Launch an Applied AI Academy your workforce and community can use.
Why Your College or University Should Do This TODAY!
Let me take you back… and to the future… to the 5 recent and biggest tech revolutions. These technologies changed the nature of work and education and in fact changed everything. I was there at IBM with personal computers, at Motorola when everyone ended up with a PC in their pocket, and have been advising media companies to leverage social media, content marketing, and AI.
All new technologies follow this growth curve. AI is no different. What is this doing to businesses and organizations today? You can be the solution and grow with the Mass Adoption curve. The time to act is NOW! See my recent articles:
- Five Tech Revolutions. Everybody Doubted Them. Then They Took Over.
- The Future of Work Is Already Here – and It Wants Your Desk
Corporate and Community Education is uniquely positioned to help employers answer two immediate questions: Where can AI improve our work, and how do we prepare employees to use it safely? I recommend developing an Applied AI Workforce Academy—beginning with a disciplined, employer-led pilot.
Consulting for Florida colleges and universities
Launch an Applied AI Academy your workforce and community can use.
I help colleges turn AI interest into a practical, responsible, employer-validated program—one that equips faculty, students, staff, and local employers with usable skills while creating a sustainable continuing-education opportunity.
The opportunity
Employers need applied AI skills. Your college can be the trusted local provider.
Most regional employers do not need a theoretical introduction to artificial intelligence. They need people who can use AI thoughtfully to improve communication, research, operations, customer service, training, data work, and everyday productivity—without compromising privacy, judgment, or human accountability.
Meet workforce demand
Create accessible pathways for working adults, supervisors, entrepreneurs, public servants, and career-changing learners.
Strengthen the college
Build faculty confidence, clarify responsible-use practices, and connect AI learning to existing career and technical programs.
Generate sustainable value
Use open-enrollment workshops, employer cohorts, and customized training to create a scalable continuing-education portfolio.
A practical consulting engagement
Build an academy around local needs—not generic AI hype.
The work begins with listening: institutional leaders, faculty, workforce teams, economic-development partners, chambers, and employers. Together, we identify the occupations, workflows, and learner groups that should shape the first offerings.
- Assess institutional readiness, policies, capacity, and competitive positioning.
- Validate demand through structured conversations with employers and community partners.
- Design a branded academy portfolio with clear learner pathways and outcomes.
- Develop pricing, staffing, launch marketing, and a financial-sustainability plan.
- Establish outcome measures that connect training to adoption and workplace value.
A recommended pilot
Responsible AI for the Florida Workplace
A 12-hour, four-session academy for supervisors, office professionals, small-business owners, educators, and public-sector staff.
- AI literacy, limits, privacy, verification, and ethical decision-making.
- Practical workflows for writing, research, meetings, spreadsheets, communication, and planning.
- Sector-specific applications for your region and employer base.
- An implementation studio that produces a usable AI-assisted workflow and 30-day adoption plan.
What your academy can include
A three-level model for learners, employers, and the institution.
AI foundations for work
Short, approachable learning experiences that develop AI literacy, prompting, fact-checking, privacy awareness, and responsible use across job roles.
Applied AI by function
Focused tracks for business operations, marketing, human resources, education, healthcare administration, public service, public safety, and entrepreneurship.
AI implementation labs
Employer cohorts bring a real workflow, redesign it with appropriate human review, document results, and leave with a practical adoption plan.
How we launch
A focused process that can move from discovery to pilot.
Discover
Map existing assets, regional priorities, learner demand, employer needs, and institutional constraints.
Design
Create curriculum architecture, pilot formats, pricing logic, staffing needs, policies, and success measures.
Activate
Recruit charter employers and participants, prepare faculty and staff, and launch the first academy cohort.
Measure and scale
Document completion, satisfaction, use-case adoption, employer value, revenue, and the next sector tracks to develop.
Who this serves
Designed for the full local ecosystem.
Why work with me
Education-centered AI consulting with a community and workforce focus.
I bring together AI literacy, higher-education teaching, workforce-program thinking, research, communication, and implementation planning. The goal is a program that is credible to institutional leaders, useful to participants, and relevant to the employers your college serves.
This is not a one-size-fits-all technology presentation. It is a collaborative process for creating an academy your institution can own, market, measure, and grow.
Start the conversation
Ready to explore an Applied AI Academy for your institution?
Let’s discuss your workforce priorities, current AI activity, employer relationships, and the most useful first pilot for your community.
R. Michael Brown | Applied AI, education, workforce, and community-engagement consulting
Why R. Michael Brown LLC?
An Applied AI Academy requires more than enthusiasm for a new technology. It requires someone who understands how emerging tools become useful learning programs, how institutions build internal support, how learners gain practical skills, and how a strong initiative is communicated to students, faculty, employers, and the wider community.
R. Michael Brown brings more than two decades of experience at the intersection of technology, education, communications, media, marketing, and organizational change. His work has included helping major technology companies explain and apply new digital tools, developing curriculum and teaching in corporate and college settings, leading university partnerships, and building high-visibility programs that delivered measurable audience, enrollment, engagement, and revenue results.
Technology and Innovation Experience
Before today’s AI revolution, Michael worked at the leading edge of multimedia, digital communication, and web-enabled learning. At IBM, he helped pioneer multimedia communication, established IBM’s first multimedia studio, produced major presentations and educational materials, and served as a staff instructor for IBM Management School. He also worked as a lead speechwriter and multimedia producer for IBM CEO Lou Gerstner and authored IBM Press books on computer languages and multimedia.
At Motorola Solutions, Michael served as Global Multimedia Marketing Communications Manager, where he created global multimedia campaigns, produced web and media content for enterprise, government, and network audiences, and taught communication and multimedia courses through Motorola University. His work included support for the launch of Nextel, recognized by BusinessWeek as its “Product of the Decade,” as well as multimedia projects that reached national and international audiences.
This background matters for an Applied AI Academy because AI adoption is not only a technical issue. It is a learning, communication, implementation, and leadership issue. Michael has spent his career helping organizations translate complex, fast-changing technology into practical tools, compelling learning experiences, and real-world value.
Higher Education and Curriculum Leadership
Michael brings direct experience teaching, developing curriculum, and building education partnerships across corporate, college, university, and community settings.
- He currently teaches public speaking, speechwriting, and presentation production at Florida Atlantic University and South Florida State College, in both online and classroom settings.
- He previously developed and taught news writing, reporting, multimedia development, and broadcast journalism at Miami Dade College.
- At IBM Management School, he taught business communication, presentation, writing, and multimedia-development courses for approximately a decade.
- Through Motorola University, he taught communication and multimedia courses designed to help employees use emerging technologies effectively in their work.
- He developed applied multimedia curriculum for Full Sail University, bringing corporate technology and production expertise into career-focused higher education.
Just as important, Michael served as IBM’s University Relations Manager for communications. In that role, he helped establish bachelor’s and master’s degree programs in communication at Barry University for IBM employees – experience directly relevant to building partnerships among employers, universities, learners, and academic leadership.
Marketing, Media, and Major-Market Results
An academy must be well designed – but it also must be understood, trusted, and adopted. Michael’s career includes the strategic marketing, media, and communications experience needed to position an Applied AI Academy for faculty, students, employers, donors, trustees, and community partners.
At PulteGroup, he directed marketing and public relations for more than 80 Florida communities. His work increased qualified prospects from 70,000 to 300,000 and supported sales of more than 4,200 homes annually. He also built an in-house agency that reduced marketing cost per home sold from $7,400 to $1,200 while strengthening lead generation and sales support.
As Vice President of Marketing and Communications for My State MLS and Go Home TV, Michael led a digital-growth strategy that increased website traffic by 26 percent to 5.2 million page views and 879,000 monthly users. He expanded Facebook from fewer than 300 followers to 10,128, increased reach to 1.44 million, and helped launch and build the Go Home TV YouTube audience.
He has also led communications and community education initiatives for the Town of Palm Beach Civic Association, producing Palm Beach TV and This Week in Palm Beach, planning 24 to 27 programs annually, increasing membership 48 percent, and expanding social-media presence by 1,200 percent.
A Practical Partner for AI Readiness
R. Michael Brown LLC brings a distinctive combination of capabilities to the Applied AI Academy launch process:
- Technology perspective: Experience working with transformative technologies before they become familiar, mainstream tools.
- Education expertise: Hands-on teaching, curriculum development, faculty-facing instruction, and university partnership experience.
- Workforce relevance: A career spent connecting communication, technology, business needs, and practical skill development.
- Program leadership: Experience leading cross-functional initiatives, community programs, virtual learning transitions, and public-facing educational efforts.
- Audience development: Proven ability to turn strong ideas into understandable, engaging initiatives that attract participation and support.
- Responsible communication: A foundation in journalism, public communication, ethical messaging, and helping people make sense of complex change.
At Junior Achievement of the Palm Beaches, Michael helped transition an entire K–12 education organization to virtual delivery within two weeks during the COVID-19 school closures. The organization ultimately served 40,874 students—exceeding its annual goal of 25,500—and expanded social-media engagement by more than 3,200 percent. That experience reflects the kind of practical, adaptable leadership institutions need as they build meaningful AI-learning opportunities.
R. Michael Brown LLC can help your institution move from AI interest to AI capability—with a launch strategy grounded in education, workforce relevance, technology adoption, clear communication, and measurable engagement.
