Students’ and Academics' Perception of Flexible Learning Tools in the South Asian Business Schools: A Case Study from Pakistan

Due to globalization and the COVID-19 pandemic, we have witnessed an increase in acceptability and substantial growth in the use of flexible learning and teaching pedagogy. According to the figures released by UNESCO, some 1.3 billion learners around the world were not able to attend school or university. With an astounding 1.53 billion students out of education and 184 country-wide school closures, it's impacted 87.6% of the world’s total registered students. This study seeks to provide insight into the most effective flexible pedagogical tool, especially in the context of South Asia Business Schools. Indeed, the use of resourceful pedagogical tools is vital in developing key 21st-century employability skills among business students. In order to ensure that organizations have the right skills to support and sustain their hard-earned success, and people have a relevant set of skills they need to be both employable and individually fulfilled. Since the global economy has made largely extinct the idea of a ‘job for life’. The new norm is employability for life. Given these facts, a single case study was selected for this study; an online university that provides flexible learning to students in Pakistan and overseas via satellite TV, moderate discussion boards, recorded lectures, and one-to-one with the tutors, was used as the case. The study critically reviewed students (the end users) and academics (the service providers') perspectives on the issue of pedagogical tools. Both data strands agreed that case studies, class debates, lectures, lecture notes, PowerPoint presentations, group projects, reading, homework, multiple-choice questions, essays, and term papers are effective flexible learning tools for the development of 21st-century skills or in gaining employability for life values.