| | September 20189Dynamic and Agile ImpactThe transformational impact we are now seeing that is a result of these EdTech trends are mostly centralized around user empowerment and today's mobile learner. Adopting technologies as tools designed to enhance or integrate a learner deeper into their subject matter using elements from the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence, augmented reality, and social learning can all influence pedagogy. Conversely, just as EdTech startups stand to have a great deal of influence on what and how technologies are managed and offered from within an organization, they must continually still be looking to find their place in an ever-evolving marketplace. The most successful startups will make concerted attempts and embrace the opportunity to work closely with organizations as to better inform their products, licensing, and desired outcomes. This further emphasizes each parties shared need for working more closely and openly with one another.Best PracticesAs an organization when looking to the EdTech market space for partnerships there are several areas that must readily be considered: · Strategy: Be mindful and strategic with how you integrate new services and technologies with existing systems and partnerships. You must always keep in mind the overall user experience and goals of the organization.· R&D: Designate the appropriate funds to try different solutions knowing that many will not be a good fit or fail all together; but empower those within the organization to experiment. Today's landscape makes spinning up or winding down a service far less invasive and costly than it once was.· Budget Planning: Forming a deep bench of vendor partnerships makes budget planning that much more important as you must factor in elements such as scalable pricing models and total return on investment (ROI) for the aggregate of service offerings.· Data security and portability: Organizations must consider data security and portability as EdTech startups eventually grow more successful, potentially merge with another vendor, or fail outright.· Market evolution: The market is always changing! Organizations must understand the business need(s)that are being met by a particular EdTech partnership first and foremost. This offers an organization the opportunity to consistently and objectively assess and educate themselves on the best path forward with each service and partnership.· Level-Set Expectations: In many cases, EdTech startups are not built to be or offer robust enterprise-level or -like experiences to an organization. Level-setting your expectations and understanding the market will help inform and better prepare each side for what to expect from one another.Looking AheadEdTech startups offer organizations a tremendous opportunity to create dynamic and agile environments for users to try new things and lean forward into areas that an organization alone may be unable to. However, it is the organizations responsibility to always keep in mind its user population and overall service footprint. While many EdTech startups are making it easier for organizations to create more diverse and multi-faceted service portfolios, ensuring that systems are efficiently integrated (i.e. single sign-on), data can flow between systems (if needed), and vendor management must remain a priority. All parties stand to benefit from today's technological landscape and take advantage of the dynamicity in an EdTech startup culture, as well as the power and continuity that often comes from with an organization. Knowing this, we must embrace the symbiotic relation between them given our shared need for successful integration and student learning. Organizations are often less likely to be looking for long-term, turn-key partnerships and instead for more targeted providers that will create a more diverse service footprintBrian Fodrey
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