I recently interviewed for a Director position with an online law school based out of a town near where I live. The position would require me to run the admissions process, do the marketing for the school, and do some of the curriculum development. At the first interview I met with the gentleman that essentially founded the school and developed the distance learning technology that the school uses. He told me all about how the school developed and that the mission was to teach law students how to actually practice law as opposed to just teaching abstract legal theory. What a novel concept!
I was on the edge of my seat as he as explaining the school, how it operated, and what the position entailed. I was hooked. Then he threw me a bit of a curve ball. He asked if I were to create a certificate program, how would I go about doing it, what would it look like, and how would I market it. I took a few moments to think.
I came up with a healthcare driven certificate program that crossed industries from healthcare to insurance to legal. I will not go into all the details, but I talked about how I would develop it through talking to HR departments and figuring out the exact skills they desire and then catering to those companies. I discussed how I would use my own contacts to both determine interest before development and market the program after launch. I also came up with the idea of doing cross-industry CLE classes to market the program to those outside the legal field but who occasionally deal with legal issues and would benefit from basic legal knowledge.
The interview ended well, and I was pretty happy. As I was driving home though, more thoughts flooded my brain about possible certificate programs. When I got home that evening I sent the person I interviewed with a thank-you email and included some of my new ideas including a tech based certificate program and a biotech certificate program. Apparently the ideas struck a chord because I got a second interview!
But, the second interview came with homework. I was asked basically the same question about developing a certificate program, but instead of actually developing an idea, they want to know how I would go about developing an idea – basically they want to know the thinking process as opposed to the end result. This was a bit harder, but doable.
First I wrote down my general working process – info gathering, info organizing, comparison, product development, refinement, redevelopment, launch, marketing, evaluation, refinement etc. I think wrote a list of people I would need to speak with a questions that I would need to ask. Then I delved deeper in to the actual process and figured out what exact steps I would take to create a program. Then I asked myself how would I go about fulfilling each step and wrote details about what specifically I would do. For example step 1 is to Determine the Need or Desire for a Certain Program. Some of the details I had for the step included: look at current events, compile info on other available programs, look at what industries are hiring by scouring job postings, work with companies who are hiring etc. I repeated the process for each step.
They also asked for how I would evaluate progress. I thought a timeline approach would work best. I would start with the ultimate launch date and work backward giving myself various deadlines to complete each stage of the project.
Overall, the “homework” was pretty intense, but it gave me good insight as to how my mind really works. It was a surprisingly enjoyable experience and I hope that I get to put these processes to use in the position at the school.
Delving into how your own mind functions takes gumption!
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