Finding the balance between caution and optimism

The opportunity to build a pure-play vocational trade school in emerging tech continues to keep me excited. The endless possibilities of designing education for the future modern learner with a 60-year curriculum in mind allow me to think long. Two years in a row, we were in the top 20% of Inc. 5000 fastest-growing private companies in the US; and twice recipients of the Department of Labor’s HireVETS Gold Medallion recognition. We at Divergence strive for the same, if not better, results in 2023. However, the near-term macro indicators of increasing interest rates, capital tightening, and regulatory compliance requirements will slow us down. The year 2023 will be all about finding the balance between caution and optimism.

I am still an avid reader of HBR and The Economist articles. I study business models, read leader biographies for ideas, and adapt and adjust our brand. As Noam Chomsky says, "We shouldn't be looking for heroes; we should be looking for good ideas." On that note, last December, I dug into learning more about Herb Kelleher, a co-founder and former CEO of Southwest Airlines. I landed on this HBR article.?

Herb had committed to simplicity and consistency rather than non-stop innovation. For decades, the company flew just one kind of plane (the Boeing 737), which made it easier to train pilots and mechanics and manage fleet operations. It maintained point-to-point flight routes and thus avoided the delays and chaos of traditional hub-and-spoke systems. In a surprising but instructive way, Southwest was wildly successful over decades because it was slow to change rather than because it was eager to change.

According to the same 2019 HBR article, one of the significant challenges facing Southwest then was whether its new generation of leaders could maintain the legacy of simplicity and consistency that Kelleher championed. Three years later, in 2022, the Southwest growth, lack of significant investments in operational infrastructure, and post-COVID staffing challenges created the chaos we have seen over the last two weeks.?

Talking about simplicity and consistency with a touch of innovation, I want to highlight two businesses I experienced over the holidays –

1. TX Whiskey – Firestone and Robertson Distilling Co. The full TX range espouses the brand’s rugged elegance. The bottle tops are handmade from boot leather; the canvas neck wraps are a nod to pioneer-covered wagons, and the silver band around the base of every bottle represents a polished symbol of Western culture.
2. Duluth Trading offers high-quality, solution-based casual wear, workwear, and accessories for men and women who lead a hands-on lifestyle. You may have watched their quirky ads on TV. They have a Direct-to-Consumer model and have a store in Arlington as part of the omnichannel (Web, Phone, and Retail store) strategy. I learned about entrepreneurship and Brand Building. As an avid reader, through “The Art of Building a Brand,” a book I received as a Christmas present, I learned that being an entrepreneur is hard work. Amid the public adulation, nobody tells you that getting a startup off the ground is difficult without venture capital backing. There are not enough business startups in the United States today. I became an entrepreneur the old-fashioned way, bootstrapping with the help of severance dollars from my layoff at Microsoft and our savings. Bootstrapping is far more challenging today. For one thing, regulations keep the community banking system from lending to startups. On top of that, the spike in interest rates to 9% in the last 12 months does not make borrowing easier.

At Divergence, we are learning from giants across industries – airlines, distilleries, and apparel – to put guardrails in place so that Divergence as a brand does not go astray. We want to ensure that Divergence, unlike Southwest, does not change too much or too quickly and, in the process, becomes bewildering or unrecognizable. It takes a staff of twenty-three (23) and growing to keep things simple and operationally efficient. Our unifying message is that Cyber Risk is a Financial Risk, and anchoring all four immersive to Security Operations, we are investing in keeping 2023 simple yet rewarding.

SECURITY OPERATIONS AS AN ANCHOR IN OUR BOOTCAMP PROGRAM EVOLUTION

In recent years, Cybersecurity has taken center stage as an essential skill for future workers. It’s hard to imagine a career in the future that doesn't require some level of cybersecurity expertise—whether in Cybersecurity itself or as one component of a complete technical skillset.

A few key factors are driving this:

• Cyberattacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated and frequent. We live in an age where cybercrime is prolific and pervasive; cybercriminals can hack into your bank account from anywhere in the world simply by accessing an infected website or email attachment.?
• Cybersecurity has become cross-functional. The future will see jobs where workers must balance their responsibilities across different departments, including operations teams responsible for protecting data security against internal and external threats. Employees who understand how these things function together will have more success than those who don't have such knowledge!

As we drive our operational excellence to improve our content and curriculum via feedback, we aim to help learners develop skills relevant to the workplace. There are many ways to facilitate this learning best. Some experts emphasize the role of technology in modernizing education; others believe that technology should be used when appropriate and as an adjunct to existing teaching methods. The context in which we are going to offer our four immersive programs in 2023 will be Security Operations.?

At the core, we are a Bootcamp company serving career changers. Bootcamp in the education market is a proven business model. The recent M&A between staffing and education businesses proves that the HIRE-CERTIFY-DEPLOY model is still alive to onboard talent differently for varied economic reasons. On top of that, cybersecurity-related challenges are forcing the reprioritization of talent – “Doing more with fewer” – and yet achieving digital transformation goals securely.?

• HIRE - Hire the right people
• CERTIFY - Certify the right people
• DEPLOY - Deploy the right people

The reason this is important is that most companies need to do this. Companies can only hire people and expect them to be good at what they do, especially if they have yet to learn what that is. They need a process for finding the right people, certifying them on their skills and abilities, and then deploying them into roles where they can succeed. This process of HIRE-CERTIFY-DEPLOY is where most companies fail and why so many startups fail. To build a successful company, they need to get this right from day one.?

The Tech Bootcamp helps build a team of professionals rather than just hiring people with skills. Companies learn to find the right people and then train them on what they need to know. That saves the company time and money—and most importantly, it ensures that everyone is performing at their best during the crunch time.

OUR BOOTCAMP EVOLUTION

Bootcamps are everywhere, so learners continue to want to learn different and specific technology skills without going through all the prerequisites required by traditional college programs. Tech jobs continue to increase in popularity, and they pay very well. So, it’s a very appealing thing for a career changer.

Trends started forming way back in 2015. The Divergence Academy’s audience is career changers, with the average age being thirty-five (35). The pandemic in 2020 then displaced millions of American workers from their jobs, which changed everything drastically. Bootcamps have grown significantly over the last couple of years because people need to retrain and get back to work quickly.

In 2015, Divergence received Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) approval for the Data Science Immersive program. We were new entrants into the Bootcamp market, and the wise recommended we pick one. The initial intent was to submit two additional programs for approval – IoT Immersive and Software Engineering Immersive. Two years later, in 2017, we envisioned an Applied Data Science program. Though not noticeably clear then, what the applied industry domain would be – Healthcare, Industry 4.0 (Manufacturing / IoT), or Finance.?

At the same time, in 2017, we received TWC approval for Cybersecurity Professional Penetration Tester (CPPT), Cloud Engineering Immersive (CEI), and Security Operations Management (SOMI) programs. The challenge, like in 2015, was the same. Despite having all the approvals, we launched only one – CPPT.

The idea of Data Science applied to Cybersecurity did not arrive until late 2018 after delivering a Cybersecurity Professional Penetration Tester cohort. The biggest motivator was that one or more of the datasets used in those cohorts were Network Traffic related and Indicators of Compromise (IoC).??

Here is our program development process: ENVISION ?? DEVELOP ?? INCUBATE ?? REFINE ?? MAINSTREAM ?? IMPROVE.?

Our process from envisioning to mainstreaming is about two years. The improvements are rolled out every 90 days, with a yearly version labeled as a major. Our Incubate and Refine processes include learning via feedback from our Corporate Deliveries. During that process, one or more program components, say Shift-Left Thinking of Cloud Engineering Immersive, is refined.?

2023 INVESTMENTS

Bootcamp Evolution: An Integrated Product for Learning Pathways and Career Journeys

Learning pathways are how we learn, and career journeys are how we progress through those pathways. The future of learning is about understanding these two things: how you learn and what you're supposed to do with that information.

The idea of a midpoint milestone is emerging as a new term in this area. It's not a midpoint or a milestone; it's more like an innovation in career development than anything else. The idea of the midpoint milestone is that you must reach a point in your career where you can take stock of what you've done so far and decide what's next. It's not something that happens overnight; instead, it occurs over time as you move through different jobs, roles, and responsibilities.

Corporate learning validates our program offerings. It validates the skills or sometimes introduces us to new skills, 21st-century skills that don’t come up in the labor market reports or that aren’t listed in the job postings but are essential to employers. It helps us identify internships, job opportunities, and work-based learning opportunities like panel discussions, guest speakers, and site visits. We're able to prepare students for jobs and careers directly and give them a more realistic expectation of what the job holds than just going off a report.

One reason is that we can update our curriculum quickly. We update our curriculum every time we teach it to the latest stable version.

Companies want tech talent immediately because they need people with practical application experience using this modern technology. But we also find they like a good mix of people who have been through traditional university programs—computer scientists and bootcamp students. Bootcampers don’t always know the theory, but they know how to make the systems work.

But many companies need people who can also write more complicated algorithms and do more computer science parts, so a mix of those people helps companies stay ahead of the game. It’s a revenue diversification strategy.?

Expanded Enrollment Opportunities: A Continuous Learning Subscription Model?

The average age of a Divergence Academy student attending a bootcamp is thirty-five (35).?

Gary Matkin coined the 60-year curriculum (60YC) to define the modern era of lifelong learning clearly. More recently, John Richards and Chris Dede concluded that higher education must provide life-wide opportunities for continuous upskilling as enduring learners traverse multiple careers from mid-adolescence to retirement. As longevity becomes a more prevalent societal force, there will be seismic shifts in the ways and means of curricular development, presentation, delivery, and assessment.?

A 60-year curriculum is a modern approach to a lifetime of learning that encourages continuing education at every life stage. It is based on the best practices in technology and education, emphasizing skills such as critical thinking, creativity, communication, critical thinking, creativity, communication, and collaboration skills and collaboration. This approach is designed to encourage lifelong learning and improve students' employability. It's not just about education—it's about preparing for life.

On one side, strategic enrollment planning has never been more challenging. The shelf life of new knowledge is getting shorter, people are living longer, and expanded populations of learners are seeking a college education and development that requires new ways to access affordable learning across their lives and careers. Reconciling these symbiotic realities opens space to reimagine Divergence's purpose and promise; there have never been more abundant enrollment opportunities for students.?

As a scholar-practitioner of vocational trade school administration, I contemplate the effect a 60YC may have on the evolution and strategic enactment of enrollment management.

1. Adult Education, Intergenerationally Mixed Courses, Skills & Employment-based Learning, and Shorter Cumulative Programs
2. Time considerations are also significant for adult learners who experience competing priorities, conflicting schedules, and incongruent influences in their personal, professional, and educational spheres.
3. Stackable- and micro-credentials become more viable and desirable pathways for students to achieve their educational goals.

Future of Learning: Stackable Credentials and Gamified Learning Environments

We have been listening to the term 'Future of Work' for several years. As we approach the midpoint milestone of the 21st century, a new word is emerging - The Future of Learning.

The Future of Learning will be a game changer that requires a new approach to education and training. The Future of Learning is not just about technology; it's also about how people learn, what they want from their careers and how businesses can meet those needs in an increasingly competitive environment. Many companies are already on board with this idea, but some still need clarification on what it means.

The Future of Learning is about designing education for the future modern learner—a human being who uses technology as part of their daily routine but who also values face-to-face interaction with other humans over text-based communication. In this context, "modern" means different things to different people: to some, it's a reference to the new crop of learners that have grown up with technology; in other cases, "modern" refers to educational practices that are informed by what we know now about how humans learn and interact with their environments.?

Workforce and Community Development: Powered by Divergence L&D Solutions

We instituted a new team at Divergence focused on Workforce and Community Development. The goal here is to help our students, local communities, and the employers we work with. For the students, it’s about building skills and competencies that match employer needs. Because we have the freedom to develop unique programs, we can base them on industry needs. But with employer industry information, we're serving our students as they should be. So, we do much labor market research via a JobsEQ platform from Chmura.

Career Development Center (CDC) is available for Immersive Programs, Workforce Development, and Professional Development students.

CLOSING OUT

As I ponder the potential impact of a sixty-year curriculum (60YC) on the responsibilities of a school president and the development of enrollment management strategies, I am reminded of the need to consider the historical and contextual foundation of these endeavors. Like the tree from which they draw their strength, our roots are ever evolving and dynamic, constantly branching out and intertwining with one another. The field of enrollment management is a rich and varied tapestry woven from threads of complexity and diversity. It is a profession that continues to grow and flourish, adapting to the changing needs of the world around us.

Beyond the Enrollment Management role, I think about stewardship, which requires flexibility too. Divergence Academy will continue to watch out for how we must adapt.

• As consumer wants, needs, and attitudes change;
• As our primary demographic is multi-generational; and
• As new technologies and new distribution channels emerge.

In 2023, it is crucial for business leaders to adopt a forward-thinking and proactive approach to taking advantage of the opportunities presented by a 60YC model. This means being adaptable and open to trying innovative approaches, embracing experimentation, and actively seeking out opportunities for innovation. By embracing this generative mindset, business leaders can position themselves to fully realize the potential of the 60YC and drive positive change in their organizations.

Here is a poem written by ChatGPT to welcome 2023:

Embrace the beauty of diversity,

Allow your thoughts to shift and flow,

Take impromptu action with boldness,

Embrace a kaleidoscope of wonder and glow.

We at Divergence Academy wish all our instructors, learners, and employer partners the best of 2023.?

SOURCES

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/10/11/companies-are-finding-it-harder-to-get-cyber-insurance-.html?

https://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/gartner-top-security-and-risk-trends-for-2021

https://woodruffsawyer.com/cyber-liability/cyber-insurance-requirements-next-frontier/?

https://query.prod.cms.rt.microsoft.com/cms/api/am/binary/RE5bUvv?culture=en-us&country=us?

https://evolllution.com/programming/applied-and-experiential-learning/e-portfolios-raise-the-bar-for-adult-learners/?