A business school case study serves as a spectacular educational innovation that reflects the greatest challenges and problems that confront leading companies, non-profitable organizations, and even government enterprises. At the same time, the particular case study contains an incomplete data that can occur in real business situations with a goal to stimulate or enhance student’s decision-making. Therefore, due to the dynamic process of sharing ideas, defending own points of views, and relying on the specific skills or experience, the business school case study provides students with an opportunity to analyze the relevant issues, exercise judgment, and make difficult decisions.
To begin with, the discussed case study relates to LinkedIn and the potential disruption of the educational landscape, especially concerning the fact of the LinkedIn’s recognition as the largest professional social network across the world. For instance, over 400 million individuals from more than 200 countries are active members of this website; what is more, the various professionals are joining the certain website at a significant rate of two new members each second. In addition, there are approximately 39 million students as well as the recent graduates from colleges and universities who compose the fastest-growing group in LinkedIn. On the other side, the company decided to acquire Lynda.com, a popular online education company, that offers thousands of video courses related to software, creative, or, business skills. The mentioned company deals with the production of video tutorials that are conducted by the industry experts in the relevant fields; for example, nowadays, there are almost 6,300 courses on the different topics as well as 270.000 videos that can be viewed from all available Web browsers, smartphones, or tablets.
Thus, the purchase of Lynda.com for about $1.5 billion is regarded as the largest purchase in LinkedIn’s history and even the fourth-largest operation ever in social media, that promotes an unexpected company’s entrance into the market of the educational technologies. However, it remains necessary to determine the major goals of such an acquisition, especially considering the fact that there are two possible reasons: the discussed purchase is a specific sign of the Internet bubble in the Silicon Valley or the intention to become a leading actor in the education domain. Finally, this case study presents the strategic dimension connected with the Linkedin’s purchase of Lynda.com from various perspectives. This means that one of its main key learning objectives is to analyze the influence of such an operation on the company’s corporate strategy and assess the potential synergies of both organizations. At the same time, the students of business schools are predicted to examine the value-creating systems of these organizations, including the determination of the various stakeholders, the relationships among them, and their roles.
In conclusion, a business school case study seems to be the most appropriate method to prepare students to the potential challenges and the other important issues regarding leadership. Such claim can be proved by the fact that students play a role of the decision-maker who is obliged to determine the existing problems and propose the relevant solutions.
This article has been written by WorldEssays.com writers.
References
Kessler, Z. (2016). Education looms big in shared dreams of LinkedIn, Microsoft. The Seattle Times. Retrieved from http://www.seattletimes.com/business/microsoft/education-looms-big-in-shared-dreams-of-linkedin-microsoft/
Lunden, I. (2016). LinkedIn doubles down on education with LinkedIn Learning, updates desktop site. Tech Crunch. Retrieved from https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/22/linkedin-doubles-down-on-education-with-linkedin-learning/
MacMillan, D. (2015). LinkedIn to Buy Career-Skills Educator Lynda.com for $1.5 Billion. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from https://www.wsj.com/articles/linkedin-to-buy-career-skills-educator-for-1-5-billion-1428583116
Michel, S. (2016). Will LinkedIn Learning Disrupt the Education Landscape. IMD. Retrieved from http://www.imd.org/research/publications/education-publications-case-studies/2964/will-linkedin-learning-disrupt-the-education-landscape
Schaffhauser, D. (2016). What a Microsoft-Owned LinkedIn Means for Education? Campus Technology. Retrieved from https://campustechnology.com/articles/2016/06/20/what-a-microsoft-owned-linkedin-means-for-education.aspx