By Ray Birch
MADISON, Wis.—The pandemic has taught credit union leaders an important lesson, and in doing so altered the course of professional education programs.
Christopher Stevenson, SVP/chief learning officer at CUES, emphasized that point during an interview with CUToday.info about how professional education programs have evolved over the last 10 years, a decade during which the knowledge needed by credit union leaders has had to expand as operations have become larger and more complex.
“We've been able to very effectively conduct advanced online learning remotely in part because people were able to see during the pandemic that it actually works,” said Stevenson.
But that doesn’t mean it’s preferred.
As a new academic year approaches, Stevenson’s insights are part of a CUToday.info series themed “Back to School” that highlights credit union professional education programs.
Stevenson said CUES’ professional education programs have experienced a dramatic shift in the past three years. The organization serves more than 38,000 people, including board members, CEOs, senior executives, managers, and other staff, from credit unions across North America and the Caribbean.
“Obviously, the pandemic created a rapid shift in how people want to learn, what they're willing to explore, and the different types of professional education,” he said. “The last few years have illustrated to credit union professionals that hybrid learning is a viable way of education.”
Stevenson said that prior to the health crisis, credit union professionals did not view remote learning as being effective as in-person courses.
“Back then, remote learning was more check-the-box, especially with compliance,” Stevenson explained. “For example, with BSA courses, you’ve got to do them. Remote learning was a way to get those done and show that box had been checked. Remote learning then was not used to explore more in-depth concepts, like executive education. Those types of courses, online, just a few years ago were unheard of.”
Not Better or Worse
Stevenson pointed out CUES just delivered its annual CEO Institute program remotely, the second time the organization has done so for its flagship event that previously had been an in-person only course.
Christopher Stevenson
“The content is the same (as previous in-person CEO Institute programs). The instructors are the same. It's just delivered remotely,” said Steveson. “But we now can do very advanced online learning through this program.”
Stevenson said he does not believe online learning is better than classroom programs, but it does allow people who are unable to travel or don't have the budget access to more professional education opportunities. And while professional education programs made a marked shift in last three years, people now are wanting to go back to more in-person events, for several reasons.
“CUES had typically been almost exclusively in-person programs,” said Steveson. “We would do webinars and a handful of virtual classrooms where the learning is free to our membership. And, as I explained, during the pandemic we went entirely remote. Now it's starting to shift back. People still want to do digital learning, but they want to travel. They want to see people face to face. They want to network.”
The Biggest Flaw
Networking, perhaps, is the biggest flaw of digital events, offered Stevenson.
“Networking is hard to do remotely,” he said. “How do you kind of capture the feeling of standing in a room with cocktails and appetizers and having conversations about what you learned that day? Virtual happy hours really don't work. That's an area we are continuing to explore. I don’t think any organization, so far, has done this well.”
Stevenson said that CUES is now back to emphasizing in-person courses, supplemented by digital learning. In 2022, just one-third of CUES programs will be delivered fully digitally or in a hybrid manner.
“I would say that digital learning is not better or worse than in person—pretty much the same,” explained Steveson, citing course evaluations have been largely the same for online and in-person events.
What Do People Want?
And what do evaluations, and requests from the CU community, say about the types of education professionals are wanting?
“Over the last four years people are wanting to learn about attracting and retaining employees, developing future leaders, building sufficient bench strength and developing robust metric programs,” Stevenson said. “They also want to learn about communication, strategic and critical thinking, personal or soft skills and emotional intelligence. Our surveys tell us people want to know the technical side of lending and compliance. The HR and talent development executives, as well as CEOs, are most interested in helping people to become better leaders and master critical thinking, communications and emotional intelligence.”
New topics, too, are surfacing.
“We have seen a shifting a bit as far as topics are concerned…subjects like fintechs are coming up more often, as well as cyber security,” said Stevenson.
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