Fortunately, here at kmbs, we have already used different options for online interactions – both for internal team meetings and as a part of educational programs. Yet, this situation urged us to rethink the educational opportunities that we provide to our participants on a dramatically larger scale.
Now we are on the final stage of transforming all our programs into online format – from short-term executive development programs to two-year MBA programs. All current groups already tried a new format and continue their studies online. Moreover, we succeeded in launching new programs without “offline background”.
During this process, we have learned many things, and there are some findings we would like to share:
1) Whatever online platform you use, it is essential to create a lively atmosphere in the virtual class. For that reason, we ask our participants to always switch on the camera and microphone during the lecture. After the implementation of this policy, we noted a significant increase in in-class engagement.
2) We reconsidered the efficiency of studying full day online. To keep executives’ attention and enhance better learning, we decided to change the length of learning day on our programs. Now the program became longer in days, but participants study no more than 3-4 hours per day.
3) During online classes, a productive discussion between participants is of utmost importance, so we often divide them into groups of up to five people and facilitate learning with the use of whiteboard, online stickers, etc.
4) The crucial role in this adaptation process played all kmbs professors and the team. Fortunately, each of our team members was open for experiments and ready to learn best practices to keep the high quality of our educational products in an online format. To make it possible, the first step was to develop a set of internal training for our faculty and team about instruments for online study and work processes. We continue to develop this training, reflecting and paying more attention to our day-to-day experience.
5) Before the pandemic, we had already worked on the Virtual Learning Environment of kmbs. Now we put our efforts into further development of the virtual system that will not only provide temporary learning opportunities but will keep being an essential part of kmbs in the after-pandemic era.