More professionals than ever are looking into online courses, including ones previously relegated to traditional classroom settings. Conventional wisdom once said that human skills like leadership and negotiation could not be learned online. However, this may no longer be the case. The Curve interviewed two online education experts at MIT about how educators and learners can improve the quality and efficacy of their next online course.

Finance is core to all business operations, but it isn’t the sole domain of MBA graduates and Wall Street analysts. All professionals benefit from strong finance understanding and capability as they make decisions, manage budgets, and work to advance new ideas and initiatives across their organizations.

Erica LeBlanc is the Global Sales Enablement Manager for Logi Analytics, a software company that offers integrated development environments for programmers to embed dashboards, visualizations, and analytics into software applications. Although LeBlanc has over a decade of sales enablement experience, and plenty of on-the ground negotiations practice, she was looking for a quick yet comprehensive way to brush up on the latest negotiation techniques from renowned experts in the field.

Remote work tips and tricks for managers and employees from MIT Open Learning and beyond. Between 2005 to 2017, the United States' workforce saw a 159% increase in remote work. Despite this general trend, many organizations and their employees were not prepared to make their workplaces completely remote. As working from home became a mandatory step for companies across the United States to reduce the spread of COVID-19, you may have found yourself scrambling to align with scattered colleagues, or attempting to balance your newly-entangled work and home life.

New technologies are giving rise to new jobs and redefining the tasks of many more. Companies around the world and across all industry sectors are trying to capture the potential for growth and adopt new technologies in their business models to remain competitive in today’s dynamic markets.

In the mid-1960s, Ford Motor Company had an audacious plan: not only to enter the professional car racing circuit, but to defeat Italy’s Ferrari racing powerhouse. To achieve that goal at 24 Hours at LeMans, the most prestigious European endurance race, Ford hired two American racing legends, Carroll Shelby and Ken Miles. This story is captured in the current Oscar-nominated movie, Ford vs. Ferrari.

Resources you should bookmark for the next time you're ready to throw the iPad out of the window. As more employers institute remote work policies and more schools dismiss classes due to COVID-19 concerns, working parents may find themselves at home with their kids during the day. If your kids are usually glued to YouTube or a Nintendo Switch during downtime, finding engaging ways for them to learn at home can be especially challenging. Luckily, MIT offers tons of free online educational resources for parents who are looking for enriching (and fun!) at-home activities.

Former NFL Linebacker Ryan Nece is no stranger to negotiation. Whether it's with his 3-year old son ("He beats me every time," says Nece) or negotiating on behalf of his venture capital firm, Next Play Capital. Despite all of this day-to-day negotiation practice, Nece felt that he was missing formal training. So, he decided to participate in MIT xPRO's online negotiations course, Negotiating to Create Value: The Mutual Gains Approach. We sat down with Mr. Nece to discuss his online learning experience, and how athletes and executives alike can benefit from the Mutual Gains Approach (MGA).

The quantum computing revolution could empower companies and entire industries to solve previously intractable problems. As investment in quantum technology grows and tech giants vie for quantum advantage, demand for professionals with foundational quantum computing knowledge and hands-on quantum experience has never been higher.

Things are changing at Ford. The rise of “the smart car” has spurred customer demand for automation, electric vehicles, and other intelligent automotive features. To keep up with the rapid pace of change in the industry, the 116-year-old auto giant has had to make significant shifts in its portfolio of vehicles – eschewing the sedan in North America, while launching new SUVs and crossovers. New variants and features have required a more rigorous systematic approach across all engineering functions. To improve efficiency, lower variable costs, and reduce error as it launched a new portfolio of products, Ford improved its Systems Engineering (SE) approach in three key ways: