What We Can Learn From Failed Airlines

Three airlines just went out of business last week. Over thirty colleges, universities and career colleges will do the same this year. High gas prices were certainly one culprit but not the only, nor the major one. Client retention, or lack of it, was the final issue. They did not have enough repeat business nor advocates to assure enough booking and revenue for the days ahead. Why? Weak and poor customer service. Same reason why colleges and schools lose enrollment.

We can eliminate cost as a factor for choosing not to return to flying at least one of them. Skybus which was an airline that sold tickets for as low as $10 – yes $10 – yet it was having trouble getting people to repeat flying. You could fly from its base in Columbus, OH to California, Florida, Massachusetts, NY or many other states for less than it would cost you for a few gallons of gasoline yet people were starting to choose more expensive airlines. The last two times I flew Skybus’ full size Airbus planes, the flights each had fewer than 40 people. That includes crew.

When I perform a simple customer service mini-audit on Skybus, some sad issues come forward that can also inform colleges and businesses losing students and clients.

The first contact with Skybus was its web. In fact, for Skybus that was its primary means of contact. In a move to reduce operating costs, it chose not to have any actual people answering phones or addressing questions of potential or present customers. It relied much too heavily on technology when the reality is that technology is not as well received as a customer service provider as Skybus, People want to talk with people. People want to be helped by people. And even when using technology like a website, cell phone or email, people want to know thnat a person is somewhere on the other end and WILL get back to them.

Skybus unfortunately believed all the hype of the people who create and build technology and tried to use it as the main means of client business contact just as too many schools do. Though technology is ubiquitous, it is not as used or even as well known as the people who sell the same technology want you to believe. Most people do not use or even know what much of it is! For example, when you are IM-ing….Oh, that’s Instant Messaging. Point made? But that does not mean you should not be aware of the latest in student contact technology. Just use it correctly in ways that emphasize people talking with people.

People know people. They trust people. They want to talk with and be served by people – not technology though most colleges have replaced people with technology. Maddening phone tree anyone? For yes, press 3. Skybus removed the people. A very bad customer service error. People consider electronic phone answering with its instructions to listen closely…as if you were a child with telephonic ADHD

Skybus and you would have improved client acquisition and retention numbers immensely if it had just hired some people to answer the phone and talk with people; answered questions; resolved problems; been human.

Colleges have similar problems when they replace people answering phones with phone trees or automatons who might as well be. Keep in mind that we hate phone trees. Moreover, we really believe we have some value and when we get an electronic voice telling us what to do, we feel diminished and do not like that. Furthermore, it tells us so much about you. The first thing it says it though you say the call is important, we know it isn’t. Therefore, we know you don’t think we are important. And if we are not important enough to talk with now, what good can there be in the future.

Moreover, the technology that we do use it people to people technology. Cell phones and email are great examples. When we call SOMEONE on a cell phone, we expect to engage is a person and person discussion. When we send an email, we expect a response. Skybus provided neither. They did have some email response but it was so slow and irregular using boiler point replies that it was not acceptable or helpful. Phones must be answered and emails responded to. This is a basic rule of customer service which if broken will certainly hurt you.

And though this does not pertain to Skybus which did not have phone answering, when someone answers that phone, that person must at least sound polite, happy and welcoming. A simple “Yuh” or “Yes?” or “Welcometofillintheblank.CanIdirectyuh call?” is as bad as Press 34 for… People do not answer the phone well and that does not reflect well on you.

Moreover, the Skybus web site was not a good one. It was difficult to navigate. It did not supply the information the visitors wanted and/or needed. The visitors not the company. Websites are for people to visit and learn about you. They are not for you. They should be designed for people who do not know what you do and not assumptions should be made. For example too many, way too many college web sites were designed by and for the campus community. They were set up to make campus constituencies happy not potential students or other visitors. In some cases, this is obvious as every department or office designed its own page making sure there is no consistency in design, information, font, links or anything that could make a positive statement about the college. Most college websites are like Skybus’ was – terrible. And the result, your university or college loses potential students, even donors, when they can’t navigate your web site Click here for more on webs

Skybus also did not train its first contact people very well and dressed them even worse. The people at the Skybus counters in the airport ticket areas were few and not very helpful. Their primary job it seemed was to tell arriving passengers to use the self-check in machines and collect money for checked baggage. Sort of like when we tell students to go on line and do whatever they sought help to get done. That is not to say that some of them were not helpful but not all like receptionists and other first contact people at your school.

The next people the clients encountered were the young people at the gates. They were not rude really. Their level of indifference and lack of concern did not have enough energy to be rude. Too much effort. They just ignored the passengers until it was time to board. Then they gathered up enough energy to call out the boarding groups in a bored monotone.

The company dressed all their employees in cheap black tee shirts with slogans on them such as Only Birds Fly Cheaper or Ten Dollar Tickets to….. Somehow indifferent young people dressed in inexpensive black tees did not inspire a sense of professionalism. Couple that with indifference to customers and Skybus had achieved a level of customer service that helped lead to its financial doom. Always keep in mind that every employee of the college whether they be a president or one of the more important front line service people is a living objective correlative for the institution. Skybus did not do that and cheapened the company and its people with its cheap appearance.

People may want to pay less but they do not want to feel as if they purchased something cheap. Or worse, they were cheap in their buying decision. Skybus’ lack of professionalism in action and appearance made its passengers feel as if they were getting their ten dollars worth but not any more. The company made one feel as if you paid little so don’t expect much. This is a basic and destructive customer service flaw. When we purchase a bargain, we want to feel as if we got a good value for very little money. Just because we saved money by going to say a community college rather than a private baccalaureate school, students do not want to fell either cheap or cheated. They want to feel valued, important and intelligent for choosing to go there. This is the Target approach. Well laid out and lit environment with an upscale look and lower prices. Discount shopping in an upscale environment. That’s also how our schools should look. People do not want to feel cheapened by the appearances of staff or facilities.

This also leads to a problem for many schools. Faculty and staff dress in a manner that says we do not take this enterprise seriously nor did I even bother to try and look professional for you. You are just not important enough for me to take the time to look professional or even semi-professional. Granted it is quite difficult to make anyone on campus especially faculty dress in a manner that reflects pride in what they do and the people they interact with. There is even case law that allows people to dress as they wish but that does not stop an institution from trying based on the reflection of pride in the college, the mission and the work we represent. There is some case law that does allow a college or business to provide guidance on appropriate dress for some positions such as receptionists and basic standards. Role modeling can also be effective. And when a school employs students in offices or other visible areas, they can be instructed to dress for work not play. Moreover, one way to help solve the situation is to supply students and others college logo shirts, blouses, etc (BUT NOT TEE SHIRTS) to wear. That is not only a strong suggestion; it can be a clear statement.

In any case, Skybus did not do any of the above and placed its emphasis on the lowliest part of its name BUS rather than Sky. Not a good service or client retention approach.

Finally, Skybus had some service delivery problems. Too often the airline offered a flight, the client agreed to take that flight and paid for it but later had cancelled it. Too many flights were canceled. How many is too many? For the passengers, one is too many. When they planned a portion of their lives around a scheduled flight only to find out it is canceled, that is a sure first step to never coming back. The same is true for colleges when they offer a course or section, students choose it, pay for it, plan their schedules, their lives around that decision only to have it canceled by the school. A VERY bad decision. And one which is seldom supported by the usual excuse of fiscal concerns as was discussed in the article How many Students Does it Take to Put in a Class?

So what can we learn from Skybus’ bankruptcy?

1. Fiscal problems are most usually the result of poor customer service problems
2. Technology is not the savior and can even hurt when not used wisely.
3. Have your web checked with a WebEval Just mention this blog and it will be free.
4. Have trained people answer your phones and have them do it correctly
5. Return calls and emails
6. Have people ready and happy to help
7. Make the place look more expensive than it is
8. Work at making employees look professional, engaged and proud to be there
9. Do not cancel classes
10. Train everyone on academic customer service and keep training. It is not a one time brochure!

AcademicMAPS has been providing customer service, retention and research training and solutions to colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as to businesses that seek to work with them since 1999. Clients range from small rural schools to major urban universities and corporations. Its services range from campus customer service audits; workshops, training, presentations, institutional studies and surveys to research on customer service and retention. AcademicMAPS prides itself on its record of success for its clients and students who are aided through the firm’s services. www.GreatServiceMatters.com 413.219.6939 info@GreatServiceMatters.com

Skybust tee shirt designed and sold on http://www.cafepress.com/

The Power of Retention: ROI Formulas - Excerpt from White Paper

This is an excerpt from an AcademicMAPS white paper The Power of Retention.If you would like a copy of the entire white paper, please just contact us at info@GreatServiceMatters.com

Calculating ROI from Retention; Three CSF Formulas

There are three primary CSFactors™,(Customer Service Factors) AcademicMAPS has formulated to help universities, colleges and career school figure out the loss or gain from retention and attrition. The CSFactors are provided as formulas schools can use to figure out how much revenue they are losing, or could and would gain if they focused on improving service to students. The formulas are quick methods to understand the financial power of retention coming out of customer service to students. Placing your college or university’s actual numbers into the formulas will quickly bring forward the real power of retention to positively affect the revenue and future or the institution.

They could also be applied to employee retention, another significant revenue and service issue but here we focus on students. The formulas were developed and tested from the research AcademicMAPS conducted during college service audits, workshops, presentations, retreats and other services provide to higher education as well as just pure research.

CSFactor 1: The Cost of Attrition CSF1 helps a college figure out how much money it is losing from its actual attrition. Factor 1 is stated as:

CSF1 = [(P X A= SL) X T]

In the formula, P represents the total school population; not just the starting fall freshman number. Most schools use the fall incoming freshmen number and that is an error. The assumption is that attrition occurs most in the first six weeks of the freshman year. That may be have some validity for the freshman year but the reality is that students are leaving colleges and universities in any one of the average six-plus years of a four-year degree and in the four-plus average years of a two-year degree. Students leave a school throughout their experience at the college. In fact, some schools are beginning to realize this and worry about the sophomore bubble. But they really need to worry about the super soph sluff, the rising junior jilt, the junior jump, super junior split, the fourth year flee and so on. Every year, every semester, in fact every day is a chance for a student to dropout. Colleges need to be concerned with every student every day of their attendance for it could be his or her last. So we look at the total population.

Annualized tuition is the number a school should use to figure its real attrition. Not the retention between the first and second semester or the freshman and sophomore years which are very popular ones. That leaves out all the students who already dropped out before the end of the second term or semester. That number fudges failure. For instance, if a college began a year with 100 new freshman and 99 left in week one but the remaining student stayed the whole year and returned for a sophomore year, the freshman to sophomore percentage would be 100%.

In CSF1, A equals attrition. Again not just from freshman but an annualized attrition rate. And this rate is to include ALL students who leave for any reason. It does not matter if the student says he or she will be back. They are not in the population and bringing in revenue until they actually do return. If they pay a “place holding fee”, that does not count them as a student until they are actually back in classes.

Fudge with the numbers if you have a need for delusion, or are insecure, unethical, or want to keep the Board feeling better but when you use the formulas, be fully honest. It will help you understand why the budget is not working or may suddenly implode. No one likes surprises, especially ones that have parentheses around them in the budget and

lead to freezes, cuts and the like. Using the formulas honestly can help forecast a reality to avoid surprises and initiate work on retaining students to maintain fiscal and operating health.

SL stands for students lost annually from total population and revenue production. And T equals annual tuition at the school.

So here is what showed up when we analyzed CSF1 for Mammon University. You may know it. Its motto is Omnes Por Pecunia. Anything for a Buck.

Its total population was 500 students.

Annualized attrition was at 39.6%

So SL (students lost annually) was 198.

Times an annual tuition of $13,000.

So, the formula becomes:

[(500 x 39.6% = 198) x $13,000] = a revenue loss of ($2,574,000).

To carry this forward a bit, we can plug in other numbers and see how an increase in retention could add to the bottom line and thus the ability to pay for full time faculty, staff, their benefits, increases for adjuncts, instructional equipment, tutors, research release, new curricula and programs, maintenance, …. All those pesky costs that make a college or university better.

If attrition dropped by 5% for this school and we substitute 5% increased retention for attrition percentage in the formula.

CSF1 = [(500 x 5% = 25) x 13,000] =

$325,000 more revenue.

Plug your school’s numbers in and see how increasing retention affects your budget and instructional strength while attrition will sap the ability to meet budget and mission.

For the full white paper, please contact info@GreatServiceMatters.com

(I have been told the link is sending people to our web page where the email can be found but if you wish to skip the web page, copy and paste the address in your email editor. Sorry for any inconvenience.)

The ROI of Retention 2 - CSFactor 2

CSFactor 2

CSF2 = [(SL x CA = -E) + CSL1]

There is a universal law that it should take less energy to sit on a flagpole than to climb it. Seems logical. Climbing it numerous times to gain four different views would require burning more calories than shinnying up once and sitting up there to look around for the views.

Yet there are certainly those who seem to have not learned the lesson. Colleges that have not yet focused on the value of retention which can be increased through some simple customer service training rely on the old churn and burn approach. Keep bringing in ever increasing numbers of new students and don’t worry if they just drop out never to return. Just get some more.

These schools make admission folks in particular climb the pole over and over, burn calories, the late night compact fluorescents, and just plain burn out trying to meet ever-increasing admission goals. You’d think some universities had never heard of flag pole sitting on a pillow called retention. Or the stabilizing element of customer service that creates the toochas-saving cushioning in the pillow. Or ever concerned themselves with little issues like revenue, budgets and paying for things. Or the energy-saving and budget building value and cost-savings of retention. Because flagpole climbing not only burns calories and people, but piles of revenue.

Admissions Costs – Retention Saves CSF2

Another simple reality here. Every student a college enrolls costs it money to do so – big money too! Every student retained costs from nothing to quite little.

In fact a study we did two years ago found that the average cost of enrolling a student is $5,460. This study of 40 randomly chosen colleges, universities and career schools included ALL cost of enrolling a student. Most colleges just look at direct marketing costs per student and forget about all the associated costs. They divide marketing and advertising, maybe lead costs too, by the number of students and voila – a miscalculation.

The real costs of enrolling a student include the marketing costs yes, but also the marketing staff, advertising, publications, admission staff, clerical people, travel, orientation, printing, allocated time and effort from bursar, registrar, academics, counseling, advising, student services, financial aid, orientation, registration, and so on; mailings, emails, phone calls, website and so on and on and on. Fixed capital costs associated with most all of this add another 7-9% on the average. There are in fact very few parts of a college that are not involved at some point and time in admissions. We also found that schools were not including all students who had made inquiries to the college. Every time a student is responded to, there are costs. These all add to the time and costs. Considerable costs. $5,460 worth of costs. (For those who wish the full description, methodology and breakouts of research data, I am sorry to say we do not supply it. It is proprietary and not available.)

For some schools, the cost of recruiting a student actually outweighs the tuition received from them. The ones that survive are generally assisted by some public assistance based on an unduplicated headcount formula. But even with public assistance many schools still lose money on student acquisition when he or she who drops out. (I suppose they intend to make it up on volume?) This is especially so if the student leaves before providing tuition and fees at least equal to the acquisition costs. And every student who leaves must be replaced with at least another at another additional expenditure of $5,460. But it usually required more than one re[placement student and associated acquisition costs.

In fact, to obtain one FGE (full time graduate equivalent) at the average annualized attrition of 32%, it will take 3-4 students acquired to get one FGE at a two-year school. 6-8 will be needed at a four-year school, with an average graduation at 5 years. If average graduation is more than 5 years, add another admission needed to get the FGE.

By the way, annualized tuition is the number a school should use to figure its real attrition. Not the retention between the freshman and sophomore years which is a very popular one. That leaves out all the students who already dropped out before the end of the second term or semester. That number fudges failure. For instance, if a college began a year with 100 new freshman and 99 left in week one but the remaining student stayed the whole year and returned, the freshman to sophomore percentage would be 100%.

Annualized attrition includes all students who left. It does not look at a starting class such as the freshman class as an isolated entity. It recognizes the Sophomore Bubble, the junior jump, senior slide, super senior slump and the “I’m not sure what I am except outta here” slump. Students leave at all times and should all be counted in the attrition number to be able to not just be real but to really understands how a college and its budget are actually performing.

The cost of retention at one school was reported by a participant during a workshop I was presenting at the Snowmass Institute (a very good enrollment management conference by the way). She said her university spent an average of $35 per retained student.

The Growing Importance of Retention to Graduation

The public, employers and legislatures (local, state and federal) are starting to catch onto the fact that the number of students who start or attend a college or university at headcount day is a meaningless statistic. Granted it may improve a person to get some education and even a drop out may have added value before leaving a university. But it is the diploma that is the real indicator of the success of a student and a school. That is the certification that everyone uses to determine someone has been educated and trained enough to contribute to the economy, the culture and society. It is the diploma, indifferent to whether it really indicates the holder is truly educated or really capable, that is the sign this person can be considered for a job and add to the economy.

This is our own fault to some extent. We keep telling society and legislatures that higher education is the fuel for the engine of the economy. And they have started to believe us to the point that they want to put the emphasis on the number of graduates that schools put into the economy. This is where political accountability is starting to move. The number of grads, not just attendees. Support formulas are going to start moving to the number of graduates and work backwards to entering students.

Starting with the number of graduates will make retention and even more important issue than it is now. This is due to retention rule 4 – students who drop out from the school tend not to graduate.

CSFactor 2 Using the formula.

CSF2 = [SL x CA = -E) + CSL1]

SL - # of students lost
CA – Cost of acquisition
-E – Enrollment $ lost
CSF2 – Total revenue lost

So using the numbers from the prior CSF1 example:

[198 x $5,460 = $1,081,080 + $2,574,000) = -$3,655,080.

This school has lost $3,655,080 along with almost 200 students. If it had retained the 198 students, it would have saved the $3.6 million. Even if it did cost $35 a student to retain them, that would have cost them $6,930. Even if we wish to extend that out of four years, the $27,720 is still just a bit less than $3.6 million.

Seems again that retention saves while attrition costs. And one hell of a lot of money.

But let’s not forget the human costs of people working very hard to bring students into the school just to see them leave. We have not even worked in the costs of replacing admissions and enrollment people who simply burn out from the ever-increasing new student goals and the psychological pain of climbing the ever-growing flagpole every start when they should be able to just sit there every so often and enjoy the retention view.

Figuring the ROI of Retention and Customer Service - CSF1

Following a presentation on customer service and retention at a major conference, I was asked by one of the attendees if I would supply the way I figure ROI from retention and customer service. In my presentations I always review the students’ seeking of their personal “ROIs” as well as the fiscal ROI the school should be looking at. His interest was to use the information in his marketing to show his company would provide a good return on investment.

I was inclined to help this person since his company is one I feel most schools could benefit by using. They supply counseling to students that helps keep them enrolled. But since I receive no remuneration from companies I recommend (income-wise it would be wise to take it but ethics-wise, it would not be wise except from Leadwise™ (personalized on-line view books, catalogs and web sites which I helped create….wise) I thought it best to share the formulas with everyone who can use them.

They help schools figure out how much revenue they are losing, or could and would gain if they focused on improving service to students. Keep in mind that 72% of all attrition is due to poor, weak, even average customer service at a college or university. The formulas come from years of research I and very smart assistants conducted during college service audits, workshops, presentations, retreats and other services we provide as well as just pure research. . We have been studying aspects of retention it seems before retention was an issue. Just think back just eight years ago when I started AcademicMAPS. Who talked about retention as an important aspect of a college.? It was, , admissions, admissions and again admissions and still is at too many places. I recall quite well the statement of the CEO of a large career college group who said “there isn’t a problem that exists that can’t be fixed by enrolling more students.”

Keeping them? Not so much.

How many did we admit and did commit to the next freshman class? When we lose students, “okay. It’s planned for in the budget as long as we don’t lose too many more than we budgeted…..” Dumb business model. Planning to lose all those customers and all the costs associated with acquiring them is a confident way of making sure the institution is always running a tight budget.

Over the years, when I asked some administrators how much admitting a student cost, the general answer was to add together the marketing budget with the admission director’s and recruiters’ salaries divided by the number of new freshman and that was the cost. Not even close. Even for-profit schools use the same basic approach. That explains why some run deficits.

(Can a school that loses money claim to be for-profit? Don’t you have to make a profit? By the way, what is the difference between a good for-profit and a good not-for-profit? Accounting terms. In a for-profit, it is called profit. In a not-for-profit, it is called “fund balance” or “surplus” and most every college president is called upon to develop one – profit or surplus that is.)

So here is the first part of what will be a three or four part series on figuring retention and customer service ROI, the CSFactors™, at your school or business. By the way, if you use the formulas and publish results for any reason from marketing to self-flagellation, please be kind enough to provide attribution to us. It will be appreciated.

CSFactor 1 The Value of Retention (or the Losses from Attrition)

CSF1 helps a college figure out how much revenue/money it is losing from its actual attrition.

CSF1 = [(P X A= SL) X T]

In the formula, P represents the total school population; not just the starting fall freshman number. Most schools use the fall incoming freshmen numbers and that is an error. The assumption is that attrition occurs most in the first six weeks of the freshman year. That may be close to correct but the reality is that students are leaving colleges and universities in any one of their six plus years of a four year degree and in the four plus years of a two-year degree. Students leave your school throughout their experience at the school. In fact, some schools are beginning to realize this and worry about the Sophomore Bubble. But the really need to worry about the super soph sluff, the rising junior jilt, the junior jump, super junior split, the fourth year flee and so on. Colleges need to be concerned with every student every day of their attendance for it could be his last.

So we look at the total population.

A equals attrition. Again not just from freshman but an annualized attrition rate. And this rate is to include ALL students who leave for any reason. It does not matter if the student says he or she will be back. They are not back in the population and bringing in revenue until they actually do return. If they pay a “place holding fee”, that does not count them as an student until they are actually back in classes.

Fudge with the numbers if you are overly deluded or insecure, or unethical enough to keep the PR machine going or the Board feeling better but when you use our formulas, be fully honest. It will help you understand why the budget is not working or may suddenly implode. Remember, no one likes surprises, especially ones that have parentheses around them in the budget and lead to freezes, cuts and the like.

By the way, if your school is like most everyone I work with or call for help, you likely do not have a clear fix on an annualized attrition rate. Many schools have never figured it. Go figure and use an annualized attrition rate.

SL stands for students lost annually from total population and revenue production. And T equals tuition at the school.

So here is what showed up when we analyzed CSF1 for a particular college which for our purposes we will call Mammon University. You may know it. Its motto is Omnes Por Pecunia. Anything for a Buck. More on Mammon U later.

Its total population was 500 students.

Annualized attrition was at 39.6%

So SL (students lost annually) was 198.

Times an average tuition of $13,000.

The school uses a differentiated tuition scale per program.

So, the formula becomes:

[(500 x 39.6% = 198) x $13,000] =

a revenue loss of (sound of a trumpet flourish but on a kazoo since Mammon U cannot afford a real trumpet since it has lost) ($2,574,000)!!!!

To carry this forward a bit, we can plug in other numbers and see how an increase in retention could add to the bottom line and thus the ability to pay for full time faculty, staff, their benefits, increases for adjuncts, instructional equipment, tutors, research release, new curricula and programs, maintenance, …. All those pesky costs that make a college or university better.

If attrition dropped by 5% for this school and we substitute 5% increased retention for attrition percentage in the formula.

CSF1 = [(500 x 5% = 25) x 13,000] =

$325,000 more revenue.

Any school, college or university that doesn't want at least another $325,000 in the budget?

Plug your school’s numbers in and see how increasing retention affects your budget and instructional strength.

The Customer is Really...... What is Customer Service in College Really?

Which of the following is true?

1. The customer is always right. True  False 

2. If there is a question, referto number 1. True  False

It has been an inviolable adage found in most customer service books, that both number 1 and number two are correct. The customer is always right. It is therefore our role to all we can to please the customer; to make her feel we accept that she and her business are number 1 to the store or institution by fulfilling every wish if at all possible. To go the extra mile to make the customer happy. To indulge, pamper, spoil and if necessary, to even pander to each whim to assure the customer is satisfied and will come back. This has been the concept that has been central to Business 101 and been hung on posters and fliers in backrooms across the country almost since it was reportedly created in 1908 by French hotel owner César Ritz (1850-1918) when he stated 'Le client n'a jamais tort' - 'The customer is never wrong.” The current, more American usage was established by the Marshall Fields store in Chicago and then popularized by Harry Gordon Selfridge who left Fields to create London’s Selfridge’s department store in 1909.

It is this time honored concept that is so strongly at odds with many people on college campuses. Influential segments of the college community believe this idea that the customer is right imposes a construct of business on a very non-commercial institution – academia. A basic bastard of business which has money as its goal forced upon intellectual institutions with our ideals of intellectual pursuit and learning, in that order. Obviously not just a mismatch but an attempt to undermine the very nature of the academic environment and “corporatize the academy” as one faculty member told me prior to a workshop he refused to attend. Colleges and universities are not about money and revenue after all.

In fact, money corrupts the purity of the intellectual community, except when it comes to my office or department’s budget perhaps. Or my salary, benefit cost or equipment. But then the money is only needed to be able to provide education or services to others to make the institution stronger to be better able to meet its mission. And after all, we do not have customers. Students are not customers. They are….students. So I don’t pick 1 or 2.

But students do pay for an education so they must be customers and we should listen to business to make sure the revenue comes in. After all, without money coming in how are we to fund your budget, pay for salary and benefit increases and all the other things we need to meet the mission. So we need to consider that number 1 may have some merit. Perhaps we need an ad hoc committee to study…….

Lord save us all from even one more committee! Let’s just realize that in typical academic mode, the positions are all or nothing postures that are both wrong, and yet still right.

Consider that if you checked number 1 as correct, number 2 necessarily follows as acceptable. But if you chose number one as true. You are wrong to begin with. The customer is not always right. Yet, that does not make the faculty member who derided customer service as illegitimate in higher education right. Not at all for he is also wrong. Very palpably wrong at that. And in this case, your wrong and his wrong do not make the customer right.

The reality is that the customer is often wrong. Particularly in higher education. Just think of your last quiz. I am sure you found many students were wrong in many of their answers or guesses. That is the nature of a quiz or a test after all. Though we would hope that the customer would be always right and prove that he or she really understood the lectures, the readings and the assignments, such is not the reality of most classes and schools. Students, our customers, are often wrong. (Actually so is the term customer for our students but that will be discussed in another section).

The reality is that students are wrong by very their very nature as students. They come to college to learn what they do not know; to become more correct in their knowledge and abilities. They are in school to replace erroneous or uninformed notions with information and learning. In fact, if they already knew, if they had the skills prior to coming into school, they would not have to enroll. They would not become students, our clients and customers.

Taxonomical Issue 3 Can I Graduate? and What You Can do to Make the Answer YES

When a student finds resolution or answers to the first two questions in the taxonomy, he or she then has to face certain realities. Now is when taxonomy question 3 comes into play. “Can I graduate?”

During the can I get in and pay for it levels, there is an undying optimism. “Sure I can do okay here. I’ll just study harder and apply myself. This is college and I will buckle down and get to work.” Phrases well learned after being used after every high school break, midterms, finals, grades, and even a few botched tests. But the results are quite often the same as New Year’s resolutions – unused exercise equipment and unread text books.

Consider that most students have been told that “You won’t be able to get away with that in college.” Even if that is not necessarily true. You can often get away with much more. For example, attendance. Do you REQUIRE attendance? Likely not, so it is much easier for students to skip class and get on the road to failure. (In fact, not having an attendance policy is surely very poor customer service to students and faculty. But more on this later because it really is a big service issue.)

Students know their own adequacies and inadequacies. They know if they may have trouble. And since the goal of attending college is to graduate and get that certification, that ticket to a career, that degree, they will focus on whether or not they can make it. They will ask themselves “Can I graduate?” regularly.

They care about graduating. Just look at the joy on graduation day and all the folks they want to invite to see them walk across the stage and get that empty folder (Your degree will be mailed to you). That day is what most every other day is about for them. And if they ever get the feeling they may not be able to graduate from your school, they will leave it to find another they can graduate from.

You may not realize that because most schools don’t really focus on graduation. They, we, focus on enrolling them in the first place. What happens after that. Well that is up to the student. Sink or swim approach. You’re in college now. Schools spend so much time and money recruiting yet retention is not a big enough issue on most campuses.

I’ll bet your school is like that new pair of jeans or shoes you bought. You spent a long time searching for the right ones, tried it on, checked it out in the mirror, maybe even asked a fiend to add an opinion. Now that you got it home and worn the jeans or shoes, they have lost their importance. Shoes have gone unshined and the jeans washed whenever and folded up into a draw with others and you are now thinking about something new to go and seek out. The new almost always outweighs the interest in what we’ve got. That applies to the jeans, the shoes and surely to students at our schools.

Do you even have a director of retention whose job is to be responsible for retaining each and every student? If you have anything close to this, does he or she have a staff anywhere as large as the admissions staff? Your answers will quickly tell you if there is a commitment to retention or admissions.

Learn and Earn or Churn and Burn?

For most schools, life is a treadmill. Just keep running and lose calories? Not quite. More of churn admissions and burn enrollments. That’s our basic M.O. And it is a losing one too. Loss of students does equal loss of revenue, loss of morale, loss of integrity and loss of the chance to actually meet that mission statement so prominent in catalogues but not many other places I fear. Churn and burn is a loss not just for students but for schools. (If you’d like a copy of the article from University Business “Learn and Earn, not Churn and Burn”, just let me know at nealr@greatservicematters.com)

And graduation? Just a day to have a small committee arrange, get a speaker, pull out the academic robes and see if anyone else from the school shows up unless they have to.

But just because we don’t care all that much, does not take the concern away from students. This is especially true of neo-traditional students. Those students who used to e called non-traditional (adults, single parents, minorities, lower socio-economic students…) but have become sought after admits for schools to make their admission quotas. The neo-traditionals know that their cohorts graduate at much lower rates than the traditionals who came from better schools, families with an educational focus and money to at least obtain loans and be able to pay them off.

The March 23 Chronicle of Higher Education article "The Graduation Gap" states that

..students from low-income backgrounds are less likely to graduate from college than their wealthier peers. For college students from families with annual incomes of $25,000 or less, slightly one in four earns a bachelor’s degrees within six years…For students from families with annual incomes of $70,000 or more, that figure is 57% percent.

One in four. Wonder if students in the lower-income cohorts are concerned about their own chance to be in that 25%? You bet they are.

And the 57% from better economic backgrounds? Wonder if they…. Hey wait a minute! Only 57%. That means 43% of all students who start higher education do not get a degree? Do not graduate in six years? Sure some take longer but this means that a huge number of students just do not graduate. THEY DO NOT GRADUATE! NOT FROM YOUR SCHOOL? NOT FROM ANY SCHOOL?????

With those numbers in mind, do you start to see why question 3 is “Can I graduate?” And if the answer is “No” or Maybe not” can you also see that since graduation and the degree is why people attend and pay for college, students will quit or at least transfer to another school where they feel they may have a better chance to graduate?

If students do not believe you will help them answer their taxonomic question 3, you will lose them. Sink or swim is not a good retention or customer service position. Think and help them swim is a much better way to go for you and for them.

Focus on helping them succeed.

Not just in remedial courses freshman year but with help, assistance and attention to needs every year, every week and every day. They ask the question over and over again. Some every week, every day. Be there to help answer the question with assistance, with tutoring services that are important enough to make sure tutors know enough to really tutor. Students might be nice in class, but that does not necessarily make them good tutors.

I have a bet for anyone reading this. You name the stake. Here is the bet. I wager your school does not care enough about students graduating to either have enough tutors or to ever train them in how to tutor, to teach. If you do, let me hear about it. Consider also that most schools use "peer tutors" - a euphemism that means we use the cheapest labor we can find even if they may not know all that much more than the people they try to help. Peer tutors are other students, often from the same class! They may be bright enough in class but not smart enough to e able to find ways to explain and help the student in need. I mean let's face it, we have enough people with Ph D's in front of classes who do not know how to teach and they do have more education. Plus they have experienced more teaching so perhaps by some form of amoeba-like osmosis they picked up some techniques. But, why believe an under-educated peer/student with no teaching ability can do the trick for the weakest students. If tutoring is supposed to help retain students by supplying help to make them believe they can succeed, at least train the tutors. Give the students and the tutors a chance to be successful. Correspondingly, get some classroom professionals to do the tutoring and drop the peer idea. A rather small investment in professional tutors can reap very large revenue savings. One tutor at say $30,000 plus benefits who helps keep 20 students in school at 20 X tuition... You do the math.

Another Starting Place

Okay, so now where to start. Here it is. Give enough of a damn to require students actually attend all their classes. Make attendance obligatory. Make learning required. Drop the “right to fail” approach and replace it with a demand to succeed. And don’t wait until they are in “academic difficulty”. Waiting until they are in grade trouble is like watching a person who can’t swim go down three times and then trying to help when a good swimming lesson could have saved everyone some trouble.

Make students believe they can graduate and you will be there to help before the question becomes so prominent that the only true answer is “Don’t know.” If you wait, they will answer it for themselves, or you will and you will lose a student, they a chance at their dreams. And all of us the opportunity for our society to get stronger and better.

A Tale of Really Poor Service

The recent series of postings on faculty and customer service led to a number of comments and phone calls. There were more than enough stories that Stephen King would have found to horrific. And in every case, the reporter of the story requested anonymity. They were concerned they would suffer retaliation from colleagues. Sad to hear. I mean even Ari Fleischer came clean in public.

I will relate one of them from a SUNY college that will remain anonymous. The story came to me from a counselor at the school and was corroborated by the parents of the student.

It seems that classes just started again for Spring semester. An adjunct is teaching an introductory foreign language course there. He announced to the class on the first day that “if you aren’t already pretty fluent in ______ you will not do well in this class.”

"But" protested a student, "this is introduction to ____________ . We took it because we don’t know any _________.”

“Too bad. I’m not wasting my time struggling to teach you introductory stuff. It’s too much work. If you don’t have facility with ___________ already you may want to get out.”

“That’s not fair. I’m paying to learn ____________ and you’re supposed to teach us.”

“Wrong understanding. See, I’m an adjunct and retired from teaching so I do this just to augment my income. And what can they do to me? Fire me? So what. If you don’t already know some ____________ better plan on working extra hard. Now who needs my syllabus?”

A group of students raised their hands including one student who already had obtained a copy through the bookstore. When the teacher saw she had one yet raised her hand, he derided her by saying “Let me try this again. I said Syl- A- Bus.” He broke the word into syllables and said them slowly as if he were talking to a simpleton.

“I see you have a syl-a-bus so may-be you do not need a-nother” again slowly and drawn out. “May-be this course will be toooooooooo touughhhh for you since you do not speak English very well.”

The student who was treated to this derision spoke with her advisor to see how one goes about transferring to another school. The student also surely told anywhere from 6 to 12 other people about this event including his or her parents who told me the tale after I heard from a colleague of the one man attrition machine. Checked the sources so be sure of the validity. I may have a word or two off but from the two reports, it is very close.

This is not a slam against adjuncts at all by the way. I heard from full-time faculty about tenured colleagues as well. The stories reminded me of my first day in grad school when a tenured professor at the University of Massachusetts tossed me out of a history of the novel course because he didn’t want to teach a class larger than 24. You see, I had read some of the novels on the syllabus so I had to go. I stayed at UMAss - Amherst by the way because other students assured me the teacher was an ---hole but most everyone else except------ and ---------- and oh yuh ------------ were good and grad school vacuums anyhow so lower expectations. Those who got profs --- and ---- and ----early on did get the heck out of grad school. Besides, I couldn't be able to afford anywhere else. I am sure that you can recall some similar attrition boosting behavior.

But my grad school colleagues were right. There were some great student oriented teachers, some of whom I have stayed in contact with all these years. And for the most part, grad school was often a long rectal exam but absolutely required as a vocational necessity.

By the way, out of a sense of ethical behavior, I sent a copy of this posting directly to the college president the student plans to leave after this semester so he can investigate. Can’t just let a mumzer like that prof kill the spirit of students.