Academic Incubation

In academics, there is no difference between academics and real world but in real world there is difference between the academics and real world.

- Nassim NicholasTaleb

“I have a unique proposition for your students. It will help them experiment with real life software platform and come up with new ideas,” I said to the dean of student affairs of a mid-ranked MBA college in India. I had travelled 200 km to meet key people from college administration. I was quite convinced that the students will get opportunity to work on real business platform.

“Will you offer them job?” the dean asked.

“No, hiring is a separate activity, but this will certainly help them in finding a job,” I replied.

“Can you at least offer them internship in your company,” the dean insisted.

After some back and forth discussion, the dean said bluntly– “Do you think the students come to this college to learn? There are lots of online courses for that. The students join this B-School only to get a good job. If you have a proposition to offer job, we can discuss any further.”

Our discussion did not proceed any further. But this essentially sums up the nature of industry – academia relationship in most of the colleges in India. Industry and academia are only connected through a bridge called ‘hiring’.

The story is no different even in premier colleges. I have had opportunities to participate in startup events at premier schools as well and I was surprised at the lack of interest from the students.

I once asked a student – “why none of students turn up for these events, wouldn’t they learn a lot from new ideas or develop of their own?”

“Sir, we have to focus on studies, get good grades and find a good job in a reputed company. After all we need to pay off our student loan first,” there was no room for any experimentation. It will be unfair to blame the students, we all have been like that during our college days – with laser sharp focus on job.

Need to change?

Last several decades the our professional lives had two clear phases – a period of learning usually for the first 25-30 years of life followed by the period of application for the next 25-30 years in our professional world. This worked because ever since the industrial revolution the pace of technological changes have more or less remained manageable. The skills learned in the universities could still be relevant in the job for the next 25 years.

Welcome to the age of AI and technological disruption. There is a no guarantee that an engineering study of four years will not be obsolete by the time the student graduates. If a school going child asks for career advice today, most of us will have no idea where the jobs will be in the next 20 years. In fact the definition of job itself may change. We are living in the most uncertain world today.

The only way to beat this uncertainty is to build a recursive loop of learning and application. This blurs the line between the student and professionals. A student has to experiment in the real world to learn and a working professional should keep going back to the universities to stay relevant. Learning becomes a lifelong imperative, even beyond the traditional retirement age.

Fluid boundary needed for continuous learning

This calls for a more fluid boundary between the academia and industry practitioners especially in a country like India. This has to go beyond the customary management development courses and select the vocational courses offered by academia. There can be multiple modes of engagement be it as mentors, course advisors, students, researchers etc. beyond the hiring relationship. There are plenty of industry experts who are willing to collaborate if there is a structured framework from the academia. Some universities are moving in that direction but lot more need to be done.

The technological disruption today provides a golden opportunity for the academia to re-architect their relationship with the real world. It will be a win-win relationship for both and to revisit the starting quote from Nassim Nicholas Taleb :-

“In academics there should be a real world and in real world there should be enough of academics”.

#AcademicIncubation #FutureOfWork #Disruption #Eduction

#WhoStoleMyJob - https://www.amazon.in/Who-Stole-Job-Sunil-Mishra/dp/9387022579/