This one has MOOC in the title...

... so that made you click it, right? Well, read on because this post actually is about MOOCs. It has a few completely fictitious examples on business MOOCs just to name something.

The hangout and the central question where MOOCs and Business might meet 

Two days ago, Jay hosted a Google Hangout session on the topic 'MOOC+Business'. It had speakers like Dave 'I came up with the MOOC name'  Cormier, the duo George-Stephen 'we did the initial connectivism MOOCs and we are also Canadian' Siemens-Downes, Lal 'we from Coursera are revolutionizing higher education' Jones-Bey, and other equally interesting people sharing their experiences with MOOCs. You can read the twitter stream #QMOOC here and watch the recording below.





MOOCs were and are the talk of the town, at least in the higher education space. What value can they bring to business? Personally, I cannot see any future where the corporate world doesn't take a good look at the MOOC extravaganza going on right now and experimenting with it in a corporate setting. (We are not that high up our ivory tower, are we?) But the end result might be a totally different kind of MOOC - maybe unworthy of the name for purists. To be fair, the original MOOCs (now called cMOOC) and the version that got popular last year (called xMOOC) are different beasts already.

Image all the MOOCs

I just used my thumb (the left one) to come up with a few examples of MOOCs+Business to help with the conversation:

Lego-MOOC : Lego organises a Massive Online Open Course where every week a new product line is covered such as mindstorms, etc. Participants (you'd think they are mainly children, but you'd be surprised) learn from certified Lego Builders how to make yourself in lego, how to create moving robots, etc. A competition to make the best lego project is included in the MOOC and the winners are appointed by the community itself. 

This example illustrates the 'easy' value proposition for anything on the internet or social media: let's try it out for marketing, to train people in using/having fun with our products and to learn from them what they are doing and need from us. It is great for branding, for getting your products out there, for having conversations and relationships with your clients. Of course, it can also blow up in your face if you try to dictate people what to think of your products.

BMW-MOOC : BMW organises a MOOC on their new model the BMW 17 series. Over the course of a few weeks, the whole world can learn about the new model, how to operate it best, how to service it, the new kind of engines, etc. Originally BMW targeted their own large number of dealers worldwide, in an effort to get them all up to speed quickly. But of course the specialised press and the many BMW fans jumped on the bandwagon too... As the product manager of the BMW 17 series describes it: "we were good at getting the word out on our new models quickly, but never before did we got the actual training to service the new model out that fast and to everyone who wanted to know... "

I think this one could also work. The value promise of the MOOC format for business is primarily scale and speed and therefore reduced costs. I talked to training managers in the car industry before, and it is a big problem to get the skills related to new technology out there in time (it almost takes more time to make and roll out the training to all service agents than to make new technologies...- and you don't want to know how much it costs). MOOCs are 'M'assive as the acronym suggests, and in the course of a few weeks get a worldwide audience learn about your topic. But equally important in a BMW-MOOC scenario the community also creates new insights and best practices for the new technology, so it goes two-ways... (and the marketing element is still there...)

SafetyMonthMOOC : a global oil company uses a MOOC for a whole month to reinforce its safety measures but also to make the company a safer place to work. The course starts with a week on 'stairs safety' and includes the usual tips from safety experts, the accident numbers from last year and a game approach to spot unsafe situations. But the company is equally providing actual challenges for their employees to work on to come up with safer solutions. The MOOC builds to a climate on safety to 'not blow up anything'.

First observation here is that this kind of MOOC is very close to initatives already in companies: very often there are learning days or weeks on certain topics throughout the company. I know consulting companies that organise a 'learning week' on new fields every year for example. Why do these initiatives work more than making the same learning available 24x7 in your LMS? When you think about it, MOOCs have actually taken one aspect away from the traditional e-learning promise : it is not anytime, anyplace, anywhere, any device and anyX anymore. The anytime aspect is different. MOOCs happen at a specific time range, like the next days and weeks. But by reducing the availablity, interest and engagement seems to go up. It's the same effect you see at rock concerts: the music is available on YouTube for free anyway, but you want to be part of the concert - even via a live stream on the same YouTube channel. Why? There is something engaging about the feeling of 'I was there' that you get from a MOOC and not from a similar e-learning course.

But the purists will say that this MOOC example is a MOC(kery). It is not 'open' because non-employees cannot get in. That's true. The concept of 'open' is the hardest one for companies to crack - also in mindset. However, there is a place in large organisations to offer open access massive courses like in an intranet situation. So what will we call that?

And what about small companies? How big do you need to be to have a 'MOOC'? George Siemens gave a very useful answer to that: big enough for network effects to play. It should be possible for sub-groups to form in pursuit of their own interests within the topic, or go their own way.

FlandersDC MOOC - Flanders District of Creativity organises a MOOC for start-ups in the region. Over the course of 7 weeks the MOOC will link business experts, existing start-up owners and wannabe-startups to help them see the light through all the stuff and administration it takes to get your business from the ground. Participants are encouraged to create a business plan and submit it for peer review.

Now, is this a MOOC? There is a very local aspect in this fictitious example. Maybe it is a LOOC. I'm just illustrating that as corporations look into the MOOC hype, they might tweak a few of the letters in the acronym. For me, this example is still MOOC enough to deserve the title.

Also, this example is about a different entity: it is not one corporation, but a collection of corporations (in this case small start-ups) that have a joint learning goal that overcomes any other competition they might have. In the hangout, Stephen Downes said corporations and MOOCs are a contradiction as corporations are all about 'closed' by definition. Even when you agree with that statement - there is still a place for a collection of corporations with a common learning goal to organise MOOCs. For example companies that on their own do not have the scale or resources for the networked learning to happen - small and medium businesses come to mind. Industries have a common goal of educating people on their specifics, and can do that much more effective  together. Industry associations already exists and I can see them become a provider of MOOCs.

... my left thumb is all small and tingly right now, I'm out of ideas... you have some? I think it helps to get away from very abstract points of view when we talk about MOOC+Business.

Why am I suddenly so interested in MOOCs?

It's not for the views on my blog. The real reason is that I'm part of a team at CCL who will pilot a MOOC on leadership development later this year. Over the past months we talked to many people to get their advice and insights, and I'll be sharing that in later posts.

Now, to finish this never-ending post, let's all sing together:

Imagine all the MOOCs

Imagine there's no classes
It's easy if you try
No blackboard in front of us
Above us only the cloud
Imagine all the peers
Learning for today...

Imagine there's no diplomas
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to cram or flunk for
No accreditation too
Imagine all the peers
Learning live on the job...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no proprietary knowledge
I wonder if you can
No need for access or obedience 
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the peers
Innovating all the world...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will learn as one