The Milwaukee School of Engineering has created a Social Media for Business certification program to help engineering, business and technical professionals advance their social media skills, develop social business strategies and tailor their strategies to their companies’ needs.
MSOE partnered with 7Summits, a Milwaukee-based social business organization, to structure courses for the certification program. The courses will begin in September.
“We actually will be providing people with tools and skills that they can instantly apply in their organization,” said Dr. Kathy Faggiani, director of continuing studies and outreach at MSOE.
The certification program consists of three courses at three different levels. Faggiani describes level one as the foundational course for participants who specifically want to learn more about social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter and understand when and how to use advanced social media tools. Level two is designed for professionals who understand social media and who are interested in learning more about social media best practices and how to track social media performance. Level three provides participants tools to organize a social media strategy that reflects their business’ objectives and gives them hands-on experience in creating a draft of a particularly useful social media strategy.
“One of the really unique things about our program is that we married our very sound pedagogical approach with 7Summit’s hands-on expertise, so we could provide the best possible information for the people who sign up for the certificate program,” Faggiani said.
The courses are aimed at working professionals who need the credential and working knowledge of social media. Interested professionals can take all three courses. Professionals experienced with social media may skip the levels one and two to focus directly on developing a social media business strategy.
“We expect that those businesses who invest in their personnel and have them complete the certificate program will have a noticeable positive impact on their bottom line,” Faggiani said.
MSOE planned the certification program over a year and a half and collaborated with 7Summits after the company helped MSOE produce “Bridge,” a social media recruitment tool that allows current and prospective students to talk directly with admission counselors.
According to Faggiani, companies that don’t learn how to leverage social media risk falling behind the curve. This is where the university can step in.
“It’s so hard sometimes to know which of the trends that are out there in technology and business really have staying power and which ones are really valuable for industries to pursue,” Faggiani said. “I think that one of the roles that we can serve as a university is to help identify best practices in technology and business and share those with the business community.”
For registration information and course prices, visit http://bec.msoe.edu/social_media/.
