Developing a Service Culture
at NNU
Positives--- NNU
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Seasoned Leadership
Terrific Staff
Outstanding Product
Committed Constituency
More than an Education
Good Value
Desirable Location
Right Size
Why A+ Service at NNU
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Competition.
Turns recruitment success into retention
success.
Rising expectations of our “customers.”
Improve our image.
Contributes to a pleasant work
environment.
Facilitate learning.
Our students are our customers, as well as
our product. We must treat them
accordingly, in the way that you expect to
be treated when you go to make a major
purchase.
Derek Hodgson, Provost – Mississippi State University
“A student does us great honor by
entrusting her or his higher education to
us; they give us their future. In return, let
us be certain that we do everything that
we can to ensure that when they leave
here, they are as well prepared for that
future as we can possibly make them.”
Derek Hodgson, Provost
Mississippi State University
REMINDER
No one has to enroll at NNU
No one has to stay at NNU
Everyone want to be treated with respect and
appreciated
Student-keeping Colleges:
 Value Students – Every college or university teaches that students
are important. We’re not talking about employee manual
directives, but about the heartfelt, sincere belief that the student
is the most important person in the organization.
 Are Organized Around Students – The Student-keeping institution
has flattened the hierarchy-happy organizational chart and broken
down the thick walls between departments. It doesn’t matter how
high or how deep you are inside the institution; students are still
the concern.
 Are Hardwired to Serve Students – Hardwiring is the rewards
system. A student-keeping institution’s hardwiring will reinforce
attitudes and behavior that place the students first.
 Have Leaders that Point the Way – Leaders provide three critical
elements to change: permission to experiment, try new ways to
fail; protection from organizational immune systems that kill
anything new; and tools to help people create solutions.
Great service keeps customers coming
back:
Oliver, the doorman at Chicago’s
Continental Plaza, opened the taxi for a
man, greeting him, “How are you?
We’ve been waiting for you!” The man
beamed – at last people realized how
important he was. The doorman was
tipped generously, and as the man
walked into the hotel, he heard the
doorman open the next taxi and cry
out, “How are you? We’ve been waiting
for you!” Tough Selling for Tough Times –
Murray and Neil Raphel
Technology and Service
“Technology is entropic; it always
degrades. The biggest problem is what I
call ‘mid-tech’ – the trappings of hightech, but delivering a low-tech
experience. When you check into a hotel
and have to wait in line for 45 minutes
because the computer is down, that’s
mid-tech. When you call an ‘800’ number
and it just rings 20 times, that’s mid-tech.
It drives customers away…”
James Rosenfield
There is less to fear from
outside competition than
from inside inefficiency,
uninspiring teaching,
discourtesy, and bad
service.
Special Report on Campus
Retention
*The number of faculty and administrative
staff employed is based on enrollment.
*When student enrollment is down, there is
less need for faculty and administrative staff.
*Student enrollment is down.
Can you help??????
The Key!!
The key to achieving sustainable competitive
advantage in today’s markets is to build
relationships with students by serving them
in excellent fashion…not just selling to them.
In the Service age, service
is not just something
managers should think
about now and then; it is
management.
Karl Albrecht
Five General Dimensions of Service
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Tangibles: Appearance of physical facilities,
equipment, personnel, and communication
materials.
Reliability: Ability to perform the promised
service dependably and accurately.
Responsiveness: Willingness to help
customers and provide prompt service.
Assurance: Knowledge and courtesy of
employees and their ability to inspire trust
and confidence.
Empathy: Caring, individualized attention the
firm provides its customers.
Relative Importance of service Dimension
When Respondents Allocate 100
Points
Assurance
Reliability
32%
19%
Empathy
16%
Responsiveness
22%
Tangibles
11%
Two Levels of Expectations
Desired service
Zone
Of
Tolerance
Adequate Service
Customer – Student Service
“One of the most common mistakes I
think organizations make is that they
put responsibility for good customer
service totally on the shoulders of the
front-line employees. Good customer
service does not happen without
effective management methods,
strategies, and empowerment of
employees. It’s a behind-the-scenes
effort that results in good front-line
customer service.”
Linda Halverson, University of St. Thomas, Minneapolis, MN
…every point of service delivery
is a time when students evaluate
whether they have gotten their
money’s worth, whether the
price they have paid equals or
exceeds the value of what they
are getting and what they were
promised.
Sales and Marketing
Management
Common Customer Service Problems
 Complicated fee payment procedures.
 Poor communication between offices.
 Technology behind the times.
 College’s hours and services don’t match
student needs.
 Repeat same mistakes semester after
semester.
 Admissions not responding to needs of
entering students.
Generic Product
Expected Product
Augmented Product
Potential Product
Good Student-Customer
service involves…
1. Feeling positively toward student
2.
3.
4.
5.
customers.
Encouraging student-customer
feedback.
Responding to student-customer
problems.
Developing repeat relationships.
Seeking to exceed student-customer
expectations.
Linda Halverson, University of St. Thomas, Minneapolis, MN
Ten Commandments of Human Relations
1.
2.
3.
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9.
10.
Speak to People. There is nothing as nice as a cheerful
word of greeting.
Smile at People. It takes 72 muscles to frown, only 14
to smile.
Call People by Name. The sweetest music to anyone’s
ears is the sound of his name.
Be Friendly and Helpful. If you would have friends, be
friendly.
Be Genuinely Interested in People. You can like
everybody if you try.
Be Generous with Praise. Cautious with criticism.
Be Considerate with Feelings of Others. It will be
appreciated.
Be Thoughtful of the Opinions of Others. There are
three sides to a controversy – yours, the other fellow’s
and the right one.
Be Cordial. Speak and act as if everything you do were
a genuine pleasure.
Be Alert to Give Service. What counts in life is what we
do for others.
Ways
to
Win
 Being the low cost provider
 Having unlimited capitol to finance growth
 Winning with customer care and service.
Quality is not enough…
“Companies that win big in the future will
be adept at providing more than quality
products. They will make owning and
using their products a satisfying
experience. Companies that succeed on
these terms will win their competitive
battles, not by miles but by inches. But
once they win, they will be very tough to
displace.”
FORUM – New York Times
The Marketing-Service Grid
Nature of External Marketing
Superior
Moderate
Optimum
Strategy
Aggressive
Possible
“Overkill”
Quality of
Service
Inferior
Need to move Counter
up instead of Productive
to the right
Strategy
There is only one boss, and whether a person shines shoes for a living or
heads up the biggest corporation in the world, the boss remains the same. It’s the
customer. The customer is the person who pays everyone’s salary and who decides
whether a business is going to succeed or fall.
And he doesn’t care if a business has been around 100 years. The
minute it starts treating him badly, he’ll start to put it out of business.
The boss – the customer – has bought and will buy every thing you have
or will have. He’s bought all of your clothes, your home, your car. He pays your
bills and for your children’s education, and he pays in the exact proportion to the
way you treat him.
The man who works deep inside a big warehouse or in a retail store
might think he is working for the company that writes his paycheck, but he’s not.
He’s working for the person who buys the products offered in the stores. In fact,
the customer can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, and
he can do it simply by spending his money somewhere else.
Some of the largest companies that had flourishing
Businesses a few years ago are no longer in existence. They couldn’t or didn’t
satisfy the customers. They forgot who their real boss was.
The greatest measurement of our success is how well we please the
customer, “our boss.” Let’s all support “aggressive hospitality” and have our
customers leave 100 percent satisfied every day.
Sam Walton
Service management is
a crucial but often
overlooked part of
enrollment
management.
Why Do You Think They Call It
Higher Education?
$16,000
$14,000
$12,000
$10,000
$8,000
$6,000
$4,000
$2,000
$0
1980
1983
1986
1989
1992
1995
1998
2001
What Does It Take?
The secret to success doesn’t lie in being the
luckiest, the smartest or even the most well-connected.
According to a recent survey of executives by
Accountemps, the most successful people they’ve
known became that way through good old-fashioned
hard work and determination.
Respondents were asked: Of the successful
people you have met over the years, which one of the
following is the main reason for their success? The
responses were as follows:
*Hard work – 40 percent
*Determination – 38 percent
*Knowledge – 7 percent
*Luck – 5 percent
*Contacts – 5 percent
*All of the above – 2 percent
*Other/Don’t know – 3 percent.