Customer Service in Colleges and Hospitality

In his book Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business,  Danny Meyer makes an important distinction between services and hospitality that should be considered and employed. On page 65 he wrote “Understanding the difference between service and hospitality has been at the foundation of our success. Service is the technical delivery of the product. Hospitality is how the delivery of the product makes the recipient feel. …Hospitality which most distinguishes our restaurants – and ultimately any business – is the sum of the thoughtful, caring, gracious things of staff does to make you feel we are on your side when you are dining with us.”

Granted he is talking about running a restaurant but the same distinction applies to running a successful school. Danny Meyers is looking to have his clients come back to his restaurant again and again and tell others about what great service and hospitality they received to get others to come. And we are working to keep our students coming back to our classes and school until the graduate and become active donors.

Some schools do a good job of delivering services in the classroom and in the offices but they do not always do so with hospitality. Meyers refers to service as a monologue in which the restaurant decides what and how it will deliver the technical services such as the menu, preparing the meals and even serving them to the table. But he says that hospitality is a dialogue that includes the customer. “Hospitality on the other hand, is a dialogue. To be on the guest’s side requires listening to that person with every sense and following up with a gracious, appropriate response.”

Schools focus so very much on the service side that they often forget about their need to be hospitable as well. They forget to listen to their clients and hear what they need to be able to provide hospitality. This is in part because schools do not focus on the difference between being service providers and being hospitable to their students. They perceive what they think is a problem but do not check with the students to see how to solve it if they even see the problem in service delivery at all. They go about readjusting the service without regard to whether or not the solution is one that the clients feel will work or even with the input of the client students. They leave out the hospitality part.

An example. We recently completed a campus service excellence audit for a large university in which we checked every aspect of service and hospitality on campus which included talking with hundreds of students. We discovered that the school felt it had a problem with its billing process. Students had to wait in long lines to make payments and they were none too happy about it. So the school decided to change its service in a way that really backfired. They closed the office and made all students do their bill paying on line.

Theoretically this could have improved the service but the school did not talk to the students to see how closing the office would change the feeling of hospitality that the students would feel with the closure bed not being able to see a person on such an important matter as making sure their bills were processed correctly. The students hated the closing of the office. Even if the service could have been made better and with no lines by payments ion line, they did not like losing the person to person contact in such an important activity. They felt they were closed out of the office rather than being helped with an improved service. They felt as if their needs were not being met and the new service was anything but hospitable especially since the door was blocked with a large wooden drop of box where they were to leave paper checks if they did not want to do on line bill pay.

When the school made the decision to improve the service they did not talk with the students at all and the result was not good.  Here is an excerpt from our executive summary from our customer excellence audit and report that further explains the misjudgment in service that led to a real feeling of a loss of hospitality too.

The Treasurer’s Office (which is the current name for the Bursar’s Office) elicited many negative comments from students. They uniformly do not like the fact that the entrance to the office has been shut off to them by a unit in which they are asked to just drop off payments by check. They do not like having to just drop off a payment with no way of verifying that the check has been received and no receipt provided. They want to be able to get a receipt for their payments since there have also been problems with the posting of payments in time to avoid late fees. They also want to be able to interact with someone when they have to discuss payments and late fees which they feel are excessive and set up in a manner to cause extra payments to the University as a result of late fees which they believe are caused by the University’s approaches to billing and some bill paying issues online.

“They want to interact with someone.” That is the essence of hospitality. The ability to have that dialogue even when doing a mundane activity as paying a bill is a simple act of hospitality and not just a delivery of a service. Hospitality is a two way street and the students need to have that two way if they are to feel as if the college cares about them and their needs. Simple delivery of service is not enough.

Another example is in the classroom. The teacher may deliver the information and get through the material and thus provide a service to the students. In fact this is one of the most important services as school provides. But if the students do not feel as if they have an opportunity to have a dialogue about the material and to be recognized as people and not just numbers in a classroom hospitality is not exercised. In fact, when we provide customer excellence and hospitality seminars for faculty we go over the issue and provide the following scenario to start a class to improve in-class hospitality.

·         The professor greets the students

·         Asks how they are and listens for response

·         Reviews past class highlights and asks if there is any need to clarify any

·         Asks for questions or issues from the last class

·         Introduces the topics for the day and

·         After the class ends is the last one out the door to make sure that if any students have

·         questions or look confused she can help them right then and now.

·         We also teach the faculty how to get the students’ names since hospitality does call on developing a name to name rapport with the students. They are not just “whatshisname:” after all.

·         Finally we assure that office hours are actually being met. That is where the dialogues from the classroom really take place and if the office hours are not met, hospitality between faculty and student is lost.

But key to all of developing hospitality is actually entering into a dialogue with students and listening to their issues and concerns. Very few schools so this. They just go ahead and focus on services and forget that hospitality is the key to developing a long range engagement and relationship with their students. It is important to listen to students; to encourage them to enter into that dialogue on what makes them feel wanted on campus and what does not.  This is what we do as part of the campus service audits we perform for schools but it is something you can do also. To not just provide services but real hospitality.

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The author of the article is Dr. Neal Raisman the president of NRaisman & Associates, the leader in training, workshops and research on increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that seek to work with them.We increase your success

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Commuters and Customer Service - A Good Brochure

While giving a workshop on academic customer service at Liberty University I came across a vibrant institution that had already instituted some good customer service activities’ based on some workshop that some of their retention people  had attended. One of the things I found that I found quite notable was a Liberty University Commuters Handbook which provided this important segment of its population information it would find valuable and useful.

Too many schools focus on their on campus population and forget that that a significant part of their student body does not love on campus but commutes to it every day. This is an error since they are leaving out a large position of their student body from some of the benefits and services they deserve. Granted the students living off campus often consume fewer customer services except for the perennial problem of parking but that is not a reason to forget them.

The Liberty University brochure does not overlook them but extends some very helpful information to them for us on and off campus.

The brochures paid for by selling ads in it seems focused a great deal on the information needed to move into an apartment and the rights and regulations they must know to protect themselves. It begins by introducing them to the office of commuter affairs and lets them know they have a contact and liaison if they need one in their living situation.

It also has maps of the campus and all parking lots to help the commuters find places to park. Parking is a perennial problem at all campuses by the way. It runs as the number on complaint at most all campuses but by at least facing the issue and providing information on where to park and how to get there the Liberty brochure does help out. The brochure also provides all of the campus rules on parking to make sure that commuters know what they are rather than just having them search and hunt for the information as it is one on most campuses.

The brochure then goes on to discuss the town that they are living in and provides some very helpful and useful tips on finding things to do as well as the history of Lynchburg. I found out some very interested in facts about the city that surprised me and made want to see more of it. Did you know for example that a Dr. Malcolm Loomis actually sent radio signals through the air in Lynchburg six years before Marconi?

The brochure also makes certain that commuter students have a opportunity to participate in the activities on the campus by including  all the clubs and student organizations and such activities as intramural sports schedules so commuting students are aware of what is happening on campus.

This is a very good service piece for commuting students and should be replicated at many other schools.  It helps make Liberty a good service provider as well as a vibrant University with a specialized faith based mission. I would be wrong if I did not also say that I found Liberty to have a very good balance of that faith-based mission and its role as a university. It balances the two extremely well which shows how a good mission and good service can go hand and hand to build for success.

To get more information on the brochure feel free to contact Michael Shankle at Liberty mtshenkle@liberty.edu.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

N. Raisman and Associates is also the leading provider of workshops, training and campus audits to increase your retention and customer excellence success. Check us out at www.GreatServiceMattres.com

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The Customer Service Focus of Learn and Earn

Learn and Earn

Learn and Earn is a client/customer service focus that is a variation created by N.Raisman & Associates based on successful models of many thriving businesses. The basics of it are: When you attain a customer, do all you can to retain him so you do not have to replace him. Furthermore, the objective is to lower the required number of new customers to balance the budget while increasing loyalty and investment in the school. The goal is to upsell students, i.e., two-year degree students stay to go for a four-year degree; bachelor students continue on for a graduate degree; graduates come back for additional courses such as license prep and professional/personal growth courses and greater alumni involvement and support.

Not retaining and upselling the students is costly for a college. Every new recruit brings significant start-up costs that must be recouped and/or amortized over the whole business. A college has to bring in at least six new students for every student lost before the end of the freshman year in a four-year program to gain full revenue from each attrition student. That's assuming an average acquisition cost of the schools I have studied at about $3,516, plus lost potential tuition and fee revenue. Yes, it really is that high when one factors in all aspects, from marketing, leads, collateral media, salaries--not just of admissions people but all the people who work to bring that student into the school--specialized activities, publications, and so on. Most schools do not recoup their initial investment in a new student until into the second semester. So, if a student quits before then that creates a negative revenue situation as well as probable bad debt, collection costs, and write-offs.

Implementing Learn and Earn

Implementation of learn and earn is not all that difficult, but it does take a shift of focus to emphasize learning from a school's customers and then creating customer service around that knowledge as a primary operational tool and strategic advantage, rather than focusing on churning and burning admissions. Students become the teachers to the school on issues of what services they desire, need, and find lacking. And this is not the customer service that many schools think of, because education is a different business arena and culture than retail, which is where most customer service books focus. For example, in almost every book out there the old platitude “the customer is always right” is there front and center. Not only is that a false statement in business--“I wore the dress three times and now I want to return it.”--but it is absolutely unrealistic in higher education. If the customer is always right, why have tests for example? Indeed, a school that simply gives the student/customer what he or she wants--like high grades with no work--will soon find accreditors and the feds breathing down its neck.

The easiest way to explain how a school can implement Learn and Earn is first, learn about and listen to the student. Understand who they really are--not what you would wish them to be. Study the social and communal demographics of the students. Forget about assuming they are Generation Y, or Millennial, or whatever term is in vogue. These are PR grand labeling generalizations and may not at all encompass the reality of the particular community of students at the school. For example, over 50 percent of all college students are adults, yet the labels do not even address them. Your students may come from a social niche, region, or mindset that has nothing to do with the labels. Learn who they really are.

Colleges that learn about their clients/students will succeed by providing the clients relevant education, good customer service, and the ultimate student goal of having companies and professions that will hire and accept their graduates. These schools use what they have learned to assure student satisfaction leading to increased retention, which is how they earn present revenue and future donations.

Provide quality learning, in an appropriate environment that speaks to actual students and offers them opportunities to enjoy themselves and their learning. Get them to want to learn more and wish to be at the school. Help the students keep focus on their goals in life and career and how the school will help them get there. How to do it? Simple. Improve your customer service focus. The result is earning-- for the school and the student.

Sounds easy and it can be with some simple customer service training that focuses on the business we are in—education and learning within schools and colleges. One quick lesson: Students are not exactly customers, they are more like clients. A client hires someone to study the situation, indicate what is wrong, and then offer the tools to fix what is needed to succeed. Like clients, students come to the experts (school) to find out what they must do to improve and grow so their futures will be successful. Schools need to understand their student clients, understand what they really need and want, then provide them the academic and social services to strengthen and grow. And though some skeptics might believe it is easy grades students want, it really is not. What I have found in my studies of and for schools is that most students want three things. And it all has to do with the three ROI's. They want to feel an f-roi , a solid e-roi, a full sense of an a-roi . 

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

We increase your success

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Customer Service and Students Returns on Investments

What are the four basic indicators of a successful school in its operations and well-being?

Indicator 1 Population.

Indicator 2 Population. 

Indicator 3, No surprise here--Population.

Indicator 4, Customer service levels.

If a school is able to maintain and grow its population, then all is in order. Note I said population. Not admissions. Hitting admission numbers does not indicate the health of the institution, particularly if a school is losing 30 percent or more of its students. Simply put, if a sales team sells 100 pet rocks on Monday, but by next week 30 are returned, then how many were really sold? The sales team may be celebrating hitting its goal but the CFO is dying because the lost revenue and costs associated with selling and processing returns have basically wiped out any profit. All the company has learned is that the pet rock can be sold but has very little customer retention power and may just have been sold in a way that can lead to bigger issues down the line. The direct correlation of revenue to tuition and fees in a college or university is undeniable. Tuition is provided only by students who attend and then stay in the college. If they leave they stop paying tuition and fees. Therefore, retention is key to providing an institution the revenue it needs to run its operations. 

There is another correlation of academic customer service to retention. Academic, not retail customer service accounts for up to 84% of all reasons why students leave a college as research conducted by AcademicMAPS over the past seven years points out. AcademicMAPS surveyed and interviewed 640 students a year after they had dropped out of a school to find out what they left.  The passage of a year as well as its non-affiliation with any particular college or university provided the students the distance and anonymity for more open discussion on actual attrition causes.  The students were randomly selected.  They were often at their new college, one that we had been hired to audit or present training or a presentation. The chart below is a compilation of that research on why students really leave a school.

What was discovered is not what ex-students might tell a school official since they will generally "play to the interviewer" during their meetings with your exit counselor. (If the school has one.)  Students will most often intone "personal reasons" as their reason/excuse for leaving the school. They assume the interviewer will either not dig into their personal lives or will buy the vague soap opera they spin because they know we are basically voyeurs rather than intervention people. We do love a good story, even if it may not be true or the real reason the student is leaving. But then again, if it is "personal reasons" most officials are happy to accept that for two main reasons.  First, most colleges accept that “personal reasons” is a valid basis to leave school.  Second, if students leave for personal reason, neither the college nor the individual are not really accountable for some failure in the department, school or our so-called systems. Can't be held responsible for their personal problems, can we?
            But when AcademicMAPS personnel dug a bit, it was discovered that the personal problems fall into a few major categories which indicate that leaving students do have a sort of personal issue - a customer service issue - with the school. Most often, they said didn't like the way they were treated and that they took personally. They tell us that they felt the school was indifferent toward them as a person, as a learner, or as anything but tuition revenue. A very common statement was “all they seemed to care about was me paying on time.” This feeling of apathy from the school is the major reason 30% of the students said they were motivated to leave. This feeling violates our Good Academic Customer Service Principle 1 "Everyone wants to attend Cheers University where everyone knows your name and they're awfully glad you came." Once they feel you do not care, they are on the way out the door over to Gary’s Old Towne Tavern.

The second major reason students quit a school is dissatisfaction with how the staff treats them. Staff here means anyone who works at the college from maintenance people on down.  Administrators are staff. Faculty are staff. Everyone is in a staff relationship to the clients, the students. Everyone is there, or should be there, to serve and meet the needs of the students, the school’s primary customer.

Generally students will point out some clerical, management or administrative staff as the primary poor customer service villain.  This is because students are more lenient with faculty in general until one of them blows it big time. Sort of like the belief voters have that their local representative is honest and sincere until caught in an airport men’s room. Then all hell breaks loose. The college’s landing strip becomes filled with helicopter parents and it’s “threaten to call the lawyer’s time.” Students want to believe their teachers care about them even if they don't seem to really show it much. They will remember the slights from the clerical staff and try to overlook indifferent even cruel Paper Chase Charles W. Kingsfield type faculty member until they realize that those faculty are hurtful and not just demanding. But that can and will change if the professor shows his or her cruelty in the grade a student gets after putting in what he or she felt was hard work and effort. Grades have become the coin of the realm for students and they believe they are paying for them in one or another way – study and tuition. How many times have you heard students refer to how much they are paying and how much they deserve since they pay so much to go there? Moreover since a major motivator for staying in a school is getting a job, lower than expected grades are a disincentive dis-incentive to many students. Students who do not receive what they believe was their effort in their grades they often feel they have been or are being maltreated and they will not stay and pay for that. So they leave.

The belief that customer service is equated to giving easy grades is not true. Customer service is not in the grade itself but in a combination of the effort for the grade and the assistance provided to be able to achieve a higher grade. The situation is anometic .Students who do not put in the effort or seek help accept what grades they get.  Students who make a sincere effort expect that the college will provide the services to help them succeed with an acceptable grade.  The services such as tutoring by qualified tutors who can actually help students learn the material, review assistance, additional study material and supplementary opportunities to understand the information or achieve the skill needed to obtain an acceptable grade are customer service.
             When students leave a college for what he or she categorizes as personal or financial reasons does not mean they don't go to another school although they may tell you they problem that calls for taking time off. They don't want to insult the interviewer with negative reports about his or her colleagues or the school.  The students avoid this not because they are afraid of hurting someone’s feelings but because they don’t want to hear a defense or excuses. They want to get in and out of what they feel to be an unsettling experience as quickly and painlessly as is possible. They also will claim “personal reasons” since they do not wish to explain their real reasons for leaving if they can avoid it. Confrontation is not a sought after event.

The 2010 NSSE study indicated that over 60% of students attend more than one college prior to graduation. No indication of how many try more than one school and quit higher education completely. That should not comfort people if their school is one that loses more than receives students. Misery likes company but there are no revenue dollars in the misery of losing a large portion of enrollment, especially to those who get laid off to meet budget as a result of too many drops.

The third major reason students attrit is they are just plain unhappy with the school. The institution has spent so much time and money to get them to come that the school forgets it is much easier and much less costly to keep a student than to recruit and enroll them to begin with. Before classes, there are numerous communications, well planned activities at orientations, events, even celebrations to make sure the students will show up. Once classes start, most schools seem to forget to keep up the effort that says we are glad you came.

Even if a school tries to maintain a focus on making students feel welcome during freshman year, it almost always ends at most every school as soon as sophomore year rolls around.  Now, it is assumed, the students are mature, focused and will remain satisfied with the college. That false assumption leads to more dropouts. Just look at the chart and it will be seen that the third primary reason for dropping out is the students were just plain unhappy. Taking away the focus after freshman year is a sure way to add to potential dissatisfaction. Once any institution provides good customer service, it cannot, it should not be taken away. And it is so simple to maintain actually. In fact, all the reasons for leaving a school can be alleviated rather easily.

Customer service and a student's belief that, "My investment in this school will be met if not exceeded" in three types of ROI are the key to population. If students, and staff, do not believe their F-ROI (financial return on investment); E-ROI (emotional return on investment); and A-ROI (associative return on investment) are being positively impacted by the customer service level they receive, population is in trouble. And the school's well-being, finances, and morale are also in trouble.

Population stability and growth are primary indicators. Hitting retention says the students are pleased with the school, their education, and experience. Faculty members are happier because students are more receptive to instruction, do their work on time, and are more compliant with faculty directions. Students are even pleased to go to class. Faculty morale also increases since it is much easier to teach happy and committed students. The business officer is pleased because the college will maintain solid positive revenue, on-time collections and thus operating margin/EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization). And believe it or not, our research indicates that if students are pleased with the customer service they receive, a school can even raise tuition and not suffer adverse effects in student acceptance.

How to do all this? Focus on customer service.

As long as students, faculty and administration are all pleased with the school, admission targets might be missed, and that is not unusual in the tight competitive market all schools are trying to draw students from, yet revenues, margins, and financial goals can be met with population maintenance/retention through increased customer service. Furthermore, if everyone is happy and population retention leads the way, admissions may have a more achievable goal. That can lead to reduced stress and will lead to fewer angry admissions people. Angry admissions staffers can hurt admissions, retention, and the whole school as the public questions the school.

The Three ROI's

Return on Investment is normatively a financial formula. (ROI = Return/Investment yielding a hoped-for positive percentage.) The basic ROI formula works with colleges and customer service not as a financial plus or minus percentage basis, but on more personal and psychological formulations composed of feelings and perceptions that the investment is worthwhile. If it is, the student is comfortable, even happy, and stays. If the student does not feel there is at least a financial, emotional, and associative equity between what he or she invests and what the school returns to him or her, there will be a negative sense of ROI and the student will likely leave or trudge through unhappily, bad-mouthing the school whenever the chance arises.

F-ROI (financial return on investment) works on two levels for students. The first F-ROI is the perception of whether or not, "I am getting my money's worth. Do I feel that the money I am paying to the school is being well spent on me?" The second F-ROI is whether or not the student believes that staying at the school will finally lead to the job and career that he or she came to the school to acquire.

There then are two separate but related equations at work. For F-ROI the evaluation is a judgment of the value of a wide grouping of what might at first seem to be disparate issues that range from the obvious (such as perceived value of classroom instruction, whether or not faculty seem to care if students understand and are learning, to how staff treat students and even important physical issues such as facilities, parking, lighting, and so on). One college I studied had a low collective student sense of the F-ROI (41 percent positive) with the two major concerns indicated: "weak instructors" and "dirty bathrooms." The F-ROI was raised a quick sixteen points by cleaning and then painting the bathrooms. And retention also went up by 4.3 percent that semester.

The F-ROI that goes to future career returns on the investment is not simply of financial investment through tuition, fees, books, etc., but the feeling that "this school will help me obtain the job I am going here to get." Students must believe that the college will not only assist them in their job search but the school's position and reputation will facilitate obtaining that first job. If the school helps the students prepare for applying for jobs or, even better, if the school has an active outreach to students on careers and assistance in locating possible jobs, the F-ROI will stay in the positives.

The E-ROI refers to the emotional investment that a student and that student's family make in the school. When a student decides to attend a college, that person is making a commitment based on an expected return on investment such as the financial ones spoken of above. But, he or she is also making an emotional decision as well that is somewhat akin to an engagement. Trust, attachment, and an allegiance between the student and the school is developed in the student's mind and feelings. The student is making a pledge to the school that he or she expects will be returned. That pledge is, "I will trust you to do right by me. I will put my education and thus my future in your hands. I will trust you to treat me fairly and provide me an honest opportunity to learn and get that job I want to love." Very few, if any, students will simply make a cold business-like decision to apply, taking a chance of rejection and then finally accept the offer of engagement from a college without emotion involved. Social psychology experiments have indicated that even if applicants were not sure about the school at some time, upon acceptance, they will begin to look more favorably on the school and decide that it was a better school and choice after all.

Though students are transferring from colleges at a record rate and attending more than one institution to graduate, according to studies such as the 2006 National Survey of Student Engagement, students enter a school with a belief that they will complete a degree at that school. Students who attend to a two-year school, for instance, enter with the intention of transferring to another school after graduation, yet many do not stay to graduation. They leave.

Why? Because they fall out of love with the college. They do not perceive that their emotional investment is being returned by the school. The students I have interviewed have indicated two major perceptions of why they fall out of love with a school. First, they say, "The school only cares about me for the money they get." They see the school as putting either money ahead of the students (too many adjunct faculty, not enough sections of courses, poor scheduling, canceling classes at the last minute, not enough staff, aggressive bursar and collections letters). Second, the school does not reach out to them and show it cares about the student as a person with integrity and needs (can't find faculty during office hours, can't get extra help when needed, faculty do not seem to realize students have lives too, administrators don't care or solve problems, staff are cold or rude, no one smiles, students get the run-around also known as the shuffle, issues go unresolved or with just a decision that is unexplained, etc.).

The last is A-ROI (associative return on investment). The associative is the sense that by going to this school, “I am saying something about me and my values and character. By attending I am increasing my social standing. I am investing my standing and self-value in the school.” This can be seen in the clothes that students wear, especially collegiate or sports-related hats, tees, and sweatshirts. When a student wears a T-shirt, for example, with the name of a college adorning the front, it is done to make a statement to the world about the wearer. If a student is wearing the name of a college such as Harvard , University of Michigan, or the University of Miami, or one of the other name-brand colleges, he or she is trying to tell the viewer to associate him or her with the school--even if they do not go there. It is a statement that the student wants to be associated with the strength and value of the school's name.

The student is saying, “I am part of this school and it makes me feel good.” It improves value and recognition. That is why when I was associate provost at the University of Cincinnati (Ohio) and the Bearcats men's basketball team made it into the NCAA Final Four, applications shot up. People wanted to be associated with a successful basketball team/school. One way a school can judge if its associative value is up or down is by counting the amount of logo- or name-laden clothing that is sold in the bookstore. If students want others to know they go to the school, they will wear the association.

The ROI on association can be a strong one if the student feels that the school is well known and respected in the community. If it is not, the school can create strong associative value by providing excellent service to the student, who will then takes pride in in the institution, even if others do not know it is so good. A school can overcome lack of current recognition if the services are strong enough. "It is an excellent school and I know it, so I feel great being associated with it even if you haven't heard of it.” This is then a more personal ROI but still a very important one. Lose the student's belief in the school and the A-ROI drops. When that happens, the student does not want to be associated with the school and is a certain candidate to transfer.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

We increase your success

CALL OR EMAIL TODAY
www.GreatServiceMatters.com 

                                             info@GreatServiceMatters.com 

413.219.6939

Poor Advising is Bad Customer Service

Another common problem we find when we do a mini-audit or a full audit is advising. In fact, we cannot recall a school where the students were positive about their advising services and experiences. Here is an excerpt from a university audit that addresses common problem at most schools.

Student advising appears to be done within each college within the University which appears to produce a wide range of student experiences. We were told by staff that there were approximately 24 advisers for the entire University, resulting in a student to adviser ratio of well over 800:1. Many students reported it was difficult to learn who their adviser is as there is no available list of advisors either in hard-copy or online. Once students did identify where and by whom they could be advised, they reported long waits for appointments, or long lines when drop-in service was provided. Students also noted some advisers provided wrong information which resulted in missteps in the student's course selection and setbacks to their academic progress.

Some students reported that advising appointments were hard to get and then once they were meeting with an adviser, they seemed rushed. The students did not feel well served. Students also reported that academic program changes were not being kept current in the information available on the website and that advisers in many departments did not have the most current information making it difficult for them to provide appropriate guidance to students in selecting substitute courses.

The advisers were criticized for not being available, taking too long to get an appointment and too often not knowing what they were talking about. For example, one student reported that it took her weeks to get an appointment because the University also reduced the number of advisers in the newly formed college though it increased the numbers of students threefold. The student reported that her adviser had “over a thousand students to advise, and it was just too impossible to get in to see her. When I did get in to meet with her, she was not really familiar with my program and told me to take wrong courses. I needed to take some freshman courses that were pre-reqs but she did not seem to know that until it was too late. Now I will have to try to get the courses and it will make me stay another year at least at the University and I don’t know that I’ll have the money to do that.”

This experience was reported twenty-three times by the students who were in the programs in the merged college. This is a situation that could easily lead to students having problems in choosing courses, having to stay longer and then having to either go deeper into debt or dropping/stopping out due to lack of funding. This is also reported as a problem in other colleges as well where a student reported as did others that they have trouble seeing an adviser. The ones they do get to see are not knowledgeable enough about all the programs. As a Spanish education major stated “First off it is just too much of a hassle to get to see anyone. If you do get to see someone he doesn’t know what he’s doing because he covers too many programs and doesn’t know mine at all. But the biggest issue I guess is that I can’t even get in to see him to plan my next semester and I have to because I am a double major…but considering that he doesn’t know his staff maybe that is better.”

It appears that the University has tried to reduce the number of advisers and move more of the advising to self-advising via the website. This is not a good customer service decision. Students are told to see an adviser but when there are not enough of them they cannot do so. Students reported for example that in the respiratory therapy programs advisers were moved out of the building and to get an appointment with one now takes months. “They will answer emails but that is not what I want or need. When I want to see an adviser I should be able to get one fast. I’m paying a lot of money and advising is one of the things that I am paying for.” The same comments were common for most every other program including nursing which students reported “took months to get an appointment.”

This is not a good situation especially considering the student population at the University. Many of the students are first time in family attendees so they do not know the ways of the University and their parents cannot help them either. These students need to be able to sit down with a knowledgeable advisor to determine their programs and what courses they need to take. This is especially so for freshman who have to see an adviser in some programs but cannot get an appointment to do so. Self-advising may work well for more seasoned students but not for those early in their careers which is why a very common problem was that the students could not get to see an adviser, self-advised and chose the wrong courses.

One student reported that he went to see his math adviser because he was taking an exam and the system froze blocking him from completing the test. He went to see the adviser during office hours but there was no one there. He next made an appointment to see his adviser, but when he went to the appointment, the adviser was not there. He made another appointment, but when he went to the office there was a sign on the door that said “Gone fishing. Email me.” This is not good service at all and needs to be addressed.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

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Customer Service and Hours of Operation

One of the areas that we find quite common from doing onsite customer service audits is the disparity of office functional hours. Most offices that students need to complete their activities to go and pay for school are not available to the second segment of the college or university – the evening students. 

Most schools have two populations. There is a daytime dedicated population of students for whom going to school is their work for the week. And there is an adult population who cpo0mew from work to go to school. Yet, the schools act as if there were only the daytime dedicated students when it comes to the hours that their offices are open to help students.

Here is an excerpt from a mini-audit that points out the problem and provides some simple solutions to solve it.

Hours of operation

An issue that is allied to scheduling of classes is the hours that offices are open to serve students. The College has two populations which are separate for the most part. There is a full-time dedicated day college as well as an evening college of working adults who are attending part-time. The daytime students receive also the services they are paying for while the evening college receives almost none of the services they are paying for.

For example, the one-stop center is a good idea but it closes at 5:00 pm. That means there are no business or student service functions that can take place for an evening student should he or she wish to get something accomplished. If for example an evening student wanted to pay a bill, he could not do so because there is no one there to receive it. If she needs a transcript for a job interview, she cannot get it because the records office is closed prior to her coming on campus.

This means that many, if not all, of the activities of the evening students cannot be done on campus while they are there. They are distinctly inconvenience. This is a situation of obvious service bias and discrimination for a large sector of paying customers.

Not only are the offices in the one-stop shop closed, the bookstore and all but the Hawk’s Landing and the Resource Center/Library are closed to evening students.

This is very poor customer service. It forces the working adult who wants or needs to accomplish an interaction with the college to either leave work and come to campus or try to accomplish the work on line. According to evening students, they would choose to come to campus and give up lunch time rather than try to accomplish work on line. They find the on-line resources to be cumbersome and difficult to use. This starts with the on-line admissions application and continues from that. This forces students/customers to sacrifice and that is not good customer service at all.

Schedules should be reallocated to make certain that there are at least one or two staff members on duty to at least 7:00 each evening. There may not be steady business but that would be similar to the level of business I observed during the daytime for the day students as well. Moreover, the one-stop shop should become truly more of a one-stop in that all people who work in it, indifferent to their assigned point of work should be cross trained to know all of the functions and activities of their counterparts. This would allow a student to go to any of the four offices, whichever seems most appropriate and get an answer to most every question he or she could bring up. What the College has now is more of a service mall in that there are four separate offices close to one another which cuts down on the amount of walking a student has to do to get some situations answered but does not remove being turfed from one office to another to get an answer. This situation still creates the feeling of being shuffled around in the quest for information or an answer.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

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Academic Customer Service Mini-Audit Excerpt - Parking

I have been receiving requests from readers for information on what a mini-audit covers and what are the more common issues that are disclosed in a mini-audit. A mini-audit is when we come onto a campus for a day and audit the customer service levels at the school as a snapshot of what is happening in service excellence and when needs to be done to improve it. It leads to an executive report that has some of the most significant issues facing the campus when it comes to customer service as well as some solutions.

It is a basic recognition that a school cannot fix issues until it knows of them. The mini-audits are not as detailed as the full audits in which we do some mystery shopping and really dig into the customer service levels at the school but it does disclose some clear issues to be solved.

So to try and respond to the requests and help other schools look at themselves, we are going to provide some excerpts from some mini-audits that may also be helpful to other schools. This will be done in sections so as not to just throw out a ten page report all at once. This way you can look at your school too and see if it needs to work in the area just discussed.

We begin with one of the most common issues that faces most every campus – parking. For some more on parking by the way, we recommend that you read another of our articles on this blog Losing Enrollment in Lot C. This segment is from a mini-audit at a primarily commuter college that also has some dorms on campus.

Parking

Parking on a college campus is invariably a major concern for commuters and staff.  Thirty students and staff said that finding a parking spot was difficult especially in the early morning hours, lunch time and during special events at the Cox Center or elsewhere on campus. Specifically, students mentioned that for classes at 8 in the morning there are no spots and again at 9:15. Evening students also said they had some trouble finding spots just prior to their classes beginning.

I observed the parking lots during the evening and in the early morning and must conclude that there are some issues with parking that could be difficult to resolve. This is because I had no trouble finding parking spots in the lot near the Welcome Center and the M…. Building for example. This is a problem since it may well be that there is adequate parking but this is not believed. Or more significantly, there is adequate parking but not where the students would like to park and thus the perception exists that there is a parking spot shortage. 

It is more likely that spots do not exist where I want to park. Students and staff do not want to have to walk much these days and convenience is the key. Sometime I fear that the legs will become a vestigial organ since people want to use them so infrequently preferring to park as close to their destination as is possible.

The College uses a very appropriate first come-first served system for allotting parking spots. This removes any “class” bias in spots for parking but is allowing a perception of a parking shortage which may exist but during the audit this was not seen.  It may be appropriate to request, ask employees to park in the lots near the Welcome Center allowing those spots on the hill and behind the student center to be more readily available for students who are the primary customers after all.

It may also be appropriate to regularly repeat the first come first served and availability of spots in the lots near the Welcome Center even with a short walk to classes to the students. This may dispel the notion that there is not enough parking and replace it with recognition that there are spots but to get there earlier.

The only actual solution might be to put in more spaces between Victory Road and the Maintenance Building behind the existing hill lot. That is not a good solution since it is costly and will further surround the campus with asphalt as well as still allow for the feeling of a longer than desired walk. But it is the only way the perceptions may be ended that there is not enough parking available.

It is also important that resident students be as completely dissuaded as is possible from “driving to classes.” There may be instances in which a resident student does drive a car from the resident lot to get closer to his or her classroom and avoid the walk.

If you have any particular issues on your campus that may have been covered in other mini-audits already, let me know and I will post an example of what we found elsewhere and some possible solutions as well.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION  by clicking here

N. Raisman & Associates is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through workshops, presentations, research, training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that work with them 

We increase your success

CALL OR EMAIL TODAY
www.GreatServiceMatters.com 

                                             info@GreatServiceMatters.com 

413.219.6939