now and in the future. This report identifies 10 key roles played by the IT leaders, describes what each of these roles entails, and outlines the essential skills required to perform them.

The higher education information technology (IT) enterprise has become complex. No longer simply responsible for provisioning IT infrastructure and services, the IT department increasingly helps re-envision business and service models—all in a context of cost and accountability pressures.

From DSC:
It’s good to see the emphasis on strategy and the strategic use of technologies — especially given the increasingly important role that technologies are playing throughout the majority of — if not all — industries in existence today (not to mention the exponential curve we’re on vs. a gradual/linear trajectory). This is true within higher ed as well, as new alternatives/models/methods continue to creep up on traditional institutions of higher ed.

Adaptivity Tops Gartner’s Strategic Tech List for Ed [Schaffhauser]

On 03/03/2015, in analytics, assessment, data related items, education technology, higher education, IT in HE, K-12 related, leadership, mobile learning, mobile technologies, research, social learning / networks, strategy, trends, vendors, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Adaptivity Tops Gartner’s Strategic Tech List for Ed — from campustechnology.com by Dian Schaffhauser

Excerpt:

Even as education spending is projected to inch up two percent this year to reach $67.8 billion worldwide, the way in which school districts, colleges and universities are spending that money is evolving to reflect the growing digital nature of teaching and learning, according to Gartner. In a new report, “Top 10 Strategic Technologies Impacting Education in 2015,” the business IT consulting firm ranked 10 innovations and tech trends that it believes the education CIO should plan for in 2015.

Many of the technologies aren’t emerging from within education itself, said Gartner Vice President Jan-Martin Lowendahl. They’re being “driven by major forces such as digital business and the consumerization and industrialization of IT.”

…

1. Adaptive Learning
2. Adaptive Digital Textbooks
3. CRM
4. Big Data
5. and 6. Sourcing Strategies and ‘Exostructure’
7. Open ‘Microcredentials’
8. Digital Assessment
9. Mobile
10. Social Learning

Why you now need a team to create and deliver learning [Christian & Grush]

On 02/26/2015, in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, adjunct faculty, adult learning, analytics, animation, attention, blended learning, changing business models, collaboration, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, computer science, copyright/ownership/NFTs, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, design, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, distance education, e-books, education reform, education technology, elearning, emerging technologies, expectations, experimentation, face-to-face, faculty, future of higher education, game-changing environment, graphics, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), hybrid learning, ideas, innovation, instructional design, interaction design, interactivity, interface design, internet, learning, learning ecosystem, learning spaces, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, online learning, online media, programming, staying relevant, strategy, student-related, surviving, teaching & learning, traditional / tradition, trends, universities, user experience (UX), user interface design, using teams, web design and production, writing, by Daniel Christian

My thanks to Mary Grush at Campus Technology for her continued work in bringing relevant topics and discussions to light — so that our institutions of higher education will continue delivering on their missions well into the future. By doing so, learners will be able to continue to partake of the benefits of attending such institutions. But in order to do so, we must adapt, be responsive, and be willing to experiment. Towards that end, this Q&A with Mary relays some of my thoughts on the need to move more towards a team-based approach.

When you think about it, we need teams whether we’re talking about online learning, hybrid learning or face-to-face learning. In fact, I just came back from an excellent Next Generation Learning Space Conference and it was never so evident to me that you need a team of specialists to design the Next Generation Learning Space and to design/implement pedagogies that take advantage of the new affordances being offered by active learning environments.

Learning Ecosystems

Learning Spaces: The importance of having standards

Alternatives to traditional higher ed continue to develop

Mary Meeker: Internet Trends 2015

Reflections on “Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader” [educause.com]

Avoiding Sweet Briar [2 articles from evoLLLution.com]

Embracing failure to spur success: A new collaborative innovation model [Wilcox & Ray]

You sure you want to blow off what Clayton Christensen has been saying?

Technology in Higher Education: Defining the Strategic Leader [Educause & Jisc]

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