Lessons Learned from Online Learning at Scale: a Study of Exemplar Learning Organizations

As the areas of education and workforce training tend more toward online training, they have emphasized the rapid setup and expansion of online environments. This scaling-up and scaling-out of training programs can be difficult, but there are examples of success available for us to learn from. To capture the lessons learned, we conducted semi-structured interviews across academic, public, private, and non-profit organizations. Using deductive thematic analysis, three major groups of determinants were identified: technological infrastructure, human infrastructure, and governance. A framework consisting of three actionable recommendations was created to facilitate online learning organizational scaling-up including learner (learning experiences and user-friendly design), technical (technical competencies and the use of integrated data), and management (technical competencies for both learners and instructors as well as the use of integrated data) factors.