Five Continents in Five Years

I was excited last week to learn that in January 2012 I’ll join the staff of the Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD).

As exciting as this was, even more interesting was learning how it would work. How could I live in South Dakota and teach students in China, Argentina, Minnesota and California?

Teaching online

At MCAD, they have a fast growing online education program where students, professionals and artists can learn specialized skills on their own schedule. Every week, the new lesson is released online. The students can then login at their availability to watch, listen and learn the material presented and turn in their assignments before the next class time.

This creates an interesting challenge for the professor, like me. I have to have the entire course created prior to its start with clear learning objectives that are predetermined instead of influenced by those in the classroom. With feedback from students, the course can then be customized and tweaked to match the skills and abilities of the enrolled students.The course will be made up of screencasts, videos and audio of all aspects of digital media marketing. My biggest concern with this style, however, was how do I interact with the students?

My virtual office

Fortunately, there are set “virtual office hours” when I am on Skype and available for questions, comments and

Working virtually in Norway

discussions. Students can logon and we can video chat or have a group conversation if multiple students are struggling with a concept. In this way, we are able to have the personal interaction on top of the online materials.

This virtual teaching model helped me start brainstorming on other ways this digital format could be used. Besides teaching, how else could you make use of technology to eliminate language and distance barriers?

How businesses can teach virtually

For many businesses, digital tools can accomodate workers around the globe. A communication tool like Skype allows you to check-in like my virtual office hours while a project management tool like Basecamp enables workers to upload work and keep it organized in a central location.

Making oneself available for questions from customers or employees is a great way to personalize your company and even build rapport over thousands of miles.

5 continents in 5 years

In our digital marketing and education firm 9 Clouds, we are doing our best to become a virtual business. We want to help businesses learn to use technology regardless of where they are or where we are. This is especially exciting because of my own goal: to live and work on every continent in the next 5 years.

I still need to pin down what “live” means (and if Antarctica is included). In my head, I am thinking at least a month in each location. I have North America down and next month will add Europe to the list as I set up shop in Spain and Greece. I know that with the virtual tools that 9 Clouds uses, most of our clients won’t know that I’m across the ocean or across the country.

The best part is, you too can enjoy this kind of freedom. Your business may require foot-traffic or a storefront, but with technology you can get away and still keep in touch with employees at the store and keep your business running. If you have the ability to sell or work completely online, you can live wherever you want.

Set-up your virtual office

Just like my future students will be learning around the globe, so too can business owners create a virtual office that is every bit as successful and often more efficient than a brick and mortar storefront. In the coming months, we’ll be testing out the challenges and rewards of going virtual on our blog, so subscribe to receive posts via email to see how it is going.

Until then, think about signing up for my class!