1. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 1/7
M
Michael Korcuska, LinkedIn’s vice president of
management for learning: "Our primary focus is
really on lifelong learning. … a four-year degree is
superhelpful in launching your career, but it's not
enough to sustain your career."
TECHNOLOGY
How LinkedIn Views Its Role in
Education
By Jeffrey R. Young MARCH 21, 2016
any higher-education
leaders are watching
LinkedIn closely these
days.
On the one hand, colleges are big
users of the professional social
network, setting up university pages
and encouraging graduates to set up
profiles to get jobs. But some
officials are also wary of how much
the company plans to move into
education, especially after it
purchased the online-course library
Lynda.com last year.
A year has now passed since that
acquisition, and the company’s plans for the service are coming into sharper
focus. To find out what those plans look like, The Chronicle spoke with Michael
Korcuska, LinkedIn’s vice president of management for learning. The interview
has been edited and condensed for clarity.

2. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 2/7
Q. LinkedIn paid $1.5 billion for Lynda.com, and that's a pretty hefty price tag.
Why is this video library worth that much to a social network for professionals?
A. We think there's a lot of opportunity in marriage between LinkedIn and Lynda,
and the main thing is, we have a large professional audience who need to keep
their skills up to date. We believe Lynda has the highest quality professional-
training content in the marketplace. And we think by bringing that learning
offering and being able to distribute it to LinkedIn's professional network, there
will be a lot of benefit.
Q. Is this just the beginning of course offerings from LinkedIn?

3. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 3/7
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A. We will be investing in expanding the library of courses, with a particular focus

4. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 4/7
this year on IT and technology topics. We believe that there's a lot of opportunity
to better distribute those offerings with integrations to LinkedIn. That's an area
where I think LinkedIn can be more efficient and effective than a smaller
company like Lynda could be.
Q. Facebook has the social graph, and LinkedIn has been talking about building
what it calls the "economic graph," but I'm a little unclear what exactly that
means. Could you sketch a vision for this larger effort that LinkedIn is doing?
A. The basic notion of the economic graph is that we want to build a digital
representation of the economy: a profile for every member; an electronic profile
for every company; a list of all the jobs, full time, part time, temporary,
permanent, that are available; all the skills that are needed to get those jobs, as
well as the skills that our members have; all the vocational institutions that can
provide those skills, whether those are formal higher-education institutions or
providers like Lynda.com; and then finally all the knowledge our members have
and are willing to share. We believe by representing that digitally, we can help
people find careers more quickly, help companies find positions more quickly,
and make the economy more efficient over all, and even improve GDP.
Q. So you could affect the entire country’s wealth somehow?
A. Yeah, we believe that that's possible. That's a long-term vision. We're talking 10
years out. We're not near to achieving that. We've made progress, but yes, I think
if you take friction out of the economy in that way and help companies fill their
jobs more quickly, people get into positions where they're more fulfilled and more
effective. So that yes, it will improve economic well-being. One of those pillars is
skills, and that's a large part of why LinkedIn acquired Lynda. It's a great business
opportunity for us, but in terms of fulfilling our vision, that's a pillar where Lynda
fits squarely.

5. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 5/7
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Q. This is obviously a powerful place to sit, as unique a data set as any of these
social networks end up being. You mentioned the country and the economy,
the big frame. What if, though, the person's best educational path might be
through some other brand of education, either formal college or some other
network? Lynda is your preferred choice, so doesn't that limit what you're
suggesting, in a way?
A. First of all, those educational
institutions are already using Lynda
and incorporating it into their
programs. And the spending on
education is huge worldwide. Even
at scale, we don't believe we're
going to be the only answer to
people's educational needs. At some
point, it could be that there is a
marketplace for learning offerings
on LinkedIn, especially when Lynda
doesn't meet the needs of particular
students. Just a really simple
example: Today we have courses in
English, Spanish, German, and
French, and a few in Japanese. If
you're sitting in Russia and you want to take these courses, and your first
language is Russian, we don't have much to offer you.
Q. So going back to this idea of data, the economic graph, and how you could be
in a unique position as an education provider. Netflix makes its own shows
now, and people have noted that it obviously knows a lot about what its users

6. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 6/7
like; it can tailor its shows to what people seem to like. Does that mean
LinkedIn might do something similar with building courses based on what it
knows the educational needs are of users — the same idea?
A. Very insightful question. The integration between Lynda and LinkedIn goes two
ways. We've already talked about offering Lynda courses to our LinkedIn
members based on what we know about their career trajectories, but we can also
look at skills that seem to be in demand based on data we have on LinkedIn and
use that to inform the catalog of what we want to build for Lynda.
Q. Is that happening already, do you think it might?
A. It's happening already.
Q. Can you give a concrete example?
A. I don't have a specific example to share today. We see in job postings where
new skills are mentioned. There's other ways of getting that information, but we
think this is an interesting input to building out our course catalogs.
Q. Is this a new kind of competition for higher education? Should colleges be a
little worried about this mammoth new education player?
A. I don't think they should be worried. They're already using our offerings to
make themselves more efficient and make their learning more effective for their
students, so I think that would help make higher education more accessible and
more affordable for more people. Everybody shares that goal. Our primary focus
is really on lifelong learning. You and your readers know that the lifetime of skills
gets shorter and shorter as time passes, and that a four-year degree is
superhelpful in launching your career, but it's not enough to sustain your career.
We see Lynda as primarily focused today on helping professionals stay at the top
of their field, not as a substitute for a four-year degree.

7. 3/22/2016 How LinkedIn Views Its Role in Education - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/How-LinkedIn-Views-Its-Role-In/235788/?key=hK2DAll6zpYc58kxs_vYY6Ze6LcBIHTYB1LfZtfu9cwyVGZzTkdzUjlHS2N3UThQcFh... 7/7
Jeffrey R. Young writes about technology in education and leads the Re:Learning
project. Follow him on Twitter @jryoung; check out his home page, jeffyoung.net;
or try him by email at jeff.young@chronicle.com.
Join the conversation about this article on the Re:Learning Facebook page.
This article is part of:
Mapping the New Education Landscape
Copyright © 2016 The Chronicle of Higher Education