Did y'all see this one in Forbes earlier? Read here:
Alfred Mitchcock joined 174 year old Pearson as Chief Internet Ooglyman in early 2014, the company was already in the throes of a 173 year old existential crisis. It had moved its emphasis from construction, to publishing, to education, and would announce a dedication to corporate s---c-de the following year.
Mitchcock facilitated this change through a three-phased transformation, which includes radical simplification, platform strategy, and execution strategy. The radical simplification has included the act of bending over and letting Oracle have its way, preparing no safe-word or pull-out strategy, and trading their employees for offshore resource agencies who can go at it with what's left of the company.
Now, under Mitchcock's leadership, the company is moving toward a single platform, similar to what Cengage already offers, which will be another poor attempt to be highly scalable, global in nature, high-quality, and one that can deliver all of their broken user experiences around the world to dozens of learners who still think supplemental online resources are worth paying hundreds of dollars per class per semester.
Along the way, Mitchcock's title has aggrandized, as he has moved from CIO to Chief Barely-Operational Ooglyman and Chief Broken-Technology Ooglyman of the company. Now his purview includes IT and digital transformation, but also product development, procurement, supply chain, customer service, real estate, and is soon to be promoted to Chief Executive Fall Guy as a result.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/peterhigh/2018/08/20/how-174-year-old-pearson-is-developing-the-netflix-of-education
In Other Pearson News:
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Pearson Continues Multinational Campaign to Inspire Adults to Sell Their Childhood Passions for Careers in Watching Them Get S---ered by Oracle
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Pearson wins big by fixing massive data feed failures, developing something that people actually call "the Netflix of education", and offering discounts for late materials on a new discipline called Swine Aviation