Mid Sweden University

Given the ongoing digital transformation in the knowledge society, research on workforce and organisational upskilling seems to be more important than ever. Such research can be done from a Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) perspective acknowledging the combination of work-placed practical activities and the university tradition of theoretical studies. The use of theories from academia combined with real world problems in industry can be seen as a fruitful source of collaboration. The aim of this study was to explore and analyse how academia met the industry in the Swedish BUFFL-project. This project was a two-year pilot project on organisational development that through online educational courses arranged by the academy focused on strengthening the competencies in banking and insurance companies. In the project, a central idea was the concept of 'Bring Your Own Data' (BOYD), meaning that the involved organisations and companies were data providers in their employees' continuous education. With this short backdrop, the research question to answer was: "What are the course participants' views of an online continuous education where academia meets the industry?". 

Data was gathered by course evaluation questionnaires from 14 course modules in the BUFFL-project. Each questionnaire consisted of the same 30 questions and was answered by a total of 69 respondents. A descriptive statistical analysis of the Likert-questions, as well as an inductive thematic analysis of free-text comments was conducted. The thematic analysis conducted resulted in three themes which concerned the online continuous education: ‘pedagogical issues in courses', technical issues in courses’, and 'issues in courses concerned with the interplay between academia and the industry. Findings show that there are several pedagogical and technical challenges for adult learners with little experience of online technology enhanced learning. Moreover, it is important that academia offers an easy to access and user-friendly support model, if the meeting with the industry is to be harmonic. Finally, some course participants were a bit reluctant towards the frequent use of theoretical literature in English, and requested a stronger element of practice-based problem solving.