Miriam, That's correct! How do you recognize each of these groups?
Dr. Jean Norris
Our facility hosts open house and meet & greet sessionsx every quarter for our external customers.
To me, my external customers are any individuals outside of my classroom. My internal customers are those in my class at the time. They deserve my undivided attention and have a task that they need for me to help them with. The external customers are those that have completed my course, will be taking the course, my coworkers, and anyone that walks through the doors of my school. To me, it even starts in the parking lot. Every person deserves a smile, and I try to say the individuals name every chance I get to let them know they're a person.
We deal with various dental offices and clinics in our area for student externs.
Once per quarter we host an open house for them. This gives them a chance to see the training ground for their potential employees.
Our main external customers are the employers who will eventually hire our students, but also act as quality assurance representatives who frequently visit our school as Program Accountability Committee members, public health directors, professional association staff or other members of our professional community who are interested in the progress and success of our program.
Emeline, The community is your external customer, that is correct! What are other things you can do to recognize them and their efforts with your students?
Dr. Jean Norris
Natalie, What a great way to approach your students! Body language, tone, all of that is so important. Does your institution employ the same tactics to external customers (for example, the surrounding community)?
Dr. Jean Norris
In a Vocational Nursing program it is so important to make each and every student know that what they are doing to improve their future is important. Encourage every student individually. Your body language, tone of voice, and helping them to understand that at one point you were exactly where they are, you remember and make an effort to let tham know YOU CARE!
The community are my external customers.The way I can serve them is to provide them bussiness cards and pamphlets.Often times during my clinicals with my students I would establish rapport with the nurse assistant to encourage them to continue and advance their degree and try to enroll to our LVN program. I believe that we as a faculty could really help get students to enroll in our program as the community can actually see what we are teaching our students in the real setting.
Bill, That is true. However, when thinking about external customers consider those that are not specifically attached to your institution. For example, internship sites, companies that have hired graduates, etc. What do you do to recognize them?
Dr. Jean Norris
Security guards, phone surveys, website info are all very valuable at our school
Leila, Sure! And thank you for sharing!
Dr. Jean Norris
Carol, Great awareness! All of the things you listed appear to be great ways to provide service to the community. Thank you for sharing!
Dr. Jean Norris
Being a vocational nursing college, we have so many external customers and we provide nursing assistance to the many facilities and even provide new grads to their employee pool. We encourage many organizations to come to our school and give their expertise and knowledge to improve the educational areas within the community. We do our best to do community outreach with sharing our students for medical assessments and flu clinics, other areas where students can improve community exposure and learn about diversity within our city. When we say external customers, we not only have students,their families and friends, possible employers, venders, and anyone that might want to come to school in the future are customers.
Positive! At job fairs we have interested prospects fill out information request forms and we usually have a really good turn out. As far as passing out business cards, its hit or miss, as you can imagine!
Nicole, Prospective students are external clients, in a way. Great customer service and presentation is key! Thank you for sharing.
Dr. Jean Norris
Our main external customer is also the students! We have a great recruiting team! They show people around the school so they can get a good look at how it would be if they were really there. They are very hands on with them in showing them how things work!
David, Your graduates and their industries are a great place to find external clients. What specifically does your institution do to recognize them?
Dr. Jean Norris
Glenda, Great ideas! It sounds like you really care about your external clients, and your enthusiasm is contagious! How can you tell that you are serving your external clients?
Dr. Jean Norris
our graduates and the industry that they will be working in
