Re: all the discussion about who are customers in educational
institutions.
I agree completely that educational institutions play a wide variety
of different roles, each of which has its own value chain (suppliers,
producers/transformers, customers).
And that, I submit, is also the key problem. Our schools have so many
roles that they are unable to do any one of them well, and, since
there are usually more rewards available in the
non-teaching/non-learning roles, the better people quickly realize
that and leave the real or virtual classroom in favor of the more
lucrative research and/or consulting arenas.
So, I still am in favor of simplifying and focusing. And the best way
I know of doing that, in our society at least, is to follow the money
and focus on what the economic buyer wants. It may not be idealistic
or even optimum, but it at least should align incentives and actions,
which would be a big step forward.
--
Joe Podolsky
(podolsky@hpcc01.corp.hp.com)