Corporate universities have beena mainstay of many businesses—and government agencies—for almost 40 years. Theyall began with great promise and support across all sectors of the organization.Yet many fail. Hubris killed a lot of them, when, for one reason or another,they got carried away with their own perceived wonderfulness, essentialness,and even a little academic-like elitism (hence the name, “corporate university”).It’s no surprise that these institutions were doomed; so let’s not dwell onthose contributors.
Instead, if we look at the riseand fall of many CUs, we can identify seven other wrong turns they may havetaken on their journey:
1. Building boom and bust
Early on, many corporateuniversities invested too heavily in bricks and mortar. As learningtechnologies became more prevalent, CUs faced a dilemma. If they moved tooquickly to online learning, some believed they would have problems fillingtheir classrooms and keeping their instructors busy. This could be financiallyuntenable for them. If revenue from classroom programs fell short, there wouldbe no money to finance new technologies; but, worse, if technology really tookoff, there wouldn’t be enough students to justify the building. A few smart CUsgot out of the “physical campus” mentality and blended in “virtual” as soon asthey could, cutting their costs and making themselves more agile. Unfortunately,it was too little, too late for others. You can drive around many corporatecampuses today, and if you know where to look, you can see the relics (andrepurposing) of this expensive building boom.
2. Bloated permanent faculty
Despite goals to the contrary,too many corporate universities became saddled with large, permanent staffs. Withlittle change in the ranks, the expertise of the faculty could wane, and theability (and desire) of instructors to get back into the field could diminish. Stagnancy—andcosts—grew. Again, some smart CUs saw this as a problem and instituted a strongfield rotational program to keep the faculty fresh. Others went further,running their operations with few, if any, SMEs or instructors. Instead, theyput that responsibility on all field managers. In other words, every manager inthe field had an obligation to come to the CU to teach, part time, on a regularbasis, as part of his or her job responsibilities (coached by training experts).A side benefit was the wonderful developmental experience for top performers. CUsthat were stuck with large, non-mobile (from a career perspective) employees struggledmore to maintain their expertise and relevance.
3. Inability to recruit
In some CUs, the perceiveddiminished opportunity to get back into the field after a training assignmentdid not sit well with many top performers—who began to see an assignment to theCU as a career dead end—and many of the best and brightest did everything theycould to stay away. The existing staff of some CUs became more and more isolatedand entrenched over time. Working at the corporate university, the so-calledepitome of organizational knowledge and expertise, became a job to avoid. Asnoted, some CUs built incentive and rotational programs to get top talent tocome on board as a temporary but important career assignment, but many othersdidn’t bother.
4. Scope creep
Although most corporateuniversities started with a clearly defined charter, as costs rose and the CUneeded to attract higher enrollments, many introduced new curricula andprograms that, at first, were peripherally related to their core mission, butover time became more unrelated. To quote one CU executive I knew, “If therewas a demand for basket weaving, we might consider teaching it.” To be sure,some CUs stuck to their knitting and maintained a steadfast focus on theirraison d’etre. They got better and better at a well-defined, highly focusedmission, and many of them are still around today.
5. Market mentality
Then there were the CUs thatbelieved the best way to generate more revenue was to become more marketfocused. This caused some of them to eschew learning expertise for sales andmarketing expertise. They began to look like sales organizations, with accountexecutives and customer service staffs. While this looks reasonable on thesurface, the transition had unintended consequences, especially for CUsfocusing on internal employees. As CUs embraced the retail model, revenue,sales pipelines, class-take rates, and satisfaction scores became more importantthan performance improvement. “Want to keep your job?” they would overtly andcovertly tell their program teams, “sell more enrollments!” And the emergingLMSs were more than capable of keeping track of all this. You get what youmeasure. If and when those seats didn’t sell, naturally, the CU became an easiercost-cutting target.
6. Failure to truly understand and adapt to technology
Some corporate universitiesdismissed the rise of learning technology as a passing fad. Others insisted it wouldnever work or it wasn’t for them. Onthe opposite end, a few went into technology so fast and so hard, withoutthinking, that costs exploded and few courses actually were produced. They did,however, manage to accumulate closets full of yesterday’s gadgets (junk). ThoseCUs that embraced learning technology carefully, as an enabler of well-designedlearning and development, and not the savior of poor training programs, didmuch better. They saw technology as part of their expanding toolkit and not as eitherthe holy grail of training or something to fear.
7. Dismissing learning in the workflow
Many corporate universities wereslow to recognize the shift from learning in the classroom to learning in theworkflow (learning integrated into the work itself). Some still are. Soundsnice, but not their job. It was different in the field. As front-line managersand executives sought to make their teams more nimble and efficient, theyunderstood the need to equip them on the job with the tools they needed toperform better. To be sure, they probably took advantage of some trainingprograms, but they increasingly put more emphasis on field-based coaching andcollaboration, performance support, and online knowledge systems and productivitytools. And they often did it on their own, sometimes out of frustration withthe CU’s slow response. The CU’s lack of agility in this area isolated some ofthem, and many never really saw this shift coming.
It doesn’t have to be this way
Good corporate universities canavoid these problems, and, if an issue or two should show up, those with “openeyes” can correct their course and become more impactful, instead ofdisappearing or becoming irrelevant. But the longer a CU fails to makenecessary mid-course corrections, the harder it will be to land safely.
There is a lot of merit andpromise in the CU idea. But downsizing and cost cutting (not within the CUs’control), and a heavy dose of hubris and complacency (certainly within), havebeen the undoing of many. While hindsight is always 20/20, and pioneering CUsshould be given credit for the innovations they drove, tomorrow’s CUs must beas nimble and responsive as the businesses they serve, perhaps more so. Corporateuniversity reinvention is very much needed. New models are called for. Thecorporate university can’t just help foster change; it must, in the oft-quotedwords of Gandhi, “be the change.”
