At NISOD in
2011, the two members of the 2012 presentation and two other colleagues presented
“Can the Customer Service Model “Work” for Faculty?” In brief, the answer is
“yes”—as a way for faculty members to look at customer service for higher
education in the context of diverse businesses and services. To repeat one of
the slides from that presentation:
To be part of the dialog on the future of education—to both
understand and to be understood—faculty need to know: •
What people from fields other than education may mean when
they talk about customers and customer service •
What education does that is different from other fields
and why those differences in education are in their—and the
nation’s—interest |
Use the
table below to find the kind of information you want:
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Information… |
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Chart
that lets you compare easily how the customer service model works with
storefront retail (the way many of us think about customer service) and 6
other systems, including higher education |
•
With
the left column covering the Customers
(Users, Clients, or Stakeholders) and Issues •
With the next 7 columns covering each of the 7 models •
With rows covering each Customer or Issue (The items in each row are
color coded to show what is similar
in that row and what is different in
that row.) A close
look seems to show that higher education is not like most of the other six systems. Examples: •
Unlike the others, has multiple customers that no other system has—and
all are at risk if Higher Education fails (Notice all the differences in the Higher Education
column.) •
Unlike the others, has customers who must act but may lack both
commitment and preparation •
Unlike most others, measures a) the user as part of the product and b)
product/service itself and is therefore intransparent—to
use a term from Dietrich Dörner—but does
not have the resources of the other system that measure intransparent issues |
Chart that
lets you see the 3 systems that seem most like higher education—what those
systems do make measurement |
3
systems together that seem to be most like higher education – A close
look seems to show that higher education faces greater challenges. The chart
includes callouts revealing some of those challenges. |
Chart’s
source for the data in the seven columns for how the customer service model works
in each of the seven systems from store front retail to higher education |
List
of the presenters, their recommended resources, and their diverse work
experience—with the presenters having a combined work experience of over
seventy years (not counting our years in higher education) and having worked
in those fields for a long enough time to understand: •
How these systems “work” •
How they succeed—and sometimes how they fail |
Cognitive
reason for placing this information in a chart |
It is always difficult to look at detailed, complex, and
interconnected data. Dietrich Dörner
covers how to use analogy and plotting
of data (such as in a chart) as a way to understand a complex system. |
Examples
of the view that the only customer of education is the student Also
source of the quotation used at the top of the: §
Public High School chart: “there is only one real customer—the
individual who chooses to pursue an education” §
Higher Education chart: “If students aren't the customers of the
university, who are?” |
Quotations
plus examples of the view that the only customer of education is the student |
For
information or problems with this link, please email using the email address
below.
WCJC Department: |
History – Dr. Bibus |
Contact Information: |
281.239.1577 or bibusc@wcjc.edu |
Last Updated: |
2012 – 06/04 |
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