Applied Learning Theory in Silicon Valley

I decided to pursue a doctorate because I wanted to challenge myself intellectually, and invest time in thinking deeply about challenges in organizational learning and leadership. But I also had a great job at Google that I wasn’t going to walk away from. Penn GSE’s Chief Learning Officer Executive Doctorate was the only program that offered me the flexibility and support to do both.

Annie McKee, the program director, would often describe us as scholarly practitioners, and I think that’s right. The program was steeped in research and scholarship, but it was also practical for professionals like me, in leadership positions in the corporate and non-profit world. Our professors worked to make the content practical and applicable to our context, even when the subject matter seemed purely academic on the surface.

The program is what you make of it, and it allowed me to follow my interests and passions. While I was a student, I was living and working in Silicon Valley. For my dissertation, I followed nine startups as they evolved, struggled, adapted, and learned new skill sets to compete in a complex and dynamic environment. The end result was a qualitative and quantitative study that helped me build my data analysis skills. This is critical in Silicon Valley, where data is king.

 I used the program as a springboard to start my consulting firm. I can ground my recommendations in both the literature and industry best practice based on what I learned about research. When I’m doing instructional design work, I pull from my learning theory classes. I don’t think a day goes by that I don’t reflect on a nugget I took from Penn GSE.