Hiding in Plain Sight: Why Your Online Program's Success Has Nothing to Do with Technology
The critical success factor every online education leader can see but no one wants to discuss.
One of the most critical factors in online education success is hiding in plain sight, and that's exactly where we prefer to leave it. It's easier to blame technology limitations, budget constraints, or market conditions than to confront the uncomfortable truth: sustainable success depends less on the systems we build and more on the relationships we cultivate. Yet relationship-building rarely appears in strategic plans because it's messy, unmeasurable, and requires leaders to be vulnerable.
In my career, I've learned that technology platforms can be replicated, course design can be copied, and marketing strategies can be shared, but the relationship ecosystem that drives sustainable success cannot be purchased or outsourced.
The Uncomfortable Reality We're Avoiding
This is a topic that no one is openly talking about, or if they do it’s at a water cooler or in private. Across higher education, there's a pervasive divide that weakens our collective ability to serve students effectively. Faculty versus "the" administration. Institutions versus vendors. Less-resourced departments versus more-resourced departments. These divisions aren't just organizational culture issues, they're relationship failures that directly impact our ability to deliver quality online education.
We've convinced ourselves that online education success is primarily about technology and pedagogy. We invest millions in Learning Management Systems, hire instructional designers, and develop sophisticated course materials. These elements matter, but they're table stakes. What separates thriving programs from struggling ones isn't the sophistication of their technology stack—it's the strength of their leadership relationship system.
The reason we don't talk about this openly is simple: it requires us to acknowledge that success depends more on our ability to connect with people than our ability to master systems. It demands vulnerability, emotional intelligence, and the uncomfortable work of building trust across organizational boundaries. It's far easier to blame external factors than to examine whether we've created an environment where people feel valued, heard, and essential to the mission. One more thing, it also requires you to look in the mirror.
Let us examine intentional relationship-building across five critical dimensions: establishing trust as your operational foundation, making every role feel mission-critical, building communication that flows in all directions, using disagreements to strengthen rather than weaken connections, and maintaining personal connection as programs scale.
The Relationship Foundation: Why Trust Accelerates Everything Else
Trust isn't just nice to have, it's the operating system that allows every other initiative to run efficiently. In online education, where faculty and staff may work remotely and students never set foot on campus, trust becomes even more critical to sustainable success.
The Speed of Trust in Online Operations
When trust exists between team members, decision-making accelerates dramatically. Instead of lengthy email chains seeking approval or consensus, trusted team members can move forward knowing their colleagues (and leaders) will support their judgment. Problems get solved through quick conversations rather than formal meetings. Implementation happens faster because people aren't second-guessing each other's motives or competence.
Building Trust Through Vulnerability
Leaders who want to build trust must model the vulnerability they expect from others. This means being transparent about challenges, uncertainties, and mistakes.
One of the simplest yet most powerful trust-building tools I've used is a four-question weekly survey sent to staff every Friday afternoon.
Question 1 (likert scale of 1-10): “How was your week?”
Question 2 (open ended) “What was your biggest challenge?”
Question 3 (open ended) “What was your biggest win?”
Question 4 (open ended) “How can we improve?”
This takes two minutes to create in Microsoft Forms and can be sent through a weekly meeting invite. The leader reviews results Monday morning, and addresses critical issues that day. This immediacy of action creates space for real conversation about actual experiences rather than assumptions about how things are going.
Leaders can also send “weekly highlight” emails to staff, sharing both wins and challenges openly. This transparency creates psychological safety—when people see that struggles are acknowledged rather than hidden, they're more likely to share their own challenges before they become crises.
The Compound Effect
Small, consistent relationship investments create exponential returns over time. The leader who walks to someone's office for a five-minute conversation instead of sending an email builds a lot more trust than one who relies solely on email or Teams messages. These moments seem insignificant individually, but they compound into the foundation that supports everything else.
When team members trust each other, they're more likely to share innovative ideas, admit when they need help, and collaborate across departmental boundaries. They're also more resilient during difficult periods because they know they're not facing challenges alone.
But trust alone isn't enough. As a leader you need to ensure every person understands exactly how their role contributes to the success of the team.
Making Every Role Feel Mission-Critical
Every person, from instructional designers to technical support staff, must understand how their specific contribution directly impacts student success and be able to articulate that in terms of winning. This isn't about inflating egos or creating false importance through unearned praise, it's about helping people see the genuine connection between their daily work and the institutional mission.
Moving Beyond Job Descriptions
Job descriptions tell people what to do, but they rarely explain why it matters. Effective leaders connect daily tasks to institutional mission and success in concrete, specific ways. Instead of saying "You are an admissions counselor," try "You're the first person who helps prospective students see themselves as part of our community." Or alternatively, you can state the obvious business case, “the more students we enroll, the more resources we have to grow and support the institution's mission.” We do not like to talk about revenue in higher education, but “no margin - no mission.”
The "Mission-Critical" Conversation
While these conversations can happen in group settings or through email, I prefer getting coffee off-site with staff members every six months. It does not need to be fancy, you can start with three questions: What's working well for you? What's not working? What do you want to accomplish in the next six months?
These conversations serve multiple purposes. They demonstrate that leadership values individual perspectives, they provide early warning about potential problems, and they create space for people to articulate their own goals and aspirations. Most importantly, they allow leaders to help staff members see how their personal goals align with institutional success.
Recognition That Resonates
Generic appreciation doesn't build the sense of being mission-critical. Effective recognition connects specific actions to specific outcomes.
Some examples include sharing year-over-year improvements in enrollment in institution-wide forums. Celebrate positive comments and results from student support services with your whole department. When a formerly resistant faculty member adopts best practices, acknowledge that transformation with your instructional design staff. Share students' personal stories of academic and personal success, connecting them to the specific staff members who contributed to those outcomes.
This type of recognition accomplishes something that generic appreciation cannot: it helps people understand the direct impact of their work on real human lives. When staff members can see how their efforts contribute to student success, they naturally become more invested in continuous improvement and innovation.
When people feel essential, they naturally want to communicate and collaborate more effectively. This creates the opportunity to build relationships that flow in every direction.
Building Relationships Up, Down, and Across
Effectively supporting online students requires communication that transcends traditional hierarchical boundaries. The siloed thinking that might work in traditional academic structures becomes a liability when trying to serve online students who expect seamless, integrated experiences.
The Three-Directional Model
Most organizations focus primarily on downward communication—leaders informing their teams about decisions and expectations. But sustainable online education success requires communication that flows upward, downward, and laterally across departmental boundaries.
Upward Relationship Building involves more than managing up—it requires becoming a trusted advisor to senior leadership. This means providing context, not just updates. Instead of reporting "Enrollment is down 15% in Program X," provide context: "Enrollment is down 15% in Program X, but we’re seeing greater traction in Program Y and have already shifted marketing dollars to build on that interest."
Effective upward relationship building also involves understanding senior leadership's broader challenges and pressures. When you can connect your online education initiatives to institutional priorities like revenue diversification, market differentiation, or student success metrics, you transform your role from service provider to strategic partner.
Downward Relationship Building becomes particularly challenging in contexts where authority is often limited and front line staff do not feel a sense of ownership. Creating psychological safety for innovation and problem-solving requires consistent demonstration that good ideas are valued regardless of their source and that failures are learning opportunities. As Zig Ziglar said, “Failure is an event, not a person.”
Regular one-on-ones become essential for developing future leaders within your team. These conversations should focus not just on current projects but on professional development, career aspirations, and leadership skill-building. When team members see that their growth matters to you personally, they invest differently in both their own development and the team's success.
Lateral Relationship Building might be the most critical and most neglected aspect of online education leadership. Breaking down silos between departments requires intentional effort to create informal communication channels and build alliances that support institutional goals rather than departmental interests. As previously mentioned, a 5-minute in-person conversation goes a lot farther than a chain of emails.
Practical Implementation
Regular cross-functional meetings should focus on relationship building as much as information sharing. Start these meetings with personal check-ins, rotate leadership responsibilities, and ensure that every participant has opportunities to contribute meaningfully to discussions.
Joint problem-solving sessions across departments create opportunities for collaborative relationship building while addressing real challenges. When departments work together to solve actual problems, they build trust and understanding that transfers to future interactions.
Using Disagreements to Strengthen Relationships
Online learning touches almost every piece of the university, conflict is inevitable. But if it is handled well, it can actually strengthen the relationship ecosystem. The key is reframing conflict from relationship damage to relationship deepening opportunity.
Climbing the Ladder of Alignment
I like to use the metaphor of a ladder when thinking about organizational alignment. Each rung represents a different level of goals, with higher rungs representing broader organizational objectives. When people disagree at lower rungs—specific tactics or implementation details—effective leaders help them climb higher to find shared purpose.
For example, faculty might resist a new technology platform (low rung), but they share the goal of student success (high rung). Instead of forcing compliance with the technology decision, effective leaders facilitate conversations about how various approaches might serve the shared goal of student success. This often leads to better implementation strategies and stronger buy-in.
The "Best Idea Wins" Culture
Creating environments where disagreement is welcomed requires consistent demonstration that the source of an idea matters less than its quality. This cultural shift doesn't happen overnight and it requires leaders to actively seek out dissenting opinions, reward people who identify problems, and visibly change course when better ideas emerge.
When junior staff members see that their insights can influence major decisions, they become more invested in institutional success. When senior leaders acknowledge when they've changed their minds based on new information, they model the intellectual humility that makes innovation possible.
Conflict Navigation Framework
Below are some key tenants to keep in mind when navigating the inevitable conflict.
Assume Positive Intent: Start every disagreement from the belief that everyone wants the institution to succeed. This assumption changes how you interpret resistance or criticism. Instead of hearing "This won't work" as obstruction, you can hear it as "I'm concerned about potential problems" and respond with curiosity rather than defensiveness.
Focus on Outcomes, Not Positions: Move conversations from "I'm right" to "What's best for students?" This shift requires discipline, especially when you feel strongly about your position. But it opens space for creative solutions that might not have been visible when everyone was defending their original ideas.
Create Learning Moments: Use disagreements to understand different perspectives rather than just to advocate for your own. Ask questions like "Help me understand your concerns" or "What would need to be true for this approach to work?" These questions demonstrate genuine interest in understanding rather than just winning.
Document and Share Resolutions: Turn conflict resolution into organizational learning by documenting how disagreements were resolved and what insights emerged. This creates institutional memory and helps future teams navigate similar challenges more effectively.
Maintaining Connection as Programs Grow
As online programs expand, the challenge isn't just operational scaling—it's relationship scaling. The informal conversations and personal connections that work well with small teams become difficult to maintain as organizations grow, yet they remain essential to sustained success.
The Intimacy Challenge
Maintaining personal connection as teams grow requires intentional system design. You can't rely on organic relationship building when teams begin to grow. Instead, you need to create structures that facilitate personal connection while accommodating larger scale.
This might mean organizing work around smaller, cross-functional teams rather than large departmental structures. It could involve creating regular rotation opportunities so people work with different colleagues over time. It definitely requires leadership attention to relationship dynamics rather than just task completion.
Systems That Support Relationships
Technology and processes should enhance rather than replace human connection. Automated systems can handle routine communications, freeing up time for meaningful conversations. Project management tools can increase transparency, reducing the need for status update meetings and creating more space for strategic discussions.
The goal is to use systems to eliminate relationship friction rather than replace relationships.
Scaling Strategies
Relationship Systems include mentorship programs that pair new hires with experienced team members, creating immediate connection points for newcomers. Cross-departmental projects should be designed to build relationships while accomplishing work goals. These relationships then serve as informal communication channels that supplement formal reporting structures.
Communication Rhythms need to scale across the organization while preserving the intimacy that makes them effective. Consistent one-on-ones might move from monthly to quarterly as teams grow, but they shouldn't disappear entirely. All-hands meetings can maintain institutional connection, but they should be supplemented with small group sessions that preserve opportunities for genuine dialogue.
Cultural Preservation becomes critical as organizations grow. This requires documenting and sharing success stories, training new leaders in relationship-building approaches, and creating traditions and rituals that reinforce connection across the organization.
Building Your Leadership Relationship System
Solid technology and pedagogy are a prerequisite, relationships are the differentiator. Everyone must feel essential to institutional success. Communication must flow in all directions, not just down hierarchical lines. Conflict, handled well, strengthens rather than weakens relationships. And relationship systems must be designed to scale with organizational growth.
These aren't just nice principles. They're requirements for sustainable online education success. When people feel valued, heard, and connected to meaningful work, they contribute differently to institutional goals. They innovate more readily, collaborate more effectively, and persist through challenges with greater resilience.
Your Next Steps
Start with a relationship audit of your online education team. Map the current connections between key players and identify gaps where stronger relationships could improve collaboration and outcomes. This isn't about organizational charts. It's about understanding where trust exists, where communication flows easily, and where friction slows down progress.
Identify one person in each direction—up, down, and across—to strengthen your connection with over the next month. This doesn't require major time investment, just intentional attention to relationship building rather than task completion.
Implement one new communication rhythm that builds rather than just informs. This might be the weekly survey mentioned earlier, monthly coffee meetings, or quarterly cross-departmental problem-solving sessions. The specific format matters less than the commitment to consistent relationship investment.
The Human Competitive Advantage
We all love the disruption and innovation buzzwords, but the most powerful competitive advantage remains fundamentally human: the ability to build and maintain relationships that enable extraordinary collective achievement. Your online education program's success depends less on your Learning Management System and more on your leadership relationship system.
The technology will continue to evolve. New platforms will emerge, existing systems will be upgraded, and entirely new approaches to online education will be developed. But the fundamental human need for connection, trust, and meaningful contribution will remain constant.
The institutions that recognize this reality and invest accordingly will build sustainable competitive advantages that can't be purchased, copied, or disrupted by technological change. They'll create environments where talented people want to work, where innovation flourishes naturally, and where student success becomes the inevitable result of aligned, committed, and connected teams.
The most critical factor in your success is hiding in plain sight, waiting for leaders brave enough to acknowledge that sustainable success has always been fundamentally human.