As KPMG stated in 20201, the golden age of higher education institutions is over. In the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) environment of higher education (Pucciarelli & Kaplan, 2016)2 and continuing education, how can we reinvent ourselves and develop relevant programs and projects? I propose to see innovation in continuing education as creating value for its students (Walter, 2022)3. I suggest positioning programs and projects strategically to reduce development risks and improve performance.
The Reality of Continuing Education in Canada
The working environment has become more unstable, fast-paced and ambiguous. Increasingly, both workforce and decision-makers must adapt to emergencies, understand future trends and develop the ability to work with ambiguity. Canada’s learning ecosystem is feeling the pressure and has embraced the paradigm of lifelong learning. We have therefore witnessed a transformation of the economic actors involved in continuing education over the past decade.
On one hand, students are more diverse than ever before. More and more of them are adults integrated into the workforce, international students, newcomers, students with complex needs, and so on. Their expectations are also higher; they want recognition of their uniqueness, often have little time to study and must reconcile learning with other priorities.
On the other hand, there are more training providers and a more diversified range of training. There are new foreign providers, training platforms, more personalized and diversified training services, and new types of training. Employers are increasingly integrating employee training into specialized services, and self-training capsules are available for free. In other words, competition in the learning ecosystem has intensified.
We have witnessed a true redefinition of the learning ecosystem. The nature of continuing education is no longer a matter of course. With the advent of lifelong learning, continuing education, presented as a formal and structured service delivered in a classroom, is no longer the norm. The paradigm of continuing education has become more complex with the recognition of informal, unstructured learning close to the learner and the workplace. The boundaries of the training market are now uncertain. The old supply no longer meets the full range of needs. The dynamics of the ecosystem have changed, as the roles of actors are no longer as defined as they once were. This new reality in continuing education means that we need to reinvent ourselves and develop innovative programs faster and more in line with labor market considerations.
Risks of Development and Innovation
Still, development and innovation are often costly risks. Consider the experiences of large companies such as Coca-Cola with New Coke, Microsoft with Zune or Amazon with the Fire phone. Such examples of failure show how difficult it can be to develop innovative educational services or to reach a segment of students.
In fact, innovation and project development are based on the paradox of the new and the same. To face competition and new challenges, we try to develop new training and learning management services that require new ways of thinking. It means introducing new ideas, reaching out to new customers or adopting new technologies. But to successfully meet these challenges and keep the students who value us, we need our same structure and consistency. As we innovate or launch new projects, there’s a great risk of losing coherence among programs, our impact and, ultimately, our north star. For these reasons, we need to stay centered on ourselves.
To resolve this paradox, we propose strategically positioning programs and projects in the marketplace while remaining ourselves. Strategic positioning helps develop competitive tactics, facilitates decision-making and guides program portfolio management.
Positioning Your Programs and Projects Strategically
We have identified three principles for positioning projects and programs.
1- Analyze before developing innovative programs and projects
Strategic positioning refers to an analytical approach to program development and innovation. It requires an openness to the marketplace that goes beyond analyzing internal resources and capabilities. Positioning analysis informs us about our customers, their trends and developments, as well as suppliers and the diversity of their offerings.
It’s about knowing customers, understanding them and taking a broader view. Who are continuing education’s customers today? Students, employees, employers, professional associations, government agencies or other stakeholders? What are they looking for? What value do they place on the training we offer? Next, market study looks at the overall training offering, its characteristics and those of providers. What training is available? What learning methods are available? What makes us different from other training providers?
This analytical approach recognizes that information is ambiguous and fragmented. In a VUCA world, market knowledge can never be complete. The results of this analysis tend to define market benchmarks, develop indicators or adapt existing ones.
2- Assuming organizational identity, values and culture to select market indicators
The goal of positioning is to find a favorable place for the program or project in the training market. For some, a favorable position is about profitability, while for others it’s about achieving substantial benefits. Each organization or university department has its own mission, culture and goals that influence its perception of the market.
Given we’re in a VUCA world, it’s a good idea to examine the marketplace and conduct analyses based on your organization’s values, culture, priorities and identity. This principle requires strategic reflection on the training department’s identity, values and culture. What is important and desirable for a lifelong learning program? What does the training department want to offer its customers? The aim here is to take into account the paradox of the same and the new and to develop new programs while remaining faithful to your organization.
3- Benchmarking from the customer’s perspective
Finally, positioning analysis means comparing the program offering against selected benchmarks (with the second principle).
When gathering program information, it’s best to adopt a student perspective. The idea here is to put ourselves in students’ shoes, as they make decisions based on the more or less true data in their possession. In other words, gather information from public sources, advertising, websites or social media. There may be gaps or conflicting information, then you'll know what your continuing education student is going through. You’ll get program comparison that is closer to what the student can perceive.
With these three principles, the strategic positioning analysis allows us to identify a development opportunity or the opposite if there’s no room for the projects we’d like to launch. This analysis will allow you to reduce the risk inherent to developing innovative programs and projects. In addition, the positioning analysis will give you a better understanding of the dynamics of commercial communication in the market. Finally, it will lead you to think about your development in terms of value creation. How do we create value for your customers?
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