We like to MOOC it MOOC it.

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Top Stories: 🔝

1. The Ministry of Health has released a set of detailed standard operating procedures (SOPs) and preventive measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 in religious places, shopping malls, hotels, and restaurants.

2. A low-intensity earthquake of magnitude 2.1 hit Delhi today. The epicentre of the earthquake was at the Delhi-Gurgaon border and it occurred at 1 PM. Since April, Delhi-NCR has recorded more than 14 quakes of low and medium intensity.

3. #JusticeforEmployees is a silent protest and is organised by IT unions, who are against the IT industry body NASSCOM’s recent move to include IT sector in the labour law changes.

We have entered unprecedented territory. 27 million youth in the age group of 20-30 years lost their jobs in April 2020, due to the lockdown imposed in India by the government. #goCoronago. There is no denying that the next few years will be a challenge for anyone graduating from college or looking for a job.

The obvious sectors that have been hit are, retail, travel & hospitality, entertainment but the second leg could be worse. Consumers and small businesses who have lost their jobs/revenue will cut back on expenses and will start delaying loan payments, rents and even filing for bankruptcies. This may have an indirect impact on financial services companies, marketing & PR companies, and technology companies.

We also read a headline that stated, "the strongest MBA job market in history will come to an end." But let's also look at the data below...

Soon after the 2008 financial crisis, the % of companies hiring MBA graduates dropped drastically. Maybe an analogy can be drawn that the same will happen in 2020, going into 2021 post the COVID-19 economic crisis?

So, is it worth enrolling for prestigious MBAs programmes?

Business schools have had an immediate short term reaction to COVID-19 moving to online instruction, no face-to-face, some are waiving the GMAT in order to incentivise students to apply.

But how prepared are the b-schools to move coursework online for the long run? Not very, according to John Katzman, founder and CEO of Noodle Partners, an online education platform. "Don’t expect much more than Zoom sessions which may be a short-term fix but is not the stuff of a rigorous graduate program."

MBA is an applied degree where you learn by osmosis, networking and the environment itself. An online MBA may not be as fulfilling as being inside the iconic Harvard library or having a one-on-one with your esteemed professors.
FYI: Indians account for 18.4% of the international students in the US, that is 2,02,014 students and an average MBA costs around INR Rs 2,60,85,400 in the States.

What the 'MOOC'?

MOOC means 'Massive Open Online Courses' offered by online education providers like Coursera, EdX and are free of charge. You can now find a course on trading & financial markets (by Yale) on Coursera. MOOCs provide an affordable and flexible way to learn new skills, advance your career and deliver quality educational experiences at scale.

FYI with DR: Bengaluru based ed-tech BYJU’s posted revenue of INR 2,800 Cr in the financial year ending March 2020, a 2X growth from INR 1,306 Cr posted by the company for the financial year 2019.

What to do?

This is the time to develop knowledge, skills to focus in the fields and areas that have opportunities in the future. This is not only true for college-students but also for working professionals.

The demand for technical and scientific fields like computer science, data science, data analytics, biomedical science, nursing, and biotechnology will rise in the future.

This is also the time to specialise in a particular career rather than generalise, learn the skills before you enter the job market. Want to be a corporate lawyer? Don't just get a degree from law school, but complete an online course on drafting contracts for example. Online education is booming, it's cheap and it's here to stay.

Did I hear you okay?... (2/2)

While radio is a thing for the past, for Millennials and Gen-Z podcasting is the new trend. According to an Adobe Analytics report, 33 % of Millennials are listening to five or more podcasts in a week. During the lockdown, global podcasts listens have increased by 42%.

Why podcasting?

1. Convenient listening,
2. Your choice of genre,
3. A plethora of shows out there,
4. Fun, enjoyable and relatable, and
5. FREE

Many companies are going all out and investing in podcasting:

A. Google rolled out its new Podcast Manager tool, giving podcasters data on engagement metrics like play count, the geographical location of listeners and so on.

B. Spotify signed a deal with Joe Rogan, comedian and host of one of the most popular podcasts in the world. His show reaches about 190 million downloads a month.

C. Acast, a Swedish platform for the distribution, management and monetisation of podcasts, announced a partnership with JioSaavn, the second-largest audio streaming service in India (at 104 million monthly users), giving JioSaavn users some fresh podcast content.

So, there's an obvious hype in the podcast market and content is Queen.
Amarjit Singh Batra, Managing Director at Spotify India, this is just the beginning. “We see a lot of potential in India as a market,” he says. “As a culture, we love storytelling."

Traditional channels such as radio gave podcasts the first push in India. But, there is a huge gap in talk radio where India is concerned. Private FM stations are only permitted to carry the news bulletins / current affairs of All India Radio, in exactly the same format without any changes or alteration. Laymen terms, you cannot give personal opinions and transform news to your liking and "discuss" it on air. A dialogue will not be allowed.

Enter podcasting...where you are allowed to speak about basically anything till the time it's interesting.

Oh, and we at Dialogue Room, have our own podcasting show called 'Dialogue Now'. Our CEO & Founder, Divya gets up close and personal with Indian domain experts and business leaders and explores some much-needed topics that aren't taught but you should know about...

We are also available on Spotify, Apple, Jio Saavn & Google.

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This newsletter was edited by Kanika Shekhawat & Divya Gupta.

Want to keep dialoguing? Hear the ‘Dialogue Now’ podcast on Spotify, Apple, & Jio Saavn.