EdTech2.0 : Lean Learning

Upskilling and reskilling are taking center stage and keeping up with changing times; employees are trying their best to follow through their skill development curve and prevent it from plateauing, by adding relevant skills to their portfolio, which is when the Edtech firms come to rescue them in their pursuit of upskilling. The traffic garnered by Learning websites and apps indicates the popularity of skill enhancement among the professionals in these times of uncertainty. Furthermore, the free content and massive discount are justifying to their purpose of attracting more subscribers to various courses being offered across several learning platforms. This quest for upskilling raises a pertinent question as to how professionals can differentiate themselves from others. Today anyone and everyone having a good internet connection can gain knowledge about the skills, but only a few can actually acquire them as it depends on several factors like:

• Motivation: Intrinsic motivation leads to the real acquisition of the skills, whereas extrinsic motivation like Continuous Professional Education(CPE) score, meeting KPIs for the name sake or learning just because it's trendy, seldom yields fruitful results
• Needs Vs Learning Gap: This gaps tends to widen, especially in the situations we are currently facing; professionals tend to pursue a course that has a little alignment to their needs.
•  Timing:  Timing is a crucial aspect when it comes to upskilling and reskilling. Many times employees learn the skills without having any immediate needs. This period of dormancy takes the toll  when the time arrives for the application of their gained knowledge; they tend to forget what they learned. As per German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus' 'The Forgotten Curve' theory, an individual tends to forget 75% of the information just after six days if not applied.

Thus upskilling and reskilling require more than a simple e-learning platform. The rat race of skill enhancement not only makes it difficult for the professionals to differentiate themselves in these difficult economic times but also destabilizes the equilibrium between the demand and supply. Hence, devaluing the skills, leading to a shift in the stature of must-have skills into just ordinary skillset, rendering them redundant.

Role of Edtech Start-ups

Edtech firms can rejuvenate the learning experience by harnessing the power of artificial intelligence and machine learning to create a more personalized course experience. It can be achieved by gaining early insights from the individual’s learning style, undertaking a course, and then tweaking other modules of the course based on those insights. The whole process can further be augmented by creating learner personas and intertwining it with insights gained about the individuals to create a rich user experience. Another way around could be partnering with various organizations’ L&OD team to gain initial insights about their employees’ learning style and then correlating these insights with understanding established by the learning platform. It will help the organizations to find and stem upon the individuals’ learning pillars, to adjust the learning module as per the employees’ needs. It will not only help professionals to differentiate themselves with a solid foundation of learning but will also help the employers to choose among the best.

What’s in for the Edtech start-up?

As per KPMG, online certification and the reskilling industry is expected to grow at a CAGR of 38%, reaching around $463 Mn by 2021, and looking at the current scenario, it seems like it might surpass these numbers. As the expected growth rate is increasing, so does the number of firms. Currently, there are around 194 well-funded start-ups in India. These numbers are enough to suggest how cluttered the Edtech industry is at this point. Thus to sustain the growth and to live up to investors’ expectations, firms are left with two options: Firstly, spending a fortune to create a brand to get fixated in the prospects’ minds. Secondly, becoming a categorical leader to stand out of the crowd, but please be careful, as here the marketing efforts are not negated. Firms will still require to have a marketing budget, but the “Law of the Category” will certainly come to their rescue to leave a long-lasting impression in the prospect’s mind. Thus, preventing them from competitors’ initial imitation attacks and continuous improvement along with the R&D, will help them to fend off the competitors over the longer run.

“Change is imminent and bound to come.”

Questions that persist around the change are when and how. Looking at the fast pace growth of the Edtech industry, it seems like we do not have to wait for long to see a new wave of lean learning enriched with artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics.