Industry Leaders as Teachers in Higher Education
Education needs to be comprehensive and holistic to be effective. This is a known truth, but it is easier said than done. Today, education has become more accessible to the community at large, promoting anywhere-anytime learning and a suite of opportunities for varied learners. However, the many types of learners pose their own challenges in making education effective.
In an effort to achieve effective education, learning institutions have been trying varied methods and innovative ways to give themselves an edge over the competition. To this end, one of the more common and successful practices is to bring in leaders from the industry as visiting professors or guest lecturers. This helps provide unique, on-the-job perspectives to often abstract curricula.
Earlier this year, the world watched Satya Nadella take over for longtime leader Steve Ballmer as the CEO of Microsoft. Even more recently, Ballmer stepped down from the Microsoft board to spend time on other priorities, one of which is teaching. This fall as part of the MBA program at Stanford University, Ballmer will be teaching eighty students in a class called Leading Organizations.
Although Ballmer was not necessarily seen as a strong enough leader to take Microsoft to the next level, his industry experience cannot be discounted. He is an IT industry veteran, and that experience will make him a valued teacher.
Similar examples exist, including the founder of Harman Industries teaching at the USC School of Business and the executive vice president of Carlson Hotel Group teaching at Penn State School of Hospitality Management. Most of these leaders are invited as part of MBA programs, although it is not uncommon to see them in other disciplines, too.
Experiential learning—essentially, learning from doing—is needed now more than ever, and a lot of factors come together to promote effective experiential learning. While this largely deals with the student engaging in real-life experiences to learn a concept in a practical way, bringing in visiting professors from the industry is also becoming an important step in promoting experiential learning.
Additional fringe benefits from these teaching engagements include scouting for good candidates to join their organizations, building larger partnerships for campus hiring programs, and possible internship opportunities. These may not be very significant on an individual level, but the time-tested value of the experience these industry leaders bring is here to stay.
