When technology forces the upgrade of higher education, superficial change or overhauling?

When technology forces the upgrade of higher education, superficial change or overhauling?

Scientific and technological knowledge advances without pause, creating new possibilities for production and consumption, so that the general welfare of humanity is a reality that is perceived everywhere. Naturally, because of the differences between societies, progress does not reach everyone equitably, and there are even societies that live as in the middle of the XXth century. That is a topic that we leave for now.

In companies and organizations that rely on technology and knowledge to produce new goods and services, the need for professionals with skills, competencies and knowledge according to the current era is a priority; The difficulty in finding the right people reveals in the preached "shortage of talents" throughout the world. For a group of companies, this shortage is real; for others with deplorable and insane practices, this shortage is only the unfounded complaint because they do not find people who are willing to work in unworthy conditions (unfair wages, abusive working conditions).

In any case, professionals, on their own (not certified) and through organizations such as universities (certified) must do their part and update knowledge and skills. Bahl, Cook and Nerurkar (2009, p.7) speak of an "ocean of changes in learning", in which higher education institutions respond more slowly to technological and social changes. While for business executives, the challenges of finding qualified coaches and integrating new and old systems are practical activities by nature and are adopted immediately; For the higher educational institutions, the great challenge is to face the obsolete assumptions and beliefs, to alter the old entrenched ruins and also to find talents to teach new things well.

The long-history educational models that prioritized standardization and stability will soon be complemented or replaced by new educational models offered by non-traditional competitors that include innovation, responsiveness and organizational agility. According to Bahl et al. (2019, p.7) Many of the university respondents expressed concern about the inability to live up to the challenge. If this happens in countries where education has a high level, in countries where educational quality is absent; This concern does not exist because the business of diplomas is more important, and the methods of the SXX are maintained. When it arrives, the moment will be copied or adapted as much as possible.

The phrase "people are our most important asset" now is no longer rhetoric, because companies and universities must train people for the jobs that currently exist, and also prepare them for jobs that do not yet exist. for universities because if they are out of date in preparing for what is needed today, how can they anticipate and train people for the future?

 For Bahl et al (2019, p.6) the jobs of the future will be defined by the new conceptual tools such as AI, Big data, IoT, which will have a significant impact on work in the coming years. Automation and artificial intelligence will perform routine, repetitive and low-level tasks; also highly qualified white-collar work, making the skills and abilities of some people irrelevant, leaving behind those who can not keep up, update themselves (self-study) or higher institutions.

Bahl et al (2019, p.6) find that 76% of executives already face a huge talent gap, 73% feel that the skills gap will expand in the next five years. In 81% of companies, it is believed that it is possible to train workers whose functions, in whole or in part, have been automated; if they do not, they will lose ground. This action ensures the confidence of the employees, creates a competitive advantage over companies that move slowly and that try to find scarce talent externally. AT & T began a massive effort to discover that almost half of its 250,000 employees lacked the necessary skills in science, engineering, technology and mathematics (STEM) necessary to keep the company competitive.

The initiative is costly in the short term but profitable in the long term; it includes online courses, collaborations with Coursera, Udacity and universities, as well as a career center where employees are identified and trained for the types of jobs that the company needs today and in the future. All this effort is essential for the workforce to learn to handle work driven by emerging digital technologies.

Universities now, are no longer necessarily the source of training, unless they are updated and with all the appropriate systems; situation nonexistent in most of them. 25 years ago, for the needs and demands of that moment, any training plan necessarily relied on the universities since there was the "ultimate and total source of knowledge". Today that situation is a utopia and universities have competitors.

For Bahl et al (2019, p.8) there is no single approach to the preparation of the future workforce, but if companies and universities agree on the need to identify the skills of the future, review the existing curriculum, the learning and teaching approaches necessary to develop those skills. The refusal to this task means that they will be left behind, companies and universities, losing market both.

Currently, companies and universities estimate that 27% and 25% respectively of their staff and students have the skills base to work and interact with emerging digital technologies. It is expected that this figure will double to 62% for companies and 57% in the next five years, provided that efforts are made to complete and timely updating. In companies, organizational realignment and change management programs are proposed in the next 12 to 24 months to promote learning.

This revision (it really must be like an overhauling) will require time, practice, effort and many resources; 62% of the companies declared that increasing investment in this space is an absolute priority (for now the investment is 2.1% of their total annual income in training / learning of the workforce, it is expected to go to 4% in five years ). The evidence will be in the metrics that will be used to measure the effectiveness of their efforts, such as improved commercial operations (80%) and reduction of human error (77%) (Bahl et al, 2019, 8).

The overhauling concept (verb: overhaul) means renovation, revision, thorough repair, with detail and maximum care, by the best trained professionals. The airplanes are submitted every so often to total overhaulig; and it is evident that this revision can not be superficial or hasty.

The higher education system is like an airplane that has already exceeded the reasonable time of operations, already exceeded the scheduled flight hours and is at risk of collapse. It is already overhauling time. The creation and expansion of knowledge does not stop, and universities are left should be natural leaders in the task of collecting, organizing, disseminating knowledge for different users and beneficiaries. The contents, methods and approaches are now inadequate, inadequate and obsolete. The total overhauling, detailed and thoroughly done, whatever the cost, is strictly necessary.

The signs of change are clear: 64% of respondents believe that work will intertwine with learning in the future as people adopt new skills to align with employment opportunities. Companies and universities must adapt their content / curricula and training / teaching to the needs of students and the labor market. Now, companies and universities must be very active in identifying the skills required for future work, preparing and choosing flexible and adaptable learning content, continually updated, to create or develop new skills; adopt new forms of teaching and training (for example, led by an instructor, led by the AI ​​and adapted to AR / VR) to increase the effectiveness of learning). Difficult if, also possible, only that we have to start right now.

References

Manish Bahl, Michael Cook and Kshitij Nerurkar (2019) Relearning How We Learn, From the Campus to the Workplace,  Cognizant 2019

https://www.cognizant.com/whitepapers/relearning-how-we-learn-from-the-campus-to-the-workplace-codex3921.pdf