Business leaders return to face-to-face learning

Following a sharp expansion in online formats during the coronavirus pandemic, the return to classroom-based executive education continues to gather pace.

A 2024 survey from Unicon, an alliance of university-based executive education providers, illustrates a clear swing back to campus. In open enrolment programmes, face-to-face delivery rose from 14 per cent of programmes in 2020-21 to 62 per cent in 2023-24. Custom courses followed a similar trajectory, increasing from 13 to 64 per cent.

“Human beings are social animals. Learning naturally seems more effective, more natural, more nuanced when in person,” says Melanie Weaver Barnett, Unicon’s executive director. 

While the pandemic normalised video-based instruction, business leaders are returning to campus not just for the content, but also for the company.

Human beings are social animals. Learning naturally seems more effective, more natural, more nuanced when in person

“We’re seeing a strong movement towards in-person, perhaps more than we expected,” says Louise Croft, managing director of executive education at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School. 

The UK school has added more on-campus open programmes this year, particularly in leadership, to meet growing demand.

Croft links the shift partly to changes in working patterns. With hybrid and remote teams now common, extended face-to-face interaction is less frequent — and executives are seeking the kind of peer dialogue that video calls rarely deliver.

Helen Beurier, chief people officer at UK-based consultancy Newton, is unequivocal. “No comparison,” she says of her time on the Senior Executive Programme at London Business School in 2023 — a four-week, in-person course. “Being physically present is an irreplaceable learning experience. It creates powerful social capital that lasts beyond the classroom,” she adds.

FT 2025 Executive Education Ranking

Read the rankings of custom and open-enrolment programmes

Online executive education was well established before the pandemic — but in 2020, the shift to virtual delivery accelerated out of necessity. What began as a workaround is now a permanent part of the mix.

According to Unicon, blended formats have held steady, making up 14 per cent of open and 19 per cent of custom programmes last year. Fully online delivery, though down from pandemic highs, still accounted for 24 per cent and 17 per cent respectively.

Marni Baker Stein, chief content officer at online education company Coursera, believes the apparent tug of war between modalities is overstated. 

“There has been a rebalancing after Covid,” she says. “But I think it’s a false dichotomy to say everyone is going back to the classroom.”

Executive learners, she notes, are not monolithic. Some prefer the depth of an immersive campus experience; others need the flexibility of online learning to manage demanding schedules. Many want a mix.

Still, online formats offer clear advantages: they reduce travel, lower delivery costs and often include content that can be revisited on demand.

However, a key challenge remains: replicating the peer interaction and informal exchange that have long distinguished in-person executive education.

Many training providers are responding with hybrid formats that aim to blend the best of both worlds. Duke Corporate Education’s chief executive, Sharmla Chetty, describes it as an opportunity to “expand access while elevating quality”, provided the learning design puts connection at its centre.

“Digital doesn’t dilute learning — it democratises it,” she argues.

That belief in the long-term role of digital delivery is echoed by others — even providers that have undergone significant restructuring.

2U, the online education company that filed for bankruptcy in mid-2024 and later relaunched as a private business, has continued to grow its executive course offerings. The company says enrolment has increased every year since 2022, with AI-related programmes up 650 per cent over the period. 

Anant Agarwal, 2U’s chief academic officer, insists the current moment is not a zero-sum battle between online and in-person learning. “What we’re witnessing is an expansion of learning options to meet diverse needs,” he says.

The return to the classroom is also raising expectations, as business schools face growing competition from online platforms, corporate academies and specialist consultancies.

At IMD in Switzerland, 70 per cent of open programmes now involve in-person components, up sharply from pandemic-era lows. The business school has moved many off-site modules into purpose-built classrooms with configurable spaces and team-based work areas.

“We’re doing less in hotels. You can’t just have a pop-up screen and a projector,” says David Bach, IMD’s president. “People want to be in a state-of-the-art learning environment.” At about SFr10,000 ($12,148) for a one-week programme on campus, IMD’s participants expect no less.

Most providers now view format less as a binary choice and more as a design question — with flexibility and credibility the key concerns.

While the classroom still excels at fostering connection, many providers see online formats as a way to reach broader, more diverse cohorts.

“Virtual learning can be scaled more quickly than in-person programmes, which are limited by campus space,” says Ellen Trader, vice-president of growth at Berkeley Executive Education in California. 

For Thomas Kuiper, director for Asia-Pacific at Intercap — a company offering businesses web addresses — a hybrid course format struck a workable balance.

He recently completed Insead’s Lead the Future programme, delivered primarily online with a three-day “capstone” in Fontainebleau near Paris. The digital component allowed him to revisit complex material at his own pace, while the in-person sessions offered the kind of peer connection video calls rarely deliver. 

“Personally, I don’t see fully in-person as competition for online learning,” he says. “Each form brings its own advantages.”