One hundred years ago, we may have called the library a MOOC as the disruptor in the sense that it provided knowledge to so many who wanted “in” – C.J. Westerberg
Are you planning to invest valuable resources to build learning systems to enhance your company’s capabilities? You are probably contemplating some sort of online learning systems to complement your classroom training. Or if you already have an online learning system, are you struggling to deliver online courses to meet the needs of your organization? If you are, you are not alone. Worldwide e-learning market is expected to reach $50.5 billion by 2016 from $35.6 billion in 2011, with highest annual growth rate of 17.6% expected to come from Asia alone*.
Thanks to the sharing economy that we live in today, an exciting new learning alternative has emerged for some time. It’s called MOOC – Massive Open Online Courses. MOOCs are courses of study authored by professors from top universities made available online over the Internet without charge or at minimum cost to a very large number of people. The content is made of text, videos, interactive assessment and learners work collaboratively. Major academic MOOC players are Khan Academy, edX, Coursera and Udacity. While for corporations there are Lynda.com, Skillsoft and Udemy.
Imagine a person sitting in his own living room somewhere in Pai, Thailand can enrol and study the same course that is offered at MIT, Harvard or Columbia University. According to edSurge estimates in 2014, there are approximately +2,400 courses being offered by MOOCs, from +400 universities with 16-18 million students. An astronomical growth compared to 2008 when MOOC first started.
MOOC represents a very compelling alternative for corporate education today. Just ask World Bank Group having made 6 online courses available to 40,000 people in 190 countries as of October 2015. Assuming that you already have your training needs identified (a big assumption in itself), familiarize your training department with MOOCs and courses on offer. If possible, enrol your team in one of the course. Why not, it’s free anyway. The only thing you will be investing is your time.
Start a trial with a group of learners. But don’t call it a pilot. Call it pioneer group instead. Your learners psyche will be more positive if they believe that they are the trailblazers. I recommend you pick your technical courses e.g. IT, Marketing, Human Resources or Finance instead of managerial courses. Please note that these MOOCs are unlikely to have courses in Thai. Having said that you should check out a local Thai MOOC provider, Coursesquare.
To maximize benefit of MOOC, don’t view it as just a low cost learning & development option. Rather look at it from a wider perspective. MOOC can help develop your partners, suppliers and future talent pipeline effectively and at scale. Even though learner completion of MOOC is less than 10%, it is here to stay. MOOC.org (Google and edX collaboration) offers schools, individuals and businesses platform to build their own MOOCs for free. Now is the time to start curating MOOC to work to your company’s advantage.
Suvit Chansrichawla, next-generation HR consultant under the brand Serendipity&Co., partner of the Curve Group in Thailand.
*E-Learning market trends & forecast 2014 – 2016 Report by Docebo
