The COVID-19 pandemic has necessarily thrust online learning to the forefront. As executive director of HBS Online—which has reached more than 70,000 learners in 170 countries since 2015—Patrick Mullane (MBA 1999) has watched his numbers rise. “I think it's a combination of two things,” he says. “First, people have the time, because they're stuck at home. Second, there’s a lot of economic uncertainty, and people are worried about their job security.”

In this interview, Mullane discusses the lessons and the long-term impacts of this short-term spike.

What makes for good online learning?

Patrick Mullane: First, you need to start with a pedagogy. What’s your way of teaching? It’s your teaching soul and you need to stay true to that, whether in a classroom or online. At HBS, it’s the case method.

Second, there needs to be interaction between participants. Elements of what makes the case method great need to be in every online course. You have to vary activities frequently, or people get bored very quickly.

Lastly, I think there has to be a thread of storytelling in the teaching. When people sit in front of a computer, they’re often consuming stories, whether it be Netflix or a video game. So you associate sitting down and looking at a screen with entertainment. That said, it can be a slippery slope; we want to make sure we’re not making “edutainment.”

But humans like stories. They help reinforce your learning. So I think that if you’re creating online content, some element of storytelling—real people working through real problems—makes it stick. It’s relatable, and thus, memorable.

What role will online learning play in the recovery?

PM: I think interest will only grow. We’re going to have a long tail on this recovery, and most people weren’t prepared for a recession.

Last summer, HBS Online asked the market research firm City Square Associates to poll 1,000 American adults to gauge their recession readiness. The study showed the majority were not prepared to ride out a recession—most didn’t have an updated resume or active network—and that people would likely value short, non-degree courses. A few months into this crisis, we’ve seen that to be true. Demand for our programming is way up.

So online learning is definitely going to help fill a gap for those people who find themselves without a job and want to learn a new skill or brush up on an old skill to make themselves more competitive. I hope it’ll help people get employed faster or even pivot to a new career. Our own data supports this: In a survey of HBS Online past participants, half said they got more attention from recruiters after completing one of our programs; 53 percent gained more responsibility at work; and 25 percent got a promotion or title change.

This will be the first recession that half of all millennials—that’s 35 million people—go through as working adults. They may be in for a bit of a rude awakening. Job searching will be a lot harder over the next year than it was in the previous ten years.

How is the perception of online education changing?

PM: I think the pandemic is going to expose a lot more people to good online learning, which will help erode the stigma that still exists around online education. In addition, the way that hiring managers perceive online education will change. We tend to be biased toward what we know, and a lot of hiring managers today had a traditional undergraduate or graduate experience.

But the millions of college seniors who were forced to finish their degrees online will be entering the workforce. A lot will say, “Hey, that wasn’t so bad. I was able to learn some things.” Many will likely find online learning was better in some ways than the in-person classroom experience. Then, when they become hiring managers, they’re going to be less likely to discriminate based on the way applicants have learned.

Post a Comment