Customer Satisfaction

In our University environment there has been much discussion about the use of the word "customer". In the University's MQuality program, the use of the principle of "customer satisfaction" has been replaced with the concept of "satsifying those we serve". There is ongoing debate about who are the "customers" of higher education.

However, we in ITD are clear that our mission is to be a service division and that we are here to work in partnership with the faculty, staff and students of the University (and even others beyond the University) to provide effective information technology based solutions to our customers needs.

: (1.3mb) - maybe we should ask the customer first; (1.1mb) - Quality makes you think "customer focus"

We have come to understand that our University customers (be they staff, faculty or students) vary widely across a spectrum of comfort with the technology itself and need to be "served" differently.

In the past, we often dealt mostly with customers who, like ourselves, have been innovators. These are customers who are as familiar with information technology acronyms and as eager to try out new software and hardware as we are.

We are finding ourselves now being challenged to provide information technology products and services to the "majority group" of customers. These are people who need "whole products" or complete packages. This means we provide reliable technology, of course, but also good documentation, on-line help, telephone based help, "whole service" disks containing ancillary software for networked connectivity and even hand-holding during installation.

Last updated 5 May by tbray@umich.edu