Bosses Learn Not to Be So #Clueless; C-Suite Executives Take Pricey Courses, Learn to Use Social Media

Bosses Learn Not to Be So #Clueless

C-Suite Executives Take Pricey Courses, Learn to Use Social Media

MELISSA KORN

Dec. 17, 2013 8:02 p.m. ET

Companies are sending executives to basic training to learn how the internet works, spending six-figure sums to help c-suite executives understand how people communicate online–and how not to talk about technology, Melissa Korn reports on the News Hub. Photo: bloodytyrants.com.

Boardroom commanders are being assigned to basic training.Fearful their companies will fall behind because top bosses don’t have a firm grasp of technology or digital media, senior managers are taking lessons on how the Internet works.

Some firms are pairing individual leaders with young mentors, while others are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to teach the entire c-suite how to use social tools that most of their entry-level employees use without a second thought.

The goal isn’t for the CEO to parse the difference between a “like” and “share” on Facebook or take a spin on the company Twitter TWTR -1.70% account, though that is covered, too. Rather, instructors and managers say, a basic understanding of the digital landscape helps leaders make better decisions about what to invest in, as well as how to talk about it.

In the past 18 months, teams of senior staffers from companies including American Express Co. AXP +0.18% , NYSE Euronext and PepsiCo Inc. have gone to the Manhattan classrooms of General Assembly, which offers courses in coding and product design, to learn how to analyze data and think like a tech entrepreneur. A two-day program can cost $60,000.

In a recent class, 22 senior managers at advertising agency Draftfcb Healthcare were asked to draw Facebook from memory as part of a lesson about user experience. One participant muttered that she had “no idea what Facebook looks like” as her colleagues laughed uncomfortably.

But they all managed to sketch the social-media site and then discussed how factors like color and clutter affect the user experience. Later, in a mobile-product session, participants used an iPad app to try on glasses virtually.

Lisa Dujat, the ad firm’s senior vice president and chief HR officer, likens the courses to “having prunes in your brownie”—fun but high-fiber—and says the sessions are crucial to keep the company current.

Mediabistro Inc., a media job board and training site, also offers short corporate-training programs for executives, mainly on-site at the client’s offices, to firms in media, consumer products, finance and hospitality. The sessions don’t just cover the basics of a Twitter feed. They put the service in context, explaining which strategies work and what a company’s competitors have done, says Gretchen VanEsselstyn, director of education.

Other companies ask young people to show them the ropes. Fifteen University of Miami students are mentoring executives in Citigroup Inc.’s Latin America unit on the lives and digital habits of millennials.

Ana Fernanda Ruiz, a senior finance and management-science major, says her mentee, a managing director, wanted to learn how to connect with younger clients and future employees. In monthly meetings, Ms. Ruiz has been addressing topics including how she and her friends make purchases on mobile devices.

Some senior managers simply need vocabulary lessons. Greg Verdino, an executive coach in Huntington, N.Y., tells of one former client, a financial-services manager, who was seeking a new job but stumbled in interviews when speaking of his ability to use “socmed”—an abbreviation he had created for “social media.” Recruiters were befuddled, Mr. Verdino says, adding that he taught the client new lingo.

Then there’s the senior marketing executive who tried too hard to prove his digital savvy, name-dropping social-media sites such as Dodgeball, a location-based networking service shuttered in 2009. “He looked clueless,” Mr. Verdino says.

Still other coaches have horror stories of clients who come in using the word “interwebs.”

At best, training efforts are designed to allow executives and, in turn, companies to keep pace with changing market conditions and customer needs.

“Ninety-nine percent of executives say [digital growth] is important, but only 10% of companies are satisfied with the speed at which they are making the transition,” says Michael Robson, general manager of General Assembly’s enterprise business.

Draftfcb Healthcare chose to invest in digital training after realizing that junior staffers’ new ideas weren’t getting much traction because bosses didn’t understand their tech-heavy proposals. Young workers felt “a little bit disenfranchised,” Ms. Dujat says.

Stephanie Walcoe, a vice president at financial advisory David Lerner Associates Inc., hired Sally Falkow to teach her team about the importance of online reputation after the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority filed complaints against the Syosset, N.Y.-based company in 2011.

David Lerner didn’t sell products online, so executives had paid little attention to the Web. But the flood of negative posts made Ms. Walcoe realize she needed a better handle on how Web searches affect customer choices.

Ms. Falkow, the CEO of Meritus Media Inc., explained search-engine optimization and showed the team other ways to neutralize negative headlines. The staff now regularly checks its search-engine results and takes action when bad results bubble up.

Ms. Walcoe, 48 years old, says she had a Facebook page at the time but “knew nothing about how the Internet worked.”