Towards design standards for curriculum consistency in corporate education

The aim of this study is to develop a set of practical design standards that can be used in the context of corporate educa­tion. Economic, social and cultural turbulence in society results in a continuous need to adapt to an ever-changing environment. Learning is considered a major vehicle for organizations to implement the necessary structural, technological and cultural transformations that are needed to grow, or at least to survive.

Design standards for corporate education focus primarily on the acquisi­tion of skills that are sustained by the work envi­ronment; skills that should bring about intended changes in employee performance and an impact on the organization. The body of knowledge on public education provides the broad theoretical foundation for such design stan­dards. Moreover, the com­plex mech­anisms in corporate education, where cognitive operations of individ­ual learn­ing intertwine with social pro­cesses of an organiz­ational context, demand an extended theory that seeks to explain the current successes and failures of training systems and predicts the results of new actions. How­ever, such a study should avoid the immod­esty of presenting a grand theory that pretends to solve all prob­lems in the field. Nor can it inquire in depth into trainer behaviour and trainee background variables as age, gender, intelli­gence, culture, and previous educa­tion.

Corporate education provides intentionally designed learning situations aiming at the interactive effects of indi­vidual and organ­izational behaviour. Therefore, the curriculum design theory needed should not only incorpor­ate indica­tors for the develop­ment of curriculum materials, but also prescribe approaches that relate to the strategic issues of an organiz­ation, to structural feedback mechan­isms, as well as to the design of a work environ­ment that inhe­rently holds construc­tive educa­tional values.