hyphenpedia

Are you one out of many? Become one out of two!

2008-05-15T14:27:00.001+02:00

It’s only simple maths. Being in a neighbourhood with 10 competitive foreign language schools, you are one out of ten. Quality factors and parameters may boost or repress your chances, so it’s pretty unlikely that you and your competitors will take a share of 10% of the local student population each. Still you are one out of ten. Does it sound cynical? It shouldn’t. Especially now, when most private language schools are thinking about their promotional campaigns. How could your school not just be one out of ten when most possibly you will:

a) Invest in a campaign that statistically will cost you an average of 6,500 EUR for the period of mid-August to end-September, along with a few more thousands of private language school owners in Greece. The majority of your direct competitors are, of course, included.
b) This campaign will mainly consist of printed material, with photography or illustration possibly showing snapshots of your school’s activities, happy children’s faces and the usual and self-explanatory information of what you offer. This is preparation for all “recognized” examinations and certificates, levels from A Junior to C2, possibly pre-junior “free” classes and computer assisted learning sessions. Actually, the more you can squeeze onto each double-page spread the better.
c) You will back up your advertising material with small useful objects, like rulers, timetable charts, pencil cases, etc. to be distributed outside schools or central gathering locations.
d) You will invest a lot of effort in convincing everyone that you have developed the best methods, co-operate with the best teachers and that you use the best publications around.
e) You will promise small classes with individual care to each student.
f) You will mention the accrediting body, local association, nation-wide federation, club, closed examination centre, etc., of which you are a member, as proof of acknowledgement by peers in your field.
Parents will, most possibly, have made up their mind by then as to where they’re going to send their child. They are convinced that all schools offer the same service, prepare for the same “valid” exams, and have small classes and lots of “successes” on their windows. They will have asked around their own neighbourhood which school is “better”, less strict or stricter, more or less generous with grades, more or less hours per week. In the end they will consider which school is closer, not across a big road, cheaper, offers classes on the evenings when shops are open, and most importantly which school their child’s friends are going to go to. Does this mean that parents’ criteria are so humble and low? No, it means that your school is one out of many, so for it to be chosen, it has to satisfy the above criteria as well.
If you want your school to be the “chosen” one, you cannot be one out of many, but must become one out of two. You should be on one side and all the others on the other. To achieve this, there’s only one way; your unique selling point. Moreover, your unique selling point must be promoted in a unique way, as this point is not one individual thing, but your school’s whole entity through a characteristic that becomes a “flag”, a projected identity.
This unique selling point must make the potential customer think: “hmmm, it’s still worth overlooking the four language centres on my way there, and actually, I don’t mind paying 40 Euros more per year and having to take my child there twice a week myself!”
What could this be, though, that could make all the others look so outstandingly the same and at the same time you so different to them?
Everything starts with the service you provide. This service is only tuition and exam preparation in a world where parents don’t expect anything more than that. Still, if they see that there is something beyond that, their expectations change. Then your service includes the “experience” of the parent and your student in your school in ways that are tangible and measurable for them. At the moment what you promise takes place in class, and the parent (decision maker) experiences it filtered through their child. For a parent to pay attention, the experience has to be outstanding and involving.
Let’s run through the same list of what you would normally do, but in a rather unique way, from the end to the beginning:
a) Instead of talking about your memberships, have peer members do this for you. Talk to colleagues of other, not competitive areas and ask for testimonials, even invite them to talk at an event about your cross-area reputation.
b) Instead of falling into the trap of promising individual care through small classes, establish individual personality tests and lesson plans based on them. Train your teachers and talk to the parents on that basis and turn your incredible teaching methods into an unrepeatable learning experience for your students. Assess parents’ involvement in co-operation with their children and make the latter reflect on that.
c) Instead of promising the best publications around, organize events, campaigns, newsletters and presentations of who the publisher is, locally and internationally, who the author is, their teaching experience, their international recognition, their success, and have these people do the same for you. Prove that your school is not just a figure for the publisher, but a centre acknowledged by them.
d) Instead of investing money in objects that will be thrown away, invest in building a striking visual corporate identity and printing documents and materials based on that. Make sure these reach your current and potential customers regularly, inspire your community with your organization and gravity in your field.
e) Instead of throwing out money only in September, “throw” your news, achievements, unique selling points, testimonials, announcements and awards to the public on a regular basis, until your prevalence becomes “second nature” to everybody in your area.
f) Create a plan and an implementation policy that is comprehensive enough for your staff to follow and do not forget my COMPOSE theory.
Couldn’t all this make you one out of two? It’s only simple maths after all.

Can you choose your path within the field? Say, I CAN!

2008-04-02T14:14:00.000+02:00

For the past few years that I have been writing this column, I have also implied that there are two different, however related, needs of the market that the average language school is serving. One is that of teaching a foreign language to the extent that the student is going to acquire it as a personal means of communication. The other is that of preparing examination candidates for personal accreditation in the usage of the foreign language. These two targets have always co-run, but still they have never been and can never be the same thing.
Using a language is not only a matter of possessing the structural elements of this communicative code. Using a foreign language is about a whole cultural awareness framework in when and how the user synthesizes these structural elements, how he/she personalizes this synthesis, how confidence is built within him/her and, eventually, how language usage confidence reflects on personalization and evolves along the evolution of the actual language.
Such a complex process can never reflect any assessment system or examination that is carried out industrially. The role of such an assessment system is to assure a minimum standard, without, though, being able to prove that performance at an examination reflects that minimum standard of language awareness, rather than just a good knowledge of the language required to pass the specific exam.
The truth is that blind dedication to any sort of accreditation in our country, for reasons that I have explained in the past, has inflated any stream serving the one of the two paths, especially that of exam preparation. There are so many available standard materials, presenting standard techniques to reach a standard exam, mainly requiring standard instructional (and not teaching) styles. For such a standard environment, how could it not be that anybody who can basically understand this environment (i.e. just any English Lit degree holder and any CPE holder) opens a language centre and runs it? You see, this is not about language teaching, but about exam preparation and coaching.
With Greece moving into the phase of maturity as a free economy, whatever market pressures and competition have been like so far, I feel real adult pressure and competition hasn’t knocked on our door yet, but is not so far from it any more either.
The Super Market concept flourished in Greece after the mid-eighties. What happened then? A change of legislation, adapting our law to European law brought major chains (remember Continent?) to our country. The concept is simple. The same consumers were customers to different kinds of retailers and suppliers. The supermarket brought all different products together into one place, thus enabling the consumer to use his/her time more effectively, find better prices due to more effective distribution and product allocation, and enjoy convenience.
In the same respect, an exam preparation product can be one of the products that will be compiled along with other products and services that are of our consumers’ interest. Think how many more subjects our students have to take on, and how many more kinds of exams (computers, panhellenic exams, etc.) a student has to prepare for. If exam preparation is so straightforward for somebody that qualifies legally, then it is only a matter of legislation to enable such “training supermarkets” to occur.
However, at a time when supermarkets in Europe have become such a “trade power” (i.e. in the UK, as mentioned before, there are 5 groups that literally run the whole market), more and more people discover the value of high quality food or goods and invest money in that quality. These consumers are determined to pay more for the benefit of the substance and specialty, rather than mass production and packaging. A young family with small children invests in organic food, high quality fabrics, and the best possible education. There are two factors to facilitate that: one is the requirement of the young family being able to afford it, while the second is that a young family has been trained / convinced about the benefit of the specialist.
An overview of what, almost definitely, is going to happen, shows the need of redefining what “real quality education” is. The need for certificates and accreditation will always be there, and nobody can query their part of basic skills assurance that is needed. However, it is also definite that if a “training supermarket” is to invest in real quality, it will not be viable. In fact, no matter whether a change in legislation allows computer schools, Greek frontisteria, IIEK, and other private training centres to teach foreign languages, their viability relies on strictly standardized programmes, first due to a lack of expertise and second due to a lack of ability to manage relevant resources.
On the other hand, the viability of private language schools relies on the substantive investment in their specialty. Serving a market in ways that obviously any other business that serves the same market can, will just increase your direct competition and decrease your market share immensely.
A code of practice and a new definition of the training required will enhance the role of a few and specific language schools. The well planned communication to the parents and students community will create a need for that, at least among those who consciously believe in the value of providing their children with “the best”.
Therefore, can you choose the right path for your future viability? It is the difficult path of professional virtue. So lucky am I to have already worked with a bunch of all those who can confidently say “I can”. Actually, they say “I have”.

Answer this; "Eparkeia" for CPE holders

2008-02-19T14:10:00.001+02:00

Dear Yannis,
I am a school owner, English teacher, holder of BA degree, an ex South-African residing in Limnos for the past sixteen years( an ardent reader of your column too.)
Would you be so kind as to shed some light on the' eparkeia' issue? Has all talk of banning this blatant unfairness fallen through?
Isn't it about time the relevant Greek ministries reconsidered priorities as to what truly constitutes proper teaching qualifications, or are they content with the fact that any individual in the possession of a meager Proficiency certificate qualifies as a fully trained teacher. Where is the ELT field in this country heading?
Suddenly, a new wave of beginner teachers, come school owners, some of who I might add can hardly string a sentence together ,are now conveniently stifling the market, in which most prospective client-parents are completely unaware of the difference between a Proficiency-holder school owner,(more often than not, lacking in basic knowledge, let alone teaching skills),as opposed to a university graduate whose qualifications are based on years of in-depth analysis on classics, literary criticism, poetry, not to mention teacher training and seminars.
My question is-how much longer are we expected to tolerate this arrogant high-handedness on behalf of the 'know-it-alls'? Can we hope for some sanity in this matter?
Your insight and opinion will be greatly appreciated. Many thanks,
Sincerely,
Eleftheria Borou..

Dear Ms Borou,

Many thanks for your e-mail. The issue you are addressing in your e-mail has been a burning issue for many ELT professionals and especially school owners for many years, even from the time I was a student at a frontisterio. I can understand your frustration and the frustration of the hundreds of alumni of corresponding schools throughout the world as well as the Greek universities. However, to be in a position to analyse this issue in depth, we have to see to what extent your statement, shared by a major part of Greek ELT, represents reality in legal and institutional terms.
The State is legally, institutionally and constitutionally responsible of accrediting and recognizing teaching qualifications and teachers within the official educational system and the official school network in all educational levels. However, frontisteria have never been legally or institutionally recognized as schools. What would define the role of frontisteria in a rather wide sense of the term is “foreign language training / coaching centres”. The State is legally and institutionally happy to grand the permit of ownership and operation of such centres to both university degree and eparkeia holders. Besides “trainees” in these “training centres” do not obtain a national certificate or baccalaureate or “apolytirio” of national/state value, so as for the legality of the status of these centres and the people who work in it to be questioned.
We all understand that the “eparkeia” was institutionalized a few decades ago to solve the problem of the lack of qualified English teachers, but it was also an agreed term between the Greek government and the respective universities/accrediting bodies, in order for their product to become more appealing, along with the “recognition” of their certificates in other areas of the State sector.
However, it is pretty obvious that this institutionalization solely concerned the private training sector and more specifically the frontisteria. The State, as an employer, never recognized “eparkeia” holders as “qualified language teachers” for itself and this is pretty significant. When the first frontisteria started to appear in the Greek market the Greek State introduced what it judged to be the minimum criteria for teaching and running a frontisterio in the private sector. In this way, the State provided a solution to existing problems, i.e. a lack of specialists, foreseen unemployment, external relations with international bodies and so on. It was then that a new industry was born and associations of representatives started to appear that should have formed more specific criteria, something that never happened, however. You see, in a society always driven by the State and the dream of being employed by it, no one saw the opportunity given by it to create and run a separate private sector alongside the State sector, in full legality.
The situation with frontisteria and their raison d’être has been a problematic one for almost a decade now. However, one would have to admit that you can find incompetent and untrained teachers among university graduates as well. While I am glad to sense the effort, in depth training and self-reflection you have been investing in regarding your profession, we all know that the vast majority of foreign language teachers and frontisterio owners, regardless of their qualifications, have limited themselves and their self-development to “executing” instructions from teachers’ books pages (in the best case scenario). We travel throughout the country just to see people, both university degree and eparkeia holders, who cannot teach or even speak the foreign language they are expected to teach and still legitimately run their frontisteria.
As from the beginning of my professional input I have clearly outlined my objections to the way this whole industry operates, allow me to amplify and transfer your frustration to our readers’ community, through the following questions:
a) With the massive ASEP waves of the last 2 or 3 years and hundreds of teachers joining the State sector, who would work in the frontisteria if it weren’t for the eparkeia holders? Already this academic year has been the worst in terms of recruitment.
b) Who says that a qualified teacher who graduated from university 25 years ago and has only received training in the form of commercial presentations at exhibitions is a better teacher than an eparkeia holder who has regularly been attending further methodology training and self-development courses?
c) If the eparkeia and all the “recognitions” hadn’t been institutionalized, would the Greek public have shown any interest in the frontisteria and would this industry have existed and flourished in the first place?
d) Why have associations and representatives consumed whole decades in trying to get “State recognition” for an association generated certificate, rather than introducing and setting specific professional teaching standards in both the State and private sectors?
e) Why has everybody been bothered with the question of who should be qualified to be a teacher and not with what those qualified teachers do for themselves and their teaching afterwards, both in the private and State sectors?
f) Anywhere else in the world I would never imagine that a teacher does not hold a university degree. However, nowhere in the world is there one foreign language frontisterio per thousand people, providing exactly the same standardized kind of service (along of course with the few thousand private instructors of course). (read “A tale of two parallel worlds” , December 2005 at http://hyphenpedia.blogspot.com)

Personally, the way things are, I feel that any dramatic development regarding the eparkeia would cause more problems than it would solve. I believe that every effort and the money invested in private Greek ELT should concern quality controls in frontisteria currently operating and offering questionable services. Besides, this explains why the State has never recognized frontisteria as schools per se.

Yours faithfully,

Yannis Stergis

The Student Quest vs the Teacher Quest - Secrets and lies of Greek ELT

2008-01-03T15:16:00.000+02:00

This year we have had the lowest turnout of junior students of the past 10 years throughout the country. This is definitely something to be further observed and analysed, without rushed assumptions. Low numbers of junior students also appeared in 1998 and 2001, but not to the extent of 2007. However, this earlier phenomenon provided enough motivation for a unique research that took place in October and November this year, investigating the overall attitude of the Greek public towards learning foreign languages and the role of Foreign Language Centres in Greece.

The Student Quest
We talked to parents of students in Greece and explained the philosophy behind quality accreditation criteria with reference to the existing criteria for Foreign Language Schools in Greece, coming from schemes like the ones of Secondary education, QLS and HCQLE. The sample below comes from 500 parents (35% Athens, 15% Thessaloniki, 50% rest of Greece).

Important note: This market research took place from 1st October until 7th December 2007. It included parents from schools we service (approx. 20%) and parents from the wider area of each school (approx. 80%). The results talk for themselves, but there will be an in-depth qualitative analysis at a later stage.

Question 1:
Do you consider the existence of such quality assessment criteria important or even compulsory (sine qua non)?
460 (92%) answered compulsory – 40 (8%) answered important

Question 2:
Would you pay 20% more for your children’s foreign language school for the attainment and maintenance of such criteria?
Answers:
28 (5.6%) – Yes, definitely
124 (24.8%) – No, can’t afford it and for now my job is done without such criteria being followed
138 (27.6%) – These criteria should anyway be compulsory to all schools without us having to pay more for them
210 (42%) – No; If these criteria were met by day schools, private or state ones, we wouldn’t need to send our children to foreign language centres.

Question 3:
What do you believe makes one foreign language centre better than others?
65 (13%) – Same result for fewer hours weekly and less money (value for money)
9 (1.8%) – Methodology and teaching
191 (38.2%) – Nothing necessarily, all do the same job – ours is more convenient/pleasant/cheaper
235 (47%) – Examination results by word of mouth

Question 4:
Have you ever considered private lessons?
372 (74.4%) – Yes
94 (18.8%) – Yes, for later when kids are older and have too much to deal with
34 (6.8%) – No, I don’t believe it’s good for my child

Question 5:
Do you believe in lifelong education – would you attend foreign language classes yourself?
58 (11.6%) – Yes, actually I need to for specific reasons
168 (33.6%) – No, it’s not worth it, I don’t need it in my everyday life or at work
210 (42%) – Yes, if my employment supported my decision
64 (12.8%) – Yes, but I have serious time/money restrictions

Question 6:
Have you heard of the Common European Framework of Reference in Education, the role of personality tests and learning styles, respective methodology and lesson plans, learning independence?
492 (98.4%) – No, what is this?
2 (0.4%) – Yes
6 (1.2%) – I think so

During the same research we also reached the following conclusions:
a) No more than 12-13% of the student population chooses private lessons for foreign languages.
b) Dedicated clients do not get affected by minimal differences in tuition fees from school to school.
c) We learnt about the full range of professional accreditation schemes, criteria and combined-skill tests of organizations like City and Guilds, who have recently appeared here, as well as relevant course providers like Master-D in Thessaloniki, a member of an international chain mainly active in Spain, Portugal, Brazil and recently in Greece. It seems that many of the adults we spoke to were introduced to these through their work environment and the predominant idea is that they represent the private training centres of the near future.
d) Parents do not have a clue about what the average owner or teacher considers their competitive advantage to be.
e) That, though a massive percentage of private language schools are run by people who are under qualified (especially in Attica), the public does not have the criteria to judge.
The Teacher Quest
Another major issue that our field had to deal with this year was a shortage of experienced teachers. Reasons for this phenomenon admittedly lie with the fact that a substantial number of teachers chose the State sector (and privates in the evenings of course) through the latest couple of ASEP competitions. However, by reviewing the impact of different annually agreed teaching hourly rates in Attica and the rest of Greece, we discovered a vicious circle.

We all understand that € 7 / hour is impossible to live on, not just anywhere in Europe, but especially in Greece. However, Attica seems to be the market where school owners created a competitive advantage around their tuition fees the most, thus devaluing their service. It is not by chance that in “posh” suburbs of Attica we found “well established frontisteria” selling the level of FCE for 750 EUR annually, when the average in the rest of the country is no less than 1100 EUR. It is only fair that most of the time, with the programmes imposed by books available in the market, an average school can’t afford substantially higher wages for the teachers.

Once upon a time, a teacher would ensure at least a few hours a week at a school just for her/his IKA. However, it has become more and more of common knowledge that a teacher can be providing undeclared private lessons for slightly more and cover their own IKA through “aftasfalisi”.

At the same time, looking at things from another point of view, in order to make a parent pay more, one has to provide obvious added value. However, I can’t help but observing the following:
a) We have devised business and educational plans, both in Attica and in the rest of Greece, where teachers get paid up to 25% more than average. However, even these schools lost and had to replace some of their oldest (and most demanding teachers), who just refused to do more substantial work than a Teacher’s Book-led lesson, for the extra money. The resistance received at the beginning of the implementation of each plan was immense.
b) Apparently teachers who choose private lessons over FLSs do it just to maintain the comfort of the same old quality for more money (nothing wrong with that for as long as it is acceptable)
c) We are witnessing the creation of a dual speed school ownership and teaching; with the most known ones fading slowly but surely.
I hope all this raw material above is good food for thought and I wish you all a fruitful New Year.

Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στο χώρο των ξενόγλωσσων εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων (Β' μέρος)

2007-12-04T15:14:00.001+02:00

Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στο χώρο των ξενόγλωσσων εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων στην Ελλάδα, οι παγίδες για πιστοποιημένες και μη επιχειρήσεις, η θέση της Ελλάδας και άλλων χωρών της ΕΕ απέναντι στον παράγοντα της πιστοποίησης. (Β' μέρος)

Σημείωση:
Το κείμενο που ακολουθεί αποτελεί μέρος της εισαγωγής του πονήματος του υπογράφοντος με τίτλο «Το εθνικό ψυχολογικό προφίλ του Έλληνα στην ενιαία ευρωπαϊκή αγορά – Προσόντα και δεξιότητες». Με σεβασμό στον διατιθέμενο χώρο της ELT News, που για πρώτη φορά το δημοσιεύει, θα ολοκληρωθεί σε δύο μέρη.

Στο προηγούμενο τεύχος (Α’ μέρος) αναπτύχθηκαν:
· ΠΑΡΑΔΟΧΕΣ
· ΑΝΑΠΤΥΞΗ
o Ένα σύντομο ιστορικό της πιστοποίησης ποιότητας στην Ευρώπη

Β’ μέρος

Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στην εκπαίδευση

Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στην εκπαίδευση δεν έχει και ιδιαίτερα μεγάλη ιστορία ως καταναλωτικό προϊόν στην Ευρώπη. Ενώ στις Η.Π.Α. διαμορφώθηκαν από καιρό σώματα πιστοποίησης εκπαιδευτικής ποιότητας ad hoc, στην Ευρώπη τα μόνα παραδείγματα παρατηρήθηκαν στο Ηνωμένο Βασίλειο. Αυτό βέβαια, από μόνο του, αποτελεί πιθανώς ένδειξη του ότι η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας αποτελεί προϊόν καταναλωτικού και κεφαλαιοκρατικού ανταγωνιστικού φιλελεύθερου αγοραστικού προσανατολισμού. Στις υπόλοιπες χώρες το εκπαιδευτικό σύστημα περιχαρακωνόταν μόνο από τις τάσεις του κρατικού εκπαιδευτικού συστήματος, ενώ οι ιδιωτικές εκπαιδευτικές επιχειρήσεις υπόκειντο στους όρους που διέπουν το κρατικό εκπαιδευτικό σύστημα ως προς τη νομιμότητα του εκπαιδευτικού προγράμματος, ενώ ως προς τη λειτουργία και τις προϋποθέσεις της παροχής καθ’ αυτής, συνήθως αρκούσαν οι κοινές επαγγελματικές άδειες και οι άδειες επιχειρηματικής λειτουργίας κατά τον κατά τόπους εμπορικό και αστικό κώδικα.

Από πολλά χρόνια στο Ηνωμένο Βασίλειο λειτουργούσαν δύο βασικά σχήματα πιστοποίησης εύρυθμης λειτουργίας και ποιότητας ξενόγλωσσων και μη εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων, ένα ο κώδικας του ABLS (Association of British Language Schools) και ένας ο κώδικας του πολύπαθου οργανισμού ARELS/British Council. Μόλις το 2004 η γραμματεία παιδείας του Ηνωμένου Βασιλείου άρχισε να διερευνά ποιος κώδικας θα μπορούσε να υιοθετηθεί ως επαρκής για την αδειοδότηση γενικώς ιδιωτικών εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων, γεγονός που δείχνει την επιτυχημένη και ρεαλιστική προσέγγιση των δύο ενώσεων στους στόχους τους.

Διάφοροι κώδικες προέκυψαν σε διευρωπαϊκό επίπεδο στα πλαίσια που αρκετά χρόνια πριν διάφοροι μεγαλοεταίροι δημιούργησαν το ISO. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, μεγάλες αλυσίδες ή δίκτυα (π.χ. BELL, International House, British Council, κλπ.), άρχισαν να δημιουργούν τις προϋποθέσεις αναγνωρισιμότητας και επέκτασης στα κράτη-μέλη της ΕΕ, με στόχο να «πιέσουν» τις μικρομικρές εκπαιδευτικές επιχειρήσεις στις κατά τόπους αγορές. Είναι περιττό, φυσικά, να αναφερθούμε στο στόχο ελέγχου της μεγαλύτερης αγοράς μικρών εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων στην Ευρώπη, την Ελλάδα, και την προφανή επιρροή που είχε σε νέα προς προσχώρηση στην ΕΕ κράτη της Ανατολικής Ευρώπης, όπου το φαινόμενο των φροντιστηριακού τύπου μικρών εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων άρχισε να εξαπλώνεται.
Οι επιχειρήσεις πίσω από τους κώδικες αυτούς έκαναν εύστοχη χρήση της αναγνωρισιμότητάς τους, της ισχύος και επιρροής τους σε εκπαιδευτικούς επιτρόπους της ΕΕ, της δημιουργικής συμμετοχής τους σε ερευνητικά προγράμματα και όργανα της ΕΕ, και δημιούργησαν ένα μεγάλο δίκτυο συμμάχων σε όλες τις μικρότερες ή νεότερες χώρες, οργανώνοντάς τους, και έχοντας παράλληλα γνώση των αδυναμιών βιωσιμότητας των συγκεκριμένων επιχειρήσεων, οι οποίες ούτως ή άλλως τους συνέφεραν στην περίπτωση εμφάνισής τους στις νέες αγορές. Μιλάμε κοινώς για το επιχειρηματικό φαινόμενο του Δούρειου Ίππου.

Υπάρχουν δικαιολογημένες προσπάθειες των συλλογικών οργάνων τοπικών αγορών που έχουν συνασπιστεί με τους φορείς αυτούς, να δημιουργήσουν σχετικά διαφοροποιημένα σχήματα ελέγχου και πιστοποίησης ποιότητας για τις τοπικές τους αγορές, δεδομένου ότι γνωρίζουν τις ιδιομορφίες της αγοράς τους καλύτερα. Παρ’ όλα αυτά, απ’ ότι φαίνεται αυτές οι εξελίξεις έχουν «ερεθίσει» τους διεθνείς φορείς και την προοπτική που επιτρέπουν για επιβολή των μεγάλων οργανισμών-εμπνευστών τους, και έχουν αρχίσει «πολιτικού» τύπου προστριβές και ρήξεις μεταξύ των μελών.

Η θέση της ελληνικής κυβέρνησης στον παράγοντα της πιστοποίησης ποιότητας και προσόντων

Η ελληνική κυβέρνηση εδώ και πάνω από μισό αιώνα διατηρεί την ίδια θέση απέναντι σε οποιουδήποτε τύπου πιστοποίηση. Για να γίνω όμως πιο σαφής, θα πρέπει να μιλήσω για δύο ήδη πιστοποίησης:
Α) Η πιστοποίηση προσόντων ατόμων και επαγγελματιών
Β) Η πιστοποίηση επιχειρήσεων

Και στις δύο περιπτώσεις, η στάση της ελληνικής κυβέρνησης αντανακλά την εθνική μας ανασφάλεια, καχυποψία και όλα τα ψυχολογικά σύνδρομα, τα οποία θα πρέπει κάποια στιγμή να πάψουμε να αποδίδουμε στην οθωμανική κατοχή, μιας και αντίστοιχα σύνδρομα παρατηρούνται σε όλο το φάσμα της ελληνικής ιστορίας.

Ένας παράγοντας ή φορέας θεωρεί ότι χρειάζεται με κάποιο τυποποιημένο τρόπο να πιστοποιήσει τα προσόντα του ή την επάρκειά του, μόνο όταν νιώθει ότι δεν διαθέτει αρκετά μέσα ή επιχειρήματα για να τα αποδείξει έμπρακτα. Επίσης ένας παράγοντας ή φορέας νιώθει την ανάγκη να πιστοποιηθεί τυποποιημένα όταν υποπτεύεται ότι ο ελεγκτής, εξεταστής, εργοδότης ή πελάτης θα θεωρήσει την τεκμηρίωσή του ανεπαρκή, έστω και αν είναι επαρκής, είτε λόγω έλλειψης κριτηρίων, είτε κακόβουλα.
Κοινώς ο Έλληνας χρειάζεται αποδείξεις και επιχειρήματα. Αυτό φυσικά αντικατοπτρίζει όλη την ψυχοσύνθεσή του, ακόμη και σε μια συζήτηση, όπου όταν απαιτείται η ανάπτυξη επιχειρηματολογίας, ο Έλληνας μακρηγορεί και μπαίνει σε απίστευτες λεπτομέρειες, ακόμη και ως προς τα πλέον προφανή, από φόβο ότι δεν θα γίνει κατανοητός και έτσι δεν θα υποστηρίξει αρκετά τη θέση του.
Στην ανασφάλεια αυτή, φυσικά, μπορεί να κρύβεται και μια άδηλη αυτοϋπερεκτίμηση ή εγωπάθεια, η οποία να τον οδηγεί στο συμπέρασμα ότι απλά το άλλο μέρος είναι γνωστικά ή νοητικά ανεπαρκές για να τον καταλάβει.

Η πιστοποίηση, με βάση όλα τα παραπάνω, τόσο σε ατομικό, όσο και σε επιχειρηματικό επίπεδο, αποτέλεσε για την Ελλάδα κριτήριο-μονόδρομο. Η διαφορά είναι ότι λόγω έλλειψης τεχνογνωσίας, εθνικής ανασφάλειας και δυσκολιών ως προς την διοικητική υποστήριξη, η ελληνική κυβέρνηση πάντα κατέφευγε σε δανεισμένες, έτοιμες λύσεις, μη μαχητών ή διαπραγματεύσιμων ως προς το κύρος τους οργανισμών. Έτσι σε επίπεδο επιχειρηματικότητας το ΕΣΥΔ (Εθνικό Σύστημα Διαπίστευσης), το οποίο, παρεπιμπτόντως, λειτουργεί υπό το καθεστώς της ΑΕ δημοσίων συμφερόντων, έχει αποκλειστικά και αδιακρίτως υιοθετήσει οποιαδήποτε μεθοδολογία σχετίζεται με το ISO και αποκλειστικά και μόνο με αυτό.
Το ISO έχει αποδείξει την ουσιαστική του συμβολή στη βελτιστοποίηση των διαδικασιών παραγωγής, ειδικά σε υλικά προϊόντα σίτισης, ένδυσης, περιβαλλοντικής συμπεριφοράς και σε ζητήματα καταναλωτικής προστασίας. Παρ’ όλα αυτά, στο επίπεδο της παροχής υπηρεσιών είναι πρωτίστως αδύνατο να ορίσει κανείς την ποιότητα χωρίς εμπλοκή του καταναλωτή. Παράλληλα, η υπερτυποποίηση έχει αποδείξει ότι σε διαφορετικής φύσης υπηρεσίες συμβάλλει στην ανάπτυξη γραφειοκρατίας και στο τέλος η επιχείρηση αξιοποιεί το πιστοποιητικό μόνο ως μέσο προβολής, μιας και αρχίζει να παραλείπει επί της ουσίας μια μια της διαδικασίες τήρησης του κώδικα.
Σε επίπεδο ατομικής πιστοποίησης, π.χ. στους τομείς των ξένων γλωσσών και της πληροφορικής, το δημόσιο συμπλέει με τα πιστοποιητικά συγκεκριμένων ξένων πανεπιστημίων, όπως αυτά του Cambridge και του Michigan, ενώ στην πληροφορική αναγνωρίζει τα πιστοποιητικά διεθνών οργανισμών όπως τα ECDL, Microsoft, Cambridge, κλπ. Όπως και να είναι, το ελληνικό κράτος αναγνωρίζει «επισήμως» μεθοδολογίες πιστοποίησης και πιστοποιητικά με κριτήρια που αφορούν όχι κάποιες διεθνείς παραδοχές, αλλά τους κατά καιρούς επιστημονικούς συμβούλους των κατά καιρούς ΥΠΕΠΘ. Η ίδια η έννοια της αναγνώρισης είναι πανευρωπαϊκά πρωτοφανής, ειδικά ως προς τη βαρύτητά της στην επαγγελματική αποκατάσταση, τους διορισμούς στο δημόσιο, ή και το χαρακτηρισμό επαγγελματιών ως καθηγητές, συμβούλους, κλπ., όταν σε άλλες ευρωπαϊκές χώρες για κάτι τέτοιο απαιτείται τουλάχιστο πανεπιστημιακό πτυχίο και επιπλέον ειδικό πιστοποιητικό κατάρτισης και εξέτασης από δημόσιο φορέα. Φυσικά, το πρόβλημα στην Ελλάδα για όλα τα παραπάνω είναι ότι δεν υπάρχει δημόσιος φορέας με ικανή τεχνογνωσία και αυτοπεποίθηση να αξιολογήσει και να πιστοποιήσει και γι’ αυτό καταφεύγει στις εκάστοτε «αναγνωρίσεις».

Το μεγαλύτερο πρόβλημα αυτής της κατάστασης λοιπόν δεν είναι η πιστοποίηση, αλλά η αναγνώριση. Όπως γίνεται αντιληπτό απ’ όλα τα παραπάνω, η πιστοποίηση είναι παράγοντας θεμιτός και αποδεκτός όταν διενεργείται από ειδικούς, αν όχι εξειδικευμένους φορείς, οι οποίοι δεν «αναγνωρίζονται» από κανέναν, πέρα από την κοινή γνώμη και την καταναλωτική συμπεριφορά, η οποία θα επιβραβεύσει εκ του αποτελέσματος το έργο και το κύρος του φορέα.
Στην Ελλάδα παρ’ όλα αυτά, και μόνο η έννοια της «κρατικής αναγνώρισης» δημιουργεί πρώτον μια αποπροσανατολισμένη κουλτούρα στο κοινό, δεδομένου ότι αλλοιώνει τα κριτήρια και τους δείκτες εμπιστοσύνης, από την άλλη αποθαρρύνει τη συλλογικότητα ομοειδών φορέων που θα αναλύσουν τις ανάγκες του καταναλωτή, ούτως ώστε να προσδιορίσει με νηφαλιότητα την ταυτότητα της ποιότητας για κάθε προϊόν και υπηρεσία.

Εξάλλου, είναι πάσι γνωστό το οξύμωρο φαινόμενο των περισσότερων προσοντούχων στην Ευρώπη σε επίπεδο γλωσσομάθειας, αλλά με το μικρότερο δείκτη λειτουργικής χρήσης της ξένης γλώσσας, τόσο σε ακαδημαϊκό, όσο και σε επαγγελματικό επίπεδο.

Η τυποποίηση και πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στο χώρο της ξενόγλωσσης εκπαίδευσης, και δη της ιδιωτικής ξενόγλωσσης εκπαίδευσης, θα έπρεπε εξαρχής να είναι μια ιδιωτική υπόθεση, στηριγμένη σε δείκτες πελατειακής και μαθησιακής ικανοποίησης, και στο στόχο της τήρησης ενός υψηλού επιπέδου επιχειρηματικότητας και παροχής υπηρεσιών.

Έχω προβεί κατά καιρούς σε εισηγήσεις σε συλλογικά όργανα του κλάδου των φροντιστηρίων ξένων γλωσσών για δημιουργία αυστηρού κώδικα κριτηρίων. Η έλλειψη απόκρισης ενίσχυσε την υποψία, ότι οι εκπρόσωποι των οργάνων αυτών, ως Έλληνες πολίτες και οι ίδιοι, αναζητούσαν πρώτον το ποιος θα τους αναγνωρίσει (sic), δεύτερον απασχολούνταν με άλλα ζητήματα, συνδικαλιστικού ή πολιτικού περιεχομένου, ενώ προφανώς δεν είχε αναγνωριστεί η ανάγκη ουδετερότητας και διαιτητικής παρουσίας φορέα υποστήριξης.

Είναι πολύ σημαντικό να γίνει αντιληπτό ότι η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας ή προσόντων δεν μπορεί ες αεί να αποτελεί εργαλείο προβολής μόνο και μόνο γιατί το ελληνικό κράτος «αναγνωρίζει» κάποια χαρτιά. Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας ή προσόντων αποκτά κύρος όταν πραγματικά εξυγιαίνει την επιχειρηματικότητα και την ποιότητα ζωής των επιχειρηματιών και επαγγελματιών, με τρόπους που έχουν τελικό αποδέκτη τον πελάτη με υψηλό βαθμό ικανοποίησης. Σ’ αυτή την περίπτωση, πελάτης μπορεί να είναι και ο εκάστοτε εργοδότης.

Ένας ρεαλιστικός κώδικας κριτηρίων, ο οποίος θα θέτει αυστηρές προϋποθέσεις τήρησης, από έναν φορέα που ξέρει τον εκάστοτε επαγγελματικό χώρο καλά, θα οδηγήσει στη συγκέντρωση ομοειδών «πιστοποιημένων» επιχειρήσεων. Οι επιχειρήσεις αυτές οφείλουν να συνεργαστούν και να δημιουργήσουν ένα συλλογικό όργανο που θα προβάλλει τα οφέλη στον τελικό αποδέκτη και θα αναλάβει την πιστοποίηση και άλλων επιχειρήσεων, με τελικό στόχο την ανάπτυξη του κλάδου, όχι μόνο ποσοτικά, αλλά κυρίως ποιοτικά και ρεαλιστικά.

Το πιο σημαντικό είναι να μην τεθούν εκβιαστικά κριτήρια «αποκλεισμού» επιχειρήσεων από την αγορά με συντεχνιακή προσέγγιση. Αν πρόκειται να αποκλειστούν επιχειρήσεις, αυτό θα πρέπει να είναι αποτέλεσμα μη σύγκλισής των με τα κριτήρια του κώδικα, ο οποίος θα πρέπει να λαμβάνει υπ’ όψιν του επιστημονικές και επιχειρηματικές παραμέτρους, αλλά κυρίως τις πραγματικές ανάγκες της αγοράς, καθώς και της αγοραστικής της δύναμης.

Κάθε άλλο κριτήριο γεωγραφικού ή ποιοτικού αποκλεισμού θα αποτελούσε πρόθεση για τη δημιουργία lobby, το οποίο προσωρινά μόνο μπορεί να δώσει συγκεκριμένα ανταγωνιστικά πλεονεκτήματα.

Η πιστοποίηση ποιότητας στο χώρο των ξενόγλωσσων εκπαιδευτικών επιχειρήσεων

2007-11-04T15:11:00.000+02:00

The secret powers of Greek ELT

2007-09-04T15:09:00.000+02:00

Though we are getting closer to the second decade of the 21st century, talking or even doing politics in Greece is still shaded by the last half of the 20th century, in terms of ethos, expectations and attitudes. To be more specific, although a government should be a team of “nation’s employees” serving the public will, what actually happens in every country and even more so in Greece, is that this team becomes a team of authority and the nation follows. Something is obviously wrong but it’s all a matter of perspective.

The “Free Economy” world has been and will always be under dispute. It is a political issue. However, this is the world we live in and we have to as such make the best of it. The “Free Economy” world is the world that encourages private initiative. ELT in Greece is a private industry. On top of that, ELT in Greece is a semi-formal, semi-recognised, semi-purposeful private industry. All these “semis” are to blame for the status of Greek ELT nowadays. However, all these “semis” constitute some great opportunities for Greek ELT and more generally for education in Greece.

The Language Centre field is monitored by a number of authorities for different reasons. The permit for operation is provided by the Secondary Education authorities, but they don’t have a say in the nature and level of the educational service provided by language centres. Commerce authorities control levels of tuition fees every now and then, but only in terms of national competition and inflation indexes. Labour and employment authorities control minimum wages, but no collective contract has ever been formed, apart from in very few and specific cases. To cut a long story short, the Language Centre field has been a strategically adopted child in a family that can’t help discriminating between natural and adopted children, providing the latter with the minimum support and guidance.

Lack of support for private initiative is common in countries that have failed to accept a political attitude towards capital over the years. Greece is externally part of the Western globalised economy, but at the same time struggles to maintain an internal undetermined socialistic face. In such cases, if and when a private field succeeds in becoming self-sufficient, strategically or by mistake (as in the case of ELT), then the power of it can change trends and influence massive, nation-wide operations. The fact that private ELT in Greece has remained uncontrolled by the State over the past 50 years has led to the dire state of the field, but at the same time has given the field a pioneering position on issues that concern educational services, methodological trends and professional development.

To be more specific, private ELT in Greece has managed to be the only private field in Europe to have penetrated the population on a mass basis, before any governmental initiative for privatization was taken. It’s highly unlikely to find anybody nowadays who doesn’t send their children to a “frontisterio” to learn English.

ELT publishing flourished in Greece, set trends and developed methodological approaches that contributed to more profitable materials worldwide. Furthermore, the State welcomed private ELT publishing, allowing the use of materials in state schools, that are originally formed to service the independent/alternative curriculum of the “frontisterio system”.

The majority of teachers that join the State sector through ASEP (and the “epeterida” in the not so far past), developed their professional skills within the “frontisterio system” either as employed teachers or even as school owners themselves.

Quality assessment criteria and schemes were introduced for the first time by a private company and a school association (H-CQLE and QLS) that are solely related to the private ELT sector, awakening Greek ELT to issues of quality, viability and customer care. On 7th July 2007 a renowned UK newspaper published a special supplement dedicated to education in Greece (obviously funded by the Greek Ministry of Education), announcing the implementation of Quality criteria and assessment schemes, when before 2002 nobody would have expected anything like that from a State department. Not to mention of course that only recently local associations of school owners have started to re-activate quality and safety criteria and requirements (i.e. fire safety systems, insurance, etc.) and use the term “Quality” at every possible opportunity, generating comments from professionals that invested in quality and safety assurances long before “Quality” became the popular key-word.

Greek ELT was born and grew up as an orphan. It had its good times and also struggled over the years. As in the jungle, in ELT some survived, some didn’t, some will survive and some others won’t. The one thing that stuns me is how powerful Greek private ELT is. Greek private ELT has produced thousands of English teachers, profound training of immense quality, educational materials that whole generations remember, methodology of rare complexity. Greek ELT school owners and teachers first introduced solutions to learning difficulties, parental training on dyslexia and other syndromes, and opened a whole market to speech therapists, psychologists and pedagogic specialists of the private sector.

In 2007 Greek State ELT can take pride in experienced teachers, inspired advisors, internationally acceptable text material, the use of technology in ELT, a connection to the CEFR, a profound co-operation with university departments, integrated skills, task based and cross-curricular approaches, and, why not, a pretty decent attempt at a state language certificate. Greek State ELT is getting there. Greek private ELT, unbeknowingly, has done its job.

Once upon a time, the spontaneous birth of this private sector, led to the formation of a nation-wide active market. Within the field of education, it created specific needs for the whole market and thus a specific mentality. This educational product, massively accepted and bought, oriented and forced the State sector towards its current trends. All of this happened due to lack of state support, lack of state understanding, lack of state controls and prevalence of the rules of supply and demand. An active private ELT field in Greece is powerful enough to shape a healthy educational environment for the whole country, and when it becomes aware of its own magnitude, it will do that even more effectively and faster than it has done so far.
Whose interest is it in to change the status quo? Who would want to rock the boat, just as the next exciting phase of development is about to begin? Surely no team of “nation’s employees” should have the mandate to do so?

Lessons of control and interdependence

2007-07-23T14:58:00.000+02:00

Running a business is a profession by itself. Two years ago I introduced the parallelism of a business to the human body, by corresponding various human resources to the different parts of the body, with the position of the owner of the business acting as the brain of the business “body”. Still this “brain” would have to make sure that all parts of the “body” of the business would be healthy and functional with the aim of ensuring the welfare of the “body”, but at the same time providing enough food and oxygen for the “brain”.

To achieve that as the “brain” of your business, you have to admit that there are universal principles that no body or brain can overcome. The idea of physical or business existence lies along the lines that by violating such principles we contribute to the creation of an unhealthy environment for the viability of everybody, us and the ones around us. This “unhealthiness” is obvious nowadays both in business and social/physical terms. When a number of similar entities (human or business ones) gather antagonistically, then survival in an “unhealthy” environment becomes a much tougher issue.

Then is when the “brain” has to move onto a “meta-phase” of existence. The role of the brain once was to ensure the viability of the “body” and of “itself”. Now the required role has to be more sophisticated, it has to come up with strategies, techniques, long term plans to ensure “survival space”, which sometimes will have to claim land from another “brain”.

In the business world, I would call this phase “identity distancing”. My own company, hyphen, once upon a time was a concept, and then it was conceived and went through a pregnancy period for the first years, bringing up hick ups, draw backs, side effects, like every pregnancy. The development of an embryo doesn’t stop with the birth. On the contrary it continues after the birth; mechanisms become consolidated and functions are put into place. And, of course, post birth development takes place in the real world, and not in the sheltered world of the womb. Most of all, post birth development takes place after the child detaches itself from the mother. Thus, in business, development in the real world takes place once the whole operation detaches itself from the brain that conceived it. Then the brain that conceived it, as the parent, acts as a close monitor, ensuring learning, feeding, growth, inspiring responsibility, self-protection, self-control, happiness and balance. This parent though has to remember that a) the child / business is a separate entity and b) too much interdependence can become suffocating.

In a similar way, when a parent, being over protective and overindulging does everything for his/her child, depriving it from the joy of initiative, experimentation and effectiveness, this parent produces a lazy and disabled child. However, every child deserves the freedom to grow creatively, but within specific frameworks, restrictions and guidance.

What I have been telling my clients in the past year is that my own business managed to breathe when I repositioned myself in relation to it. It was then, actually, when I managed to breathe, myself. My business is its own vision, human resources, targets and practices, always under my close monitoring and ensuring that its practices cater for its survival, growth and self-respect. In return I receive plenty of satisfaction in both material and spiritual terms.

This “meta-phase” has created a whole new world in running my own business, which reflects the targets of every mature co-operation of my business with its own clients. As “unhealthy” practices, good practices reflect from entity to entity and can create a positive domino effect, which shows more and more in the wider environment. So much, that it gives you the strength and satisfaction to realize that one day, your “child-business” will have to detach itself completely from you. Either you make a mature decision to let it go strong, or you let it grow ripe with you and die slowly with retirement. It all depends on what each one of us has catered to leave behind.

As I’m talking, I consider hyphen my Number 1 client. We have a fair and just relationship of moderate interdependence, I offer my know-how, planning and guidance and, in return, I get material and spiritual satisfaction. Almost exactly like with every client of mine. I have chosen not to be my business or my children or my relationship with my wife or even my client. All these entities grow healthily by themselves and within our relationships. So do I along with them. Just like a brain does along with the rest of the body. Realism is the means not to break universal principles.

Dealing with indirect competition - A new perspective for your marketing plan

2007-06-20T15:06:00.000+02:00

There are two kinds of competition in every market.

Direct competition is practised by professionals of the same kind in an attempt to lock a larger share of the common target market. In the case of Greek ELT it is schools vs schools, publishers vs publishers, distributors vs distributors and so on.

Indirect competition is practised by those who, although not directly involved with your profession, are involved with your market and can somehow influence it against you if you are not on good terms with them. Usually this competition is positioned locally and can be of determining importance in your market’s decision to prefer your business. They may be neighbouring shops and businesses, or representatives of suppliers who serve many businesses of your kind, while in small towns they can even be suppliers of authority such as bank clerks, local authority officers, state school teachers and anyone who centrally serves a whole community, having the opportunity to gather information and spread rumours on a public level. Of course, the most important indirect competition comes from unhappy or even indifferent past clients, whose opinion matters the most to the wavering potential client, as it is solidly based on experience.

The importance of this peripheral, external environment increases in the time leading up to your actual sales period, when the target market goes out to investigate services, prices and advantages, and seeks out opinions and recommendations.

The majority of the schools we have visited over the past years prove to spend vast amounts of money on advertising, the role of which is to objectively describe their services and competitive advantages. This is important, but only limitedly effective as a part of your marketing plan, as it is addressed without discrimination to a much larger public than your actual target group. On top of that, it has been measured that advertising pushes, even when targeted, grab the attention of only 10% of recipients in terms of motivating them to investigate your business more closely. The public is really fed up with and suspicious of advertising due to the inflation of information and blatant deceit in portrayed messages. The role of advertising has become that of an announcement, so if there is not something new to broadcast to the public and thus appeal to it, then, more often than not, it is money thrown away.

In a profession that is promoted basically by word of mouth, understandably but unfortunately very few have invested money and effort in earning the attention and respect of the indirect but close and determining environment. This is about raising the public image of your school. Many school owners I talk to do admit that they make an effort to co-operate with local businesses, even if prices are higher than those offered by nationwide chains or suppliers, with the sole aim of creating what I would call “a positive vibe” about their business. However, this is only the tip of the iceberg, as this practice is based on current good relationships, but not on a profound knowledge of who you are, what your professional achievements have been over the years, where your excellence stands, what your competitive advantages are. To cut a long story short, your environment lacks the information that will act as a means of proof that your school is the best choice.
Raising your school’s public image is not rocket science. It is more of an applied art based on specific rules and principles. It usually takes less money and effort to achieve, and it is by far more effective than uncontrolled advertising. Immeasurable advertising can be frustrating, while raising your public image can be immediately rewarding and directly involves live reactions. All it takes is a realization of the need to orientate your school and yourself towards a more extrovert way of being following some basic principles, and the importance of being organized by planning and implementing a respective plan of calendar actions and on-going practices in your school that will become the second professional nature of yourself and staff. More specifically:
1) Remember that indirect competition is all around you and is ruthless. It is definitely negative when they talk against you, but even worse when they do not talk about you at all.
2) Every source of indirect competition can be turned into your biggest fan. They have to have reasons to do so though. Such reasons have always had to do with either profit or other indirect benefits, but most importantly with the emotional factor; how you make these people feel.
3) Work towards improving the COMPOSE of your environment. Inspire Comfort, Power and Security for everybody involved with you and most of all increase the number of those involved with you.
4) People talk about somebody or something because they were impressed, moved, happy, safe, motivated, inspired. All these are emotions and not facts, so work towards creating personal and collective experiences.
5) Every time you announce, advertise, or prove your excellence and advantages, check what the personal impact is on the recipients of your action. Design your next action bearing that in mind, and you will see your message reaching all possible destinations, with your recipients as the vehicle.
6) Investigate within your direct and indirect environment, current and past students and parents, current and past employees and suppliers, what their state of being is now, where their success and happiness lie and ask them how you and your school might have contributed to it.
7) Investigate within your current clients, suppliers, students and employees what could add value to their life and add a whole new experience for them next to your actual service.
8) Implement an adequate knowledge management system, supported by a clear customer care policy for your staff, and analyse the information map of your system frequently.

The benefits of raising your school’s public profile are immense and with time only grow. There is no better or worse time to start working on it. Actually, the best time to start working on it is now.

The loneliness of the business owner!

2007-05-10T11:57:00.002+02:00

Running your own business is a lonely business. Once upon a time you opened your wings to fly towards contributing something more to the field you had been working in, anyway, as an employee. Your motivation possibly came out of your frustration for the amateurism that your profession was dealt with by your employer, your disappointment in what some people consider to be “teaching and learning”, the bedazzlement of who, actually, can become a teacher in this country! Where had the talent of identifying with the students and transferring knowledge effectively gone? How dare some school owners blind the parents who trust their school with their little children? And how, on earth, dare some other school owners pay so little to the teachers who support the whole language school, since they barely know half what their teachers know about teaching?

So, you opened your own language school. The truth is that, indeed, you did a different job, you provided a different level of service. Socrates said that a good teacher is the one who produces a student who has exceeded his teacher’s prospects. The employer that stole your time, ideas and money was replaced by a tax authority, a social security service, an ungrateful parent, an undisciplined student, and, worst of all, a bossy employee, who constantly tries to prove his/her prevalence in teaching practices, communicative and organisational skills. In the worst case scenario, this employee will use your school as a pool for private lessons or open a competitive school across the road.

In 18 years I have come across two different types of school owners. The Visionary Leaders and the Kinaesthetic Processors. The first type consists of a distinct minority, while the second type refers to the vast majority of each field. The former create trends, are innovative, introduce methodologies and ideas in teaching, advertising and servicing, and the latter take this material from scratch and adapt it to their own reality. Both types are necessary and invaluable for every professional field, as the former take the field one step ahead, and the latter make these steps mature in practice. However, both types are equally vulnerable and exposed to the same risks. Both types fail in being aware of the bigger scheme of their operation.

Running a business, either as a Leader or as a Processor, is a lonely business. It takes all your energy and it makes you exceptionally introvert, especially if apart from the owner you are also the service provider. As a Leader you fail to follow what the idea you have introduced as a pioneer will become, first in the hands of another member of the field, and then in the hands of many of them. As a Processor you can never be sure that the idea you adopted is right for you, for your market, for your pocket. Like you, so many other processors will turn the same idea into something completely unrelated to the original idea. Everything’s subject to interpretation. There will only be one common result for everybody. Each version is going to backfire in the same way. The clients (parents) will still want more for less and will display a lower level of satisfaction each time.

Greeks will never learn to work for somebody else without the prospect of overtaking their employer at some point, unless of course the employer is the State. Whether it is a matter of insecurity, lack of faith in collaboration, or just excessive faith in ourselves, we will always be the nation that “knows better”. In contrast to this, other nations, like western ones, take it for granted that they will shape their career working for someone else, usually an impersonal employer. In practice, that is what encouraged all those major corporations to flourish internationally. The fact that Greeks prefer to run their own small business is not bad, as small businesses promote innovation, invention, variety, technology in every aspect, and most of all they allow space for free, creative and growing minds.

Running a business is a lonely business, but loneliness, sometimes, can be turned into a blessing. Once upon a time you realized that your reasons to open your business were fair and sound. Along the way you got disappointed, realizing that you were missing specific data and knowledge, while most of your decisions were based on youthful assumptions. Since then, all you have managed is to keep the boat afloat in a rocking sea, but without using a compass. You have done well so far, but uncertainty kills you more than poverty does.

This is the right time to face up to reality. The use of any compass requires a set destination. You have to decide what land you want to reach. Confirming that you are doing business because it happened to you, or because you want to do it, or because there is nothing else you know how to do, is not a good enough answer to help you deal with uncertainty. It is like saying that you are sailing a lifelong trip because somebody dropped you in the sea, or that you like sailing or because sailing is all you have learnt to do. Let your target, even if that is just a wonderful retirement, guide your practices. To get there, you are going to lose too. Stay, however, focused on your target. Be realistic, get trained, keep in touch with things that happen around you, which you have neglected so far, mainly because you had lost faith in progress. Accept that your employees are there for the reasons you were in someone else’s business at some other time. Also, accept that ethics and prospects have changed.

The loneliness of running a business can make you a better person. It can make you more creative when you organize your financial plan and decide to stick to it. Then, when budget is restricted, you’ll find that innovation is the effect of need. It can make you more self-confident when you realize that nothing is impossible and that sticking to the old and familiar can sometimes eat up your savings and resources, rather than generate new ones. It can boost your self-esteem when you trespass that difficult threshold of saying no to the irrational customer or supplier. It will empower you to prove that negotiations can have only winners and not losers. It can improve your quality of life and income, as you once upon a time hoped for, when you dare to admit that you have to invest in order to earn, and delegate in order to have time to think. As in teaching English, so in business, nobody pays any attention to the most important of all skills. Thinking! As a businessman or a businesswoman you have to be the captain of the boat. Not the cook!

Allow your aspirations to breed and create something better for the field you belong to. Learn, learn and learn and put all this knowledge into practice. Be tough but fair, look ahead but avoid the rocks in front of you. Increase the SQ (spiritual quotient) in your business and inspire your staff, but most of all your students. English is only the vehicle towards creating a better generation of young Greek people in the next decades. This is what education should be about!

Running your own business is a lonely business! Though I personally fear loneliness the most, I was relieved to realize that decisions taken in the loneliness of self-reflection have never failed me.

Pride and prejudice!

2007-05-10T11:57:00.001+02:00

Why numbers alone is not all you need for the development of your educational business and how the CAN DO statements of the business owner reflect on it!

Closing 2006 I proceeded with the review of 18 of my co-operations, the first phase of which was completed in the last year. Reviewing results, the first thing one would look into would be numbers, of course, and that’s exactly what I did. Having had an overview of each educational business’s state of being, it was still a bit shocking to see numbers, even though pretty justifying of the philosophy and attitude we have been breeding over the past 3 years.

The most outstanding issue was the lack of proportion among specific results. Analysing the increase in the number of students, against increase in turnover and then against increase in profit that were achieved over the first period of co-operation, the three respective rates had nothing to do with each other whatsoever. To be more specific, an overall 38% increase in number of students (4244 / 5873) reflected an 85% increase in turnover (€ 2.07 million / € 3.84 million), which in its turn gave a 219% increase in profit (€ 0.43 million / € 1.37 million) for these 18 educational businesses. The geographical distribution of these businesses, from Thrace to Crete and half of them in Athens and Thessaloniki, only showed that whatever the reasons were for these striking differences, they were rather universal.

What was though the chain reaction that contributed to this discrepancy? When we see such differences between increase rates it is more than obvious that it is not the number of students that determines the health or suffocation of an educational business. It is rather lack of controls, monitoring and most of all awareness of basic principles.

In the overall scheme of the above figures, the average tuition fees per student were € 485 in 2005, while in 2006 the same figure climbed up to € 650. That would definitely contribute to an outstanding increase in the turnover against number of students and would be based on effective marketing and communication techniques, imposing the need of such increases. However, this doesn’t excuse how the average profit spread was 20% in 2005, climbing up to 36% in 2006, which at the end of the day is what concerns every business owner. It would also be a mistake not to mention that none of these business owners were receiving a regular monthly advance of their entrepreneurial fee in 2005, whereas in 2006, arranged monthly advances for each owner, ranging from € 1,100 for a school of 70 students, to € 9,000 for a school of 950 students were being received. Of course, those entrepreneurial fees were arranged after catering for a floating investment capital for the business itself and the tax of the current year.

The above achievements of these co-operations were not only due to effective business planning (or re-planning); they were due to major initiatives of the owners to restructure their work philosophy and reeducate their market.
The first principle everyone had to realize was that their work time costs. So many times small owners that feel that their business is suffocating take on inflated numbers of teaching hours per week, so as not to pay extra wages. However, this is suicide, as they lose in personal quality of time and life, while they deprive themselves of the ability to monitor their operation, as well as their market. When either starts to collapse they look out for bad competition to blame.
The second principle everyone had to realize was that profit itself requires investment. Money can buy precious time to organize, monitor, correct and most of all communicate with your market. Also, time will facilitate the creation of an outstanding learning experience in your school, which is the only thing that can break the vicious circle of the standardized product as perceived throughout the country in terms of shaping up your own competitive advantage.
The third principle everyone had to realize was that bad management of variable costs leads to profound energy and financial leaks. Breaking healthy numbered classes, adding free teaching hours, giving out spontaneous discounts, etc. should be dealt with as important and measurable marketing tools and clients should be given the right to appreciate them rather than take them for granted. An immense difference in turnover was presented when in some of my co-operations, owners started charging their fees per class and not per student. Also, in three of the aforementioned co-operations I had to plan a temporary strategic decrease in the number of students in order to reset cost centre controls and increase profit by at least 12% that would give space for further strategic investment.
The fourth principle everyone had to realize was that pride in what you offer is something that no client is going to acknowledge without a respective claim and documentation. Treat your clients as partners and prove that what they pay is what they get. Value for money is a universal sine-qua-non. Treat your employees as your suppliers and prove that what they get paid is what they offer. Encourage everyone to contribute to the exceptional learning experience in your educational business.
The fifth and maybe most important principle was that of “I need / They want / We will”. During “zeroing” (the reset button of each business) I always encourage my clients to start from what and how much they need to earn on a personal monthly basis, in order for them to feel they live decently, if not profitably, out of their educational business. Then an analysis of the purchase capacity and value clients feel they receive, will determine how much they want to spend. A figurative manipulation of the above relation will, in its turn, determine not only the turnover of the educational business, but most importantly the trends and habits of the client in responding to their obligations, as well as the policy of the educational business itself. Mutual respect is based on self respect.
Last but not least was the vision. In international professional analyses, along with indexes like the Intelligence Quotient (IQ) and the Emotional Quotient (EQ), what has started appearing more and more is the Spiritual Quotient (SQ). In heavily competitive industries, like Greek ELT, the vision will determine the success of the owner and his/her business as well. The successful owner will synchronise his/her business and educational practices with an overall vision of how the industry he/she is in will evolve. The need for change and vast improvements should contribute to the elevation of the qualities served and with the adequate nerve, dare to even change educational practices, perceptions and prejudices in the whole educational system. Besides, in our world if there’s any space for change it will come from the private sector and the state sector will follow in time.
Education, like health and other fundamental systems for social and individual existence, requires leaders.

So long training!

2007-02-27T18:13:00.000+02:00

During our 2006 research what was specifically noticeable was the crisis training is undergoing. While once upon a time ELT professionals could take pride in being one of the best and most frequently trained professional fields worldwide, 2006 could be characterized as the most critical year for professional ELT trainers in Greece, based on interviews to 5 accredited professional ELT trainers in Athens and Thessaloniki, and 370 school owners also in Athens and Thessaloniki.

My standard professional attitude has always been that of judging processes and phenomena by result. To explain why training (among so many other ELT related professions) is going through such a major crisis, we have to analyse a series of parameters and most specifically:

What is nowadays perceived as training in Greek ELT
Which are the universal needs that are met by training as an one-off or on-going solution
How these needs apply or appear in Greek ELT nowadays
What can be done

a) What is nowadays perceived as training in Greek ELT? Training per se can only be interpreted as a development tool. Professional development requires targets, processes, keeping up-to-date with methodological trends and meeting the aforementioned targets more precisely, faster, successfully and more flexibly to achieve customized and individualized solutions, so that end receivers of our service receive a higher value for money. However, the majority of school owners and ELT teachers claim to have attended multiple training sessions throughout the year, just by attending publishing product knowledge sessions and book presentations, or even the free examination reform updates, which should also be included in the product knowledge sessions. This is a form of training and it is great that it is provided for free, but it covers only a tiny piece of the training needs of a professional.
b) Which are the universal needs that are met by training as a one-off or on-going solution? The reasons companies throughout the world train their staff and that professionals on an individual basis enrol in training programmes could be outlined as follows:
I. Product knowledge
II. New staff’s smooth incorporation into the corporate organogramme
III. New market trends
IV. On-going development / added value performance for the clients
V. Productivity and methodology
VI. Accreditation

I. Product knowledge
Product knowledge usually refers to the product or service that the professional offers or to the tools that the professional uses. In our case, the service offered has been highly standardized for years and is only related to specific certificates. The private language teaching sector has followed the state curricular standards, mainly because of pedagogical reasons that relate to the age group of ELT students. This means that we are talking about a set academic year, a rather standard number of years to reach the first certificate and the subsequent perception that “the student finishes English” in the way that they finish school with an “apolyterion”. There has been little and narrow space over the year for “ELT product” variations, mainly depending on the variations of the end target which is the certificate. Where there has been space for product development meeting variant needs of professional and adult students, the average school owner and teacher have just amended the corpus standard curriculum of the younger learners, hardly responding to the specific needs of the adults, which explains why the adult market is still so poor and only responding to the need of a “recognized” certificate for their career.
As far as products that serve as tools are concerned, as I mentioned above, they are supported by on-going presentations and usage training sessions sponsored by the publishers, thus serving regular product updates for the teaching community and sales targets for themselves.

II. New staff’s smooth incorporation into the corporate organogramme
It is common knowledge that the average ELT business in Greece has evolved rather spontaneously, with no recorded HR structures and definitely no recorded procedures and performance measurements to be met. Incorporation of new staff into the business reality is done equally spontaneously, without any methodological lines in place as there are no targets and procedures to be met. The average employment contract is as long as the academic year and there is lots of space for correctional moves based on experience.

III. New trends
Talking about new trends in Greek ELT we can only talk about new forms of language user accreditation and recognition, but not about new market trends. So far little, if anything, has been done towards serving the linguistic and communication needs of parts of the market who are not interested in state recognized accreditation by schools. Thus, there is no need for further training, as examination bodies cater for the training of teachers and their updates frequently and most importantly for free.

IV. On-going development / added value performance for the clients
Added value to the client and personal development should always be a parameter we constantly check and invest in. However, reasons of recession along with high standardization of the needs of a badly trained or faithless market make on-going training a rather expensive investment in the value for money relation. Experience and unofficial coaching offered by the owner of a school can effectively ensure the minimum requirements. Buying an undoubtedly valuable training programme on “how to teach young learners”, is no good value for money any more, first because financial restrictions have grown immensely, second because few school owners want to invest in staff that by no means can be seen as permanent.

V. Productivity and methodology
Training is usually one of the end tools to ensure productivity and methodological improvement. It definitely requires a target plan, observations and monitoring and most of all the time, resources and money to accommodate those procedures. These parameters live far from Greek ELT reality.
VI. Accreditation
A usual reason why professionals seek further training is to obtain some specific form of accreditation that would add onto their competitive advantages. Within the ELT field the only accredited qualification required is the “eparkeia” (coming from either a university degree or proficiency certification). When the whole market knows that any recognized teacher can get their students to meet exams requirements, time and money pressure keeps them from seeking further accreditation, simply because the market is not interested in further competitive advantages of this kind.

c) What can be done
The most important thing for all ELT professionals is to realize that what has made training less desired is value for money. Even small luxuries are welcome only at times of wealth. The rest of the time any added value service is purchased to add tangible potential for profit. Many teachers and school owners keep saying that nothing new or fresh has been offered training-wise over the past decade. That is not true, as Greek ELT has produced trainers of outstanding value and expertise over the past two decades. The problem is not that training is flat, but the fact that the ELT product itself is flat and too standardized in Greece.
Another thing is that trainers are framed and have associated themselves with specific products, methodologies, accreditations, spontaneously responding to market needs several years ago, which, however, do not correspond to current needs of the ELT market.
ELT training in our decade has to signify a wind of change. Training should give something that professionals do not possess; unfortunately they do not feel so, simply because they possess enough for what they are expected to give. That actually might not be true, but that is what everybody feels like and as I have said, I prefer to judge things by result.

The Can-Do Statements of the ELT business

2006-12-28T19:53:00.000+02:00

The CEFR has been a revelation so far, not only by introducing a standard framework of skills and abilities (besides it’s too standardized in this respect), but mainly by introducing autonomy, self-evaluation and the concept of producing what’s now known as Can-Do statements. However, for those who see the real value of the concept and not just the superficial “recipe”, it’s impossible to underestimate the potential for expansion into every field of activity requiring improvement, training and growth. One of these fields is your business itself.

Can-Do statements related to a knowledge and practice area, more than anything, set targets, as long as, of course, one can understand what being able to do something really means, and what use there is in it.

Business Can-Do statements should be able to relate to the success and growth of the business, but also to the satisfaction of persons involved, including the owner, the human resources and most of all the recipient of the product and the client. A business is like a human being – it needs to be viable and healthy, but also popular, growing, a good constant learner, a “socialiser”; it also needs to be adaptable and a good negotiator. Like humans, businesses have to be all the above in order to be accepted, preferred, popular, healthy and wealthy. Like humans, businesses have to spend and invest money and energy, not only to produce, but also to maintain themselves and achieve the above survival prerequisites.

Bearing in mind the above, the following could be defined as the main Business Can-Do areas in Greek ELT:
1) My business CAN plan and ensure its “nutritional” supplies for the times to come:
A business plan with an analysis of the “physical and mental” requirements and strategies of maintenance and growth is vital.

2) My business CAN develop a methodology of monitoring the implementation and progress of its survival and growth plan:
A policy of regular “check-ups”, controls, and correctional actions is as important as medical check-ups and health plans are for the human body and mind, as long as, of course, the checklist is specific and examined in co-operation with the right specialist.

3) My business CAN look after its organic vital resources:
As the human brain and heart are in charge of ensuring the good health and functionality of themselves and the rest of the organs that service the body, so should the business, for its human and other resources. In humans, a suicidal cell can be transformed into a cancer cell. The human body has the mechanisms to reject it, as long as it consistently monitors the whole body and mental function. Negligence or lack of awareness could allow this cell to “contaminate” several areas of the body with lethal consequences.

4) My business CAN ensure its prominence and competitive advantage through skills acquisition:
As humans learn and acquire new skills and techniques in order to stand out socially and professionally, so our business has to always make sure it is one step ahead. Members of society stick with their strongest, most knowledgeable peers. We’re all engineered to aim high and share glory, power, comfort and security while at the same time saving money and energy, avoiding hardship and enjoying high value. A prominent business can shape criteria, attract friends and fans, create trends.

5) My business CAN successfully communicate its prominence and competitive advantage:
A communication-focused plan referring to skills acquisition, experimentation, investment, actions, controls and measurements is vital in order to ensure marketability and popularity. A thorough analysis of the codes the target group understands will provide a strong foundation towards that.

6) My business CAN be useful (if not necessary):
Humans are self-centred. Usefulness, though, is judged by the recipient of an action. Our business has to listen and not assume. Then our business has to evaluate what is needed and, if required, to guide and educate its recipients. At the end of the day, our business will be judged by result alone.

7) My business CAN visualize itself and its condition in the long run:
Set targets, visualize your business’s existence in 5, 10, 20 years from now. Think what the world is like today and how likely it is to remain the same in the long run. How easy is it to predict? What skills does your business need to always be up-to-date?
Monitor that your course of action serves your targets. The journey will change various times, your targets should be met, whatever the journey.

8) My business CAN have access to all available tools and facilitators for its welfare:
Find the right specialists and tools that will help your business stand out. Evaluate their Can-Dos and their compatibility with your needs and visions. Use and be used by the right people and grow together. Find your niche but don’t compromise on your learning course. Always stay one step ahead.

The above areas are generic, but universal. A customized set of procedures, fully compliant with the personality and personal targets of the owner, will ensure the above Can-Dos. Fair and healthy entrepreneurship is not what Greece is renowned for. However, education is the most significant field, where the first small revolutions should brew. The education everybody once received reflects their current being. It’s as simple as that.

The educational product no.2 - Re-energizing a dormant industry

2006-11-28T19:52:00.000+02:00

To date, whenever somebody asked “so what exactly do you do?”, the most natural answer that came out of my mouth is “re-energizing dormant educational businesses”. The influence of seminars I had attended myself was, of course, obvious in this answer. However, the extent of the problem I was coming up against as a consultant reached the edges of the whole private language school field and not only specific businesses. The reasons are known – I have analysed them often over the past few years, but so far the solutions have only reached the hands of a few owners and educators. They do now have a substantial competitive advantage in a dormant field, but the actual process is a real struggle, having to swim through the murky pulp of a turbulently sinking field and the resistance of existing or potential markets and clients.

My own experience of running a company, as well as social circumstances of wider interest, played a specifically enlightening role in 2006. At the end of 2005, I gave out for the second time to my readers the results of our annual research. Maybe the most outstanding element of this research was the fact that 77% of adult certificate holders in Greece do not feel they can confidently and effectively use the foreign language they have been certified for.

Followingly, in the summer of 2006, we came across a sad phenomenon in my own company. Advertising a specific number of new posts, we received a large number (about 450) of CVs in application. Unfortunately, the short-listing procedure was too easy. You can easily tell where parents’ money goes when a BA and MBA holder proves to be unable to write competently either in Greek or in English or both. Half of all the applications we received were directed to us via e-mails addressed apparently to a large number of businesses at the same time as ours, and not ‘Bcc-ed’, but blatantly ‘To-ed’. Worst of all, though we specifically asked for a European Passport CV, also giving instructions about where to download the template from, only 10% of the CVs were along the lines of the specifications we asked for. Interviews were even more disheartening, but, as my colleague Paul says, this is an everyday situation when he interviews teachers as well.

During the whole summer and in September as well, we all, as a nation, have been experiencing the beginning of a possibly violent forthcoming ‘educational reform’ with Mrs. Marietta Giannakou bearing the heaviest globalization cross. Also, this autumn, some shocking news reached my ears from our educational Guru European State, the UK, realizing educational gaps with long-term side effects for culture and economy. I was in the UK, and my friend Nick Blinco, Development Director of the University of Birmingham, was admitting to me that traditional benefactors of the University from around the world have started to hesitate giving their donations, seeing the bad quality of graduates that Universities in the UK feed the employment market with. And the whole problem is contained within the overestimation of accreditation and certification against what graduates CAN actually DO.

What all the theory around the CEF-R hadn’t managed to do to my brain, a few words that day did, and I rushed back to Thessaloniki, calling about 20 of the short-listed candidates for our vacancies in the summer. I politely asked for an add-on interview, which, literally speaking, was just one question: “Right, Mr or Miss xyz, I appreciate your certificate, BA and MBA. Could you explain to me, specifically based on the above qualifications, what you CAN DO for yourself?”

The catch was not in what they CAN DO, but in the expression ‘“for yourself’ of course. This is where every educational system has failed, and our industry, ELT in Greece, fully, half or not-at-all recognized, is part of this system. Because amongst the majority of our ‘frontisterio graduates’ what they CAN all DO is successfully earn points within the ASEP assessment system. What sadly only a few of them CAN also DO is use the foreign language as a means of communication, self-promotion, and self-marketing in fact. The language is a tool to help you point out your background, knowledge, “paideia”. So the skill you acquired over a number of years is your tool to success. The language has also got some principles to help you do this effectively, based on the culture and trends of the native speakers, as long as anything like that has been taught to you, by somebody who CAN DO it.

While a student or user acquires a skill, a business acquires clients and students, successful or less successful ones. They are the tool to success for the business, as long as the educational business doesn’t prove to be one of those that all they CAN DO is advertise high exams pass rates. That, every educational business CAN DO, as every certificate holder can successfully meet the ASEP requirements. How does the educational business use the knowledge gathered from the presence of successful graduates, though? Which future problems of the latter does it cater for? How does the educational business cater for its own marketing by boosting its client’s self-marketing potential?

It is more vital than ever before to realize that an educational business’s service is maximizing its students’ social and self-marketing potential through teaching an educational item for the latter to use as a tool. The role of education in the EU is going to become a burning hot issue pretty soon. America’s prevailing steps are strongly based on realism of what candidates CAN DO and judgment by result. However, America lacks ‘Academia-for-all’. Europe still has it, but only just. States and state sectors are confused, dependant on forces and trends that are more temporary than markets, but their systems are too consolidated to provide valid feedback at the same time. Private sectors are forced into flexibility, and our humble little ELT is the carrier, if not the Holy Grail, of a set of skills fully compliant with our newborn globalised world. Your students are your product and by maximizing their potential you maximize yours. Their potential is maximized not only by the actual skill they acquire, but by the whole educational experience at your school. As a young parent, I can’t help noticing that children reproduce ten times more experience-related attitudes than you would expect.

If you happen to be the ‘product’ of an outstanding educational experience, point it out! I’m sure what you do is not ALL you CAN DO!

The educational product

2006-10-15T19:51:00.000+02:00

I have been working with ELT businesses for a fair while now. My first task is usually to deal with viability issues and, in specific, to encourage ELT businessmen and women to respect the business side of their school, monitor and measure cost centres, manage human resources, ensure their profit margins and market their identity effectively with respect to the needs and purchase power of parents. Of course, the most difficult part of the task has been to point out all this as the means to improve the owner’s quality of life, as time spent more productively brings more income, and thus more free time to look after their personal lives and their personal goals for self-improvement.

To achieve this target requires the development of lots of internal and external marketing systems and procedures. However, nothing can beat the universal principle of creative differentiation. Differentiation can attract consumers’ attention, meet their needs more effectively, improve customer service. Differentiation can mean more creative marketing, achieve a faster response time to customer requests, and, more to the point, establish an outstanding identity.

The Greek ELT field allows little space for differentiation. However, the problem is definitely not lack of creativity! The problem is a) the size of the field and b) the homogeneity of the businesses that service it. In a few words, the problem is this: the product of the field is highly standardized, almost fixed, serving a specifically narrow target. This means that at times of financial crisis, like most western societies are currently undergoing, consumers narrow their criteria down to value for money. Such a highly standardized product is strictly limited by its target, in our case examinations, so added value during servicing is overlooked.

As a result, the job description of the field, as defined by its name, ELT, has little to do with today’s reality. When the field was established, the conditions of its development dictated its formation. People needed to learn English, not only to enter a professional sector through certification, but indeed to be able to use English as a personal tool of expression. The latter is exactly what faded over the years due to false targeting. This loss dragged with it all the relevant factors and parameters, including qualified human resources, criteria of operation, methodology of servicing. Worse than all this, it has left whole generations of consumers not knowing what to expect nor what they need: the substantial product of ELT, a live tool of expression, so necessary nowadays in the immediate globalised economic environment. Influencing factors, including the State, foreign universities, publishers and associations have encouraged this phenomenon, both for the right and the wrong reasons.

Nowadays, Greece has millions of certified language users, the lowest exportability and investment rates in Europe, the lowest rates of cultural awareness, the biggest percentage of population that has never crossed the borders of the country and the worst national marketing and self marketing in the world. We might take pride in the fact that we have more linguists than France or Spain, but realistically, we need more communicational and self-marketing tools than those larger, richer countries. Instead of focusing on building these tools, we spend enormous amounts of money preparing armies of students for papers recognized solely by our country.
Bearing all this in mind, the need for differentiation of the product itself is obvious. A new and improved product will differentiate the field. It will allow the development of a new field within the field. The circulation of this new product will, in time, provide adequate tools to re-train the market. And then, just maybe, a new generation of opportunities will present themselves to schools, publishers and trainers, but most of all to language users throughout the country, allowing them to maximize their potential. It will take time, like anything. Good things always do.

Welcome Sales

2006-08-15T19:49:00.000+02:00

After monitoring a number of school development projects I have realised that there is a word that intimidates the average educator / school owner far more than terms like ‘finances’, ‘business’, ‘profit’, etc. It is the taboo word ‘sales’. When I first started talking about sales to my clients I came across looks of shock, confusion, negativity, even rejection. What would ‘sales’ have to do with a school, which offers education to young learners? Getting deeper into conversation, school owners would rather talk about ‘registration’, ‘enrolment’, etc. However, ‘eggrafes’ is the result of a whole procedure that I would define as ‘sales’ whether well-planned, random or even just lucky. The registration of a student is the ‘closing of a sale’.

I have dealt with lots of reactions from my clients about defining the term. The overall attitude was why, at the end of the day, should we adopt a term that sounds so disturbing and feels so incompatible with our educational nature and role? The answer is simply that words and terms determine our attitude towards procedures on a psychological basis. Terms act symbolically. On a more technocratic basis, lack of use of the right term has distanced the real nature of registrations as sales, from the art of sales. So much has been written, taught and designed regarding the art of sales that has never reached either the school owner or his/her staff, just because the most important time of the school year for the viability of the business, September, has never been related to ‘sales’.

Successful sales will define the success of our overall marketing plan, our business plan and most importantly, the viability and growth of our school business. Sales are related to marketing but are not marketing. Marketing is developed to support the overall identity of our school and communicate it, but at the end of the day, marketing exists to support our sales. Every well-organised company has to have separate procedures for sales and marketing, including separate budgets and resources. However, it is sales that will bring the customer to our business and make him/her commit to the initiation of co-operation, which at the same time I would call the ‘closing of a sale’. Below are the ten basic principles for successful sales:

1) Sales are not marketing: Sales are related to marketing and its tools (i.e. advertising, campaigns, etc.). However, marketing serves the overall identity and image of our business and is addressed not only to the target group of our activity, but also to the extended community that our target group belongs to. That’s why marketing has to be planned long-term, under the provision of a highly-controlled sequence of events. A sale is the individualised action, addressed directly to a specific potential customer or a small homogenous group of customers, and is interpersonal. The potential customer, whose interest has been adequately intrigued by our marketing, will then have to be dealt with individually, investigated individually regarding his/her needs and then convinced that our specific product is the right one for his/her needs.
2) A sale cannot be heavily standardised as a procedure: There is no recipe for closing a sale, as it is not only about the obvious needs of the customer to obtain what we have to offer. In highly competitive environments like ELT, it is also about the inner needs of the potential customer, such as his psychological need for comfort, power and security (COMPOSE). The individuals responsible for sales require thorough training to be able to identify the psychological profile of the customer and effectively respond to it.
3) A sale should not be based on assumptions about the customer’s perception: The potential customer, just like all of us, hates to contradict him/herself. People, by nature, are afraid to change their opinion on something, as such about-turns are often heavily criticised within our social and professional circles. It is vital therefore to constantly elicit approval and acceptance of our arguments when dealing with a potential customer. This brings him/her closer to us rhythmically and effectively.
4) Your argument is more powerful when it comes from the mouth of your potential customer: This is a safer but more complex method of making your potential customer commit him/herself to your business. Design specific questions that will elicit specific answers, describing your own product. Guide your potential customer to express his/her needs in ways that will reflect your competitive advantages.
5) Always have specific members of staff who deal with sales: Sales is a department on its own. People who deal with sales, whether administrative staff or teachers, have to be well-trained, skilled communicators. Invest in them in duration and you will see that added experience bears added value.
6) The key word for successful sales is good product knowledge: Your product is multidimensional. It is non-tangible, and as such is highly dependant on unforeseen conditions, the receivers of your service themselves, and overall the human factor. Train your sales staff profoundly regarding your educational programmes but also train them to show that your school knows how to make a student learn. Your product is not only the lesson, but also the successful student. State the obvious to your potential customer. Very few do it.
7) Never be a part of your sales force: You are the owner, the head of the business and educational system, the school policy itself. Sales are based on successful negotiations and negotiations are based on the principle that there are only winners and no losers. When the potential or existing customer deals with the business policy itself (you), there will definitely be a loser at the end and it is more likely that this will be you. Use your separate sales force as the filter between you and the customer. This gives a more professional impression to the potential customer, and gives you time and space to reflect on a problem before it reaches you. Then when you really need to deal with the customer yourself, after his/her first encounter with the sales person or team, you really honour him/her.
8) Be strict with the time management of a sale: Give your potential customer lots of time to talk and listen, to absorb what he/she hears, and to commit him/herself to his approval and acceptance of your competitive advantages. This means give lots of time when you are in control of the sale procedure. When this procedure finishes, control is then passed over to your potential customer, as he/she is the owner of the decision. When you reach this point, give as little time as possible. Do this gently and politely, but firmly and confidently.
9) Play ‘table tennis’ with responsibility as the ball: Give your potential customer the right to understand that this decision is very serious for him/her and that now it is their job to prove it to you. Pass the ball of responsibility onto them and show them that you understand fully that they know the best for their child. It is then and there that they will have to weigh technicalities (i.e. cost, distance, etc.) against the welfare of their child.
10) Prepare a sales action plan and train, train, train: Like every plan, your sales action plan and relevant resources should be evaluated after each sales period, and any necessary correctional action taken. Correctional action will affect both your marketing plan and your sales action plan for the sales period to come. Give your sales staff enough time to reflect on their performance, and organise appraisals. Enjoying the opportunity of only one (main) sales period per year, exploit the knowledge and feelings of your convinced and existing clients and incorporate this feedback into your annual training sessions. Most of all, never stop training yourself and your sales team. Customer trends and attitudes change constantly, as do your product and competitive advantages. Always be one step ahead.

My warmest wishes for successful sales.

Promote English

2006-06-15T19:48:00.000+02:00

Three years ago I started warning my clients and contacts in the field that we’re moving into a new era as far as the character and needs of the ELT field in Greece are concerned. We had already begun to talk about market saturation, institutional changes in the public sector imposed mainly by the EU, commercialization of the field and the “intrusion” of professionals from other fields. As I am writing, in 2006, all this has become a reality.

Very recently, at a dinner hosting both school owners and publishers, the sales manager of a publishing company was stating the opinion that the publishing industry is shrinking drastically, and that publishing companies are cutting down on investment while they have already started rationalizing the cost of personnel, most specifically their sales teams. The same manager was admitting that the junior market is shrinking faster than others, something that most school owners dread to hear. Also, that with the inclusion of foreign languages at the lower levels of primary state education, parents will start asking instead for more specialized services at higher (senior and exam) levels from private language schools, so it is the intention of most publishers to focus more on these segments in the years to come.

At the same time, with the big (dare I say overwhelming) variety of exams offered and recognized by the supreme council of personnel recruitment (ASEP), candidates feel more disoriented, and of course, so do their parents and teachers. And on top of that, an increasing number of state authorities are declaring their intention to exclude ASEP from their recruitment policies and adopt more traditional, but at the same time more substantial criteria, especially as far as professional skills are concerned (World’s Investor Sat. 6/5/2006).

To the above equation you add the sad 77% (hyphen 2005 annual market research) of Greek professional FL certificate holders who cannot speak English, thus shaping a disappointing international profile for the average Greek professional. Then it is easier to swallow that maybe this whole Greek ELT system, that has successfully served Greek insecurity and the need for formal (but not necessarily substantial) accreditation, is coming to an end.

With all the above in mind, the timely question of who is going to survive naturally pops up. As I have always said, what makes a good businessman is his/her ability to transform the vision of the business, and its services, according to the constantly changing needs of the market, but always based on his/her professional expertise. On the other hand, as I predicted at my annual market research presentation back in December, for the decade to come, business viability concerns only a third of the existing ELT businesses in Greece. The reason is very simple.

If schools cannot find an effective way to differentiate their services, profile, performance and targets from their competitors, the market itself already seems able to force Greek frontisteria to do so, fast, flexibly and effectively. By taking out of play a whole generation of school owners of retirement age, and a few thousand more frontisteria which just cannot meet the emerging needs of the saturated and commercialized market, that leaves us with only a third of existing businesses with the strength to face the biggest challenge ever in Greek ELT.

This challenge is called ‘educating our market’. It is widely accepted that nowadays, parents and students believe that whichever school they choose, the main aim of passing an examination will be met. Thus, the rising issue for us as businesses is: ‘Is this really the ultimate target of our school and its students?’ Will English as a foreign language function as a lively professional skill of a European citizen even if English starts from Kindergarten? Can the Greek state, or any state, provide customized training and orientation? Can the nine or ten locally recognized certificates (half of which are completely unknown on a European scale) accredit thorough users? Will the European Portfolio manage to stand out as a self-evaluation tool in the state sector, or will it prove itself to be more homework? And if none of these developments can ensure an outstanding international profile for the Greek professional (especially now that the Ministry is working so hard towards the promotion of a highly documented tertiary education), who is going to do this and how are they going to educate the market about their real needs and the vocational reality of modern Europe?

The ELT businesses that will survive the next few years will have nothing to do with the traditional Greek frontisterio as we now know it. I insist, and will keep on insisting, that to run a successful business, we must have something real to sell and this ‘something’ must answer the real and current needs of the market it services. If the market, due to a long period of disorientation, does not seem to know what its needs are, it is our job to identify them, point them out, explain them, and reassure the market that we are here to help. It is such a waste of time and money to state the obvious with our September advertising, the fact that we train students for exams and that our students will pass. There is no ELT business in Greece that does not deserve to state this honestly, and parents know it. What parents and students do not know is English. Even worse, they do not know how useful English is, and how late it will be when a new employer, somewhere in Europe, finds out, post-recruitment, that the certificate stated in a CV does not reflect real and existing skills.

What all good, viable schools need to promote and affiliate themselves with is teaching English. Teaching an English that can tangibly reflect on functional knowledge, learning targets and specific needs. But before they can promote this oh, so obvious service, they have to start teaching this English again. After all, once they have a real ‘something’ to sell, promoting it and regaining a lost market is accessible to anyone who takes their profession seriously enough.
issue, as the identity and reputation of the field depends on it.

Institutional Competition

2006-05-15T19:46:00.000+02:00

At the end of the academic year insecurity begins to gather about the September to come. Each school owner is thinking about promotional campaigns, numbers of new students, books and educational materials to be adopted, but also about their direct competition; other schools in the neighbourhood, chain branches, private lessons providers and even, sometimes, their own teachers.

I thought it would be useful to analyse here the kind of competition that threatens the average school owner the most. More specifically, school owners often report unfair competition through direct inaccurate information against their school, either through copying of their ideas, inaccurate exam results on competitors’ windows, and most importantly through competitors offering low tuition fees or even free courses. The truth is that none of the above behaviour can be directly dealt with, as either they cannot be proven, or, in the case of low tuition fees or free courses, it’s impossible to change the mind of a school owner, who, without a business plan and a specific strategy, has chosen a suicidal attitude towards the market, thus strangling the other schools nearby.

Why, though, do school owners, suicidal or not, choose such unfair approaches or low tuition fees / free courses to compete with the other schools in their area? As I’ve mentioned a number of times before in this column, effective marketing really means the development of, and communication of, competitive advantages. Aren’t there specific competitive advantages that any school could work on? Aren’t there solutions to make every school more attractive to parents, through developing a better educational system that parents would appreciate? At the end of the day, however, would parents actually appreciate any such possible competitive advantages?

This problem, which didn’t exist more than 15 years ago, has never been related to the ability of a school owner (or lack of it) to achieve a better, more effective marketing strategy or better service promotion and sales. I believe the problem has always been that school owners deal with the wrong kind of competition, i.e. professionals in their own field, instead of facing the real competition that has limited their growth potential to an all-time low; their own market, parents and students, their own representatives in the field, and primarily themselves, who neglect the most useful target of their profession: educating their own market about their role as foreign language schools.

This I call “institutional competition”. Eight out of ten schools we serviced in 2005 named as their number one competitor private lessons and low fees. These two factors are very significant in how the market perceives the ELT field. Our 2005 market research showed that the vast majority of parents with children in the ELT field believe that all private language schools do roughly the same job, probably using the same level and quality of materials and sharing a common exam success rate. It is not my purpose to analyse how true this is or not, but rather point out how it explains the market’s attitude.

If parents indeed believe that wherever their child goes he/she will pass the necessary exam and get the desired certificate, then how irrational is it for a parent to choose the school that is closest to home and furthermore, the school that is closest to home and cheapest? And how irrational is it for a parent to hire a private teacher who will come to the house and get paid much less than a school would?

Who has ever talked substantially to the parents about the pedagogical implications of the classroom environment, methodological issues, the running costs of a school, the reasons why some of them change teachers every academic year? Who has trained the parents to check the qualifications of a private teacher who gets paid only 4 euros an hour?

Is it maybe that all parents, excusably so, consider the private ELT field a necessary evil; an expensive substitute for the public sector that should really provide this service? Do they indeed feel it’s unfair for them to have to complement their children’s education with private tuition, due to the state’s inadequacy to provide good foreign language education? Does this resentment breed anger, leading to raw blackmail against the school owner, together with indifference about their child’s progress?

The truth is that no other public sector in Europe is doing any better a job than the Greek educational system, at least as far as EFL is concerned. Swedish public school teachers have never heard of the CEFR, which reaches them only as experimental workshops funded by European programmes through the local municipality. French students hardly reach a B1 level by the time they finish school. Italian students already define the biggest PET but not FCE market in Europe. The only difference lies with employment requirements. And the determiner in our case is the “recognition” of certain specific certificates in the public employment sector and thus in major parts of the private sector.

Parents are certainly not aware of these facts. They would also never admit that all they really care about is the certificate. They would never admit that a certificate defines the end of what I would call “constructive learning phase” and the time when usage training should start. Besides, that is why 77% of adult certificate holders cannot actually ‘use’ the foreign language.

Moreover, who can tell parents that things should be different, if things are really not that different? Could it be that school owners have identified themselves too much with the role that both the state and the parents / students market have given us, calling ourselves educators, but actually doing nothing more than following set publishers’ syllabi towards a specific certificate? Is it by chance that our national success rate at Proficiency is 29% when small, nearly unknown Latin American countries reach 100%? How can we fight institutional competition without redefining the actual phases of education through differentiating our role, something that we have the flexibility to achieve as private businesses? How can we develop our own competitive advantages if we do not, in practice, connect the foreign language as a skill with professional orientation?
When school owners choose my services for a better marketing strategy, I tell them, in honesty, that however much money a school spends on communication and advertising, it is more down to good luck, incidents (like a school closing in the area) or something temporary that will pay off any advertising investment. Learning targets differentiation will revalue the role of the trained educator, redefine tuition fees and payment terms, re-educate parents and clean up the market map, as at the moment, as we are all well aware, just about anyone can open a private language school. However, a massive nationwide campaign against institutional competition is not something that can be initiated by one individual or by schools in one area. This is truly a field

The War of the Worlds - "School owners vs Publishers"

2006-03-14T19:45:00.000+02:00

A few years ago, when I took my first publishing course back in Oxford, I came across possibly the biggest revelation of all in my ELT career. Creating books had always been, to my knowledge, a long process that required lots of research. Being a salesperson, then a consultant and later a commissioning editor and publishing manager, I realized that there’s far more than commercial criteria to be met through exhausting research when creating a book. The biggest pedagogical weight of a book is not only whether it meets learning targets, corresponds to word banks, exam requirements and grammatical structures and functions. Most of all, it is about whether it contributes to the educational, cultural and psychological needs of the learner, especially the young learner, through appropriacy, consistency and a vision to convey messages that will create healthy language users and citizens. That gave me a clear definition of the role of a good commissioning editor that most high quality publishers have on board.

It was, thus, a great surprise when I recently came across a couple of books in the Greek market, addressed to young learners, including or even making use of some hilarious elements. Without being puritanical, now that I have become a parent, I felt rather uncomfortable flicking through books with nudity or voyeuristic implications, references to drinking problems, wild youth, etc. Emotions of jealousy and intrigue between teenagers described or illustrated take us back to the times of “the bold and the beautiful” and other similar soap operas.

Taking a closer look it was not difficult to notice that the lack of knowledge of the art of fair and scientific publishing went even deeper, to educational issues. Consistency is non existent in many books, overlooking the widely accepted consolidation processes, while in some others, dryness and restriction to narrow frameworks of lists required by exams deprive students of any possibility to functionally and creatively perform.

Looking back at the books of several years ago, it is easy for the average educator to notice the deterioration of quality, spirit, creativity, novelty, but also appropriacy in terms of standard publishing and educational rules. Besides, most publishers today agree that there is nothing new in the market, everything is reproduced and books become sellers or best sellers only through effective marketing. Why is that? What has changed over the years, apart from the overall consumer attitudes and lifestyle?

The answer, one would think, lies in competition beyond any measure. The truth is that back in 1989, unlike today, there were a handful of publishers in the Greek market. When OUP, Longman or (the then) Heinemann for example counted a 10 to 25% market share each in the early ‘90s, nowadays market shares are narrow pieces of a big pie for everybody. Most publishing marketing plans focus more on freebies, free seminars, even business training nowadays, recognizing a rising need in the market that I’ve been dealing with for the past three years, and are exhausted through thousands of sample copies, many times never to be looked at.

All this is a very expensive investment. It creates more cash flow needs, which means more viability stress for the publishing company or branch, and of course more aggressive competition.
Most of all, it creates a need to more rapidly make publishing moves and launches into the market, which always weighs against quality. The average three years of research and development of a good book series was forced by, mainly Greek publishers’, specific practices and now you hear from 1 year of publishing preparation and production, down to three months from certain publishers. Research and development or production specialists disappear, and instead, well qualified teachers write, edit, proofread and sometimes even design, for little money and of course no copyright on their work.

At the same time, international publishers try to ensure more investment from mother companies abroad, based on unrealistic sales forecasts, deliberately designed so that they can excuse a decent investment in advance. Of course when actual sales figures pop up, the big drawback comes along, and incredibly capable people follow the “HR rearrangement trends” (HR = Human Resources).

I honestly believe that the crisis that is knocking on the door of the publishing world is not only due to the global economic pressures, but also to the lack of flexibility and alternative plans. For example, instead of basing investment on forecasts, one could base profit plans on existing resource controls and perform what the financial world calls “mainstream resources and profit maintenance” at times of risk. Thus, one could silently plan the big boom for after the times of crisis, invest in know-how and high specialization of HR, and most of all avoid quality sacrifices that might need to be overcome with lots of difficulty in the future, as the market seems to remember longer than we hope.

However, I truly need to point out that publishing companies are not the only ones to blame for the current situation. As independent, competitive companies, they follow restricting trends in order to survive. And I have realized that most of the time their market has reflected their own bad habits and practices onto them, thus disorientating them from good publishing.

A year ago I called together a group of school owners and directors of studies to a research focus group on behalf of a (then anonymous) publisher. We very simply asked for the elements they would require for a book at a specific level. We recorded all the feedback and created a brief to be seen by the focus group. To our simple question “would you adopt this book?” the unanimous answer we received was “no”. Although the brief was totally and seriously based on their own feedback.

It is no secret, at the same time, that school owners play with publishers, they trigger competition through gossip, information flow, asking for innumerable sample copies, asking to be bribed rather indiscreetly, and all other sorts of such favours.

I understand that this is the price of bad or superficial client management and training from the publishers’ side over the last ten years. I understand that this is a power show from the school owners’ side as well. Publishers have trained their clientele badly over the last years, and their clients, teachers and school owners, have learnt to depend too much on the book for syllabus design and teaching. Bad market and financial practices have led everybody not to be able to afford good publishing or independent teaching. Lack of money causes time constraints, lack of investment and finally a vicious circle of all the above. What nobody seems to understand is that quality is mainly defined by duration and that the viability of the Greek ELT depends on fair co-operation, fair feedback, and most of all on the fact that every small or big educational business in order to survive, develop and succeed, has to sell something. In fact, I’m not sure that most of them do any more.

I believe that quality has to be seen from a much wider perspective in the Greek ELT.

A few good reasons against known business consultancy in the Greek ELT

2006-02-15T19:43:00.000+02:00

After 3 years in the field of business planning and coaching the Greek ELT enterprise I found out that there are still areas that are open to relative interpretation and subject to diverse approaches. Our kind of activity started filling in a gap in the field and then grew and our needs grew as well, and then we started reaching out for more people. This took us back to our initial SWOT research which analysed the field of business consultants, so as to potentially trace the right specialists to join our team but most of all share our vision and our philosophy for the educational landscape in our country. This temporarily proved to be a fruitless and heartbreaking venture, but only because we had to adopt a different point of view.
Our field, with all the problems and drawbacks it suffers, is maybe one of the few fields bearing the highest Spiritual Quotient (SQ) of other professional fields in our country. That quotient cannot be served just with numbers and fancy promotional ideas.
In the past three decades, business and HR consultants have based their guidance only on measurable criteria and the use of them. Leaders’ IQ and EQ became the measuring tapes of inter-personal and inter-customer communication. Every business and marketing plan started with a SWOT analysis, Porter’s five forces, interrelated market research and financial and human resources analysis and projections. Traditionally a business plan also stated the vision of the business man/woman, but that ended up serving as the decoration only. The main axis however, has always been the competition and relevant competitive advantages against investment and profit.
From the moment we started researching other professional fields, along with ours, we saw that private ELT in Greece is the only field that professionals join not only to make money or just because they like this job. There is maybe the highest proportion of professionals that join a field because they really have a vision of what education should be, and want to make changes based on strong ideological foundations. Whether they know that they are joining a semi-recognised field or not, they soon understand that they are filling substantial gaps of the official educational system, while the foreign language exams and certificates were just the means to do so.

Business consultancy has a very clear purpose; to make the owner of a business conscious of the functions and pre-requisites for their business to grow profitably. This approach is based on two basic principles. The first is that sales are based on market needs so we should focus on how we can lead market needs effectively. The second is that profit is the ultimate target for the business and entrepreneur’s viability. The whole focus of these principles makes use of the variations between businesses in the same field to create communicative and competitive advantages.
In our field, however, all businesses offer the same service. All books provide the same learning targets. Also, in our field, needs, whether established or industry driven, eventually shape personalities. Education as a service or product breeds the market of tomorrow, but also the ethics, the dreams, the ambition and the effectiveness of our students in competing with more cosmopolitan citizens of other states in the big European melting pot.

What is it that could make a good business consultant too poor for the needs of a school owner? The answer is his/her lack of vision as well. However globalised our economy has become and principles of business viability apply to all sorts of enterprise, no business plan can guarantee viability of a school business if it doesn’t substantially bear in mind the personality and vision of the school owner. Measurable criteria must work towards the support of this vision and ensure inspiration of staff, students and parents involved with the school. Finance and marketing methodologies have to obtain a distinct identity reflecting the educator and the tens of generations that have been filtered through the school. Training has to become coaching and coaching has to become sharing and support. Most of all, especially for the educational business, business coaching has to take the form of life coaching. The parameters that recognize that the owner’s personality and the school reflect on each other have to become the corpus of each planner who then applies methodologies referring to targets, controls and correctional moves.
When reaching out for business support always make sure that:
a) Business and project planning are always followed by monitoring
b) An educational business plan always involves your vision and reasons for being in the field
c) You build on communicating your vision and finding out who are those that share it
d) You build on strengthening your vision and thus your messages to your local community
e) You face your financial figures as a tool that will empower your vision
f) You treat your business as a person that reflects your vision
g) You ask your trainer and then your coach to take you as seriously as their own vision for the field. Explore whether they have a vision
h) Your specialist knows your field from within
i) Your specialist defines quality with criteria that reflect on your students.

Bearing in mind all the above, I have already made the decision that all my forthcoming training sessions will start with reference to the experiment of the 100th Japanese Ape. The field has already reached critical mass and is strong enough to initiate the next historical change.

A tale of two parallel worlds

2005-12-15T19:41:00.000+02:00

In a small Latin American country, in 1947, a major decision had to be made by the unstable local Government. The country had just gained its independence, thus they had to organize a new National Guard. Typhus, diphtheria and malnutrition were wiping out whole local communities. The National Guard, as a specialized army needed healthy men and women, well trained, but most of all capable of physically dealing with the challenges of the jungle and the rainforests, the guerilla attacks and sabotages, the unfairly superior war machine of the foreign powers. However, there were only 760 local medical doctors and 4,500 nurses to serve a population of about 14 million people.
International pharmaceutical companies spotted the urgent need for vaccination, as the rest of health improvement parameters relating to nutrition and hygiene were of secondary priority at that point. It is great to serve the common good but even greater if you have a massive market as well. Four pharmaceutical companies came to a historical agreement with the local government that would provide long term solutions to the problem. More specifically:
1) It was particularly difficult to educate all the people about the need for vaccination. However, people would respond easier if they had an incentive. Being struck by poverty, everybody wanted a safe position in the National Guard and subsequently the whole State mechanism. A beneficial solution for everybody would be for the Government to establish a certificate of vaccination as a pre-requisite for every applicant, but also for every new student in every school.
2) As the Government’s medical resources could not support the existing demand, the consortium of the four companies offered to train responsible individuals in:
a. Basic principals of hygiene
b. How to give injections and control side effects
c. How to basically select and train new individuals, before they approached the consortium for the final course and certification
d. How to report to the consortium and the local Government medical authorities

These individuals would take a certificate from the consortium, recognized by the Government, which would allow them to open their own small “vaccination” clinics. These clinics could only provide the above two services, i.e. vaccination and basic hygiene consultancy.

The consortium would make money from sales of vaccination jabs. However, the need for a good job, as the State had a limited number of applicants it could hire every year, grew and this led thousands of potential clinic owners to apply for training and certification. Within the next few years the consortium saw that they could decide on a nominal fee to apply for every course and certificate granted.

The truth is that the system worked. In less than 7 years typhus and diphtheria disappeared from this country, which by the way has been disease-free since then. On top of that, the knowledge gathered over the years by the clinic owners improved the quality of services offered, many of these individuals attended extra courses, some of them even officially studied medicine and turned their clinics into proper general health care units. However, as an established para-medical field, it flourished to include 60,000 clinics in a country that, due to demographic changes, now has a population of about 12 million people. The State has not changed the out-dated law in the past 55 years, so officially these medical units are “vaccination clinics” and recognized as such. Viability stress has obliged the owners and their successors to focus on what they know best; vaccinations and basic hygiene consultancy. The worst thing is that the rest of the population, still functioning within an out-dated legal system still ask for their vaccination certificates in order to get a good position in the State mechanism, or open their own clinic. Since the people are asking for that, this is what clinics offer and a vicious circle has been created, maybe with no way to break it.

International observers in 2004 reported that this small country has been impressively disease free and products contributing to everyday hygiene sell like nowhere else. However, this country has the highest rates of child obesity, heart diseases, strokes and female cancer in Latin America.

The unions of the clinics throughout the country are aware of the overall health problem, as many of their local community members happened to apply for a job in the U.S. Their application was turned down due to their medical history. However, they all have a vaccination certificate.

The consortium of the four companies still exists, contributing to health improvement in other poor countries and just receiving nominal fees for the thousands of jabs sold in that little country every year. On top of that other, technologically more improved jabs have arrived in the market, along with other companies producing and distributing hygiene products, antiseptics, syringes, etc.

Vaccination certificate applicants of the public have a clinic next to their place. They take the whole process for granted and the priority of health improvement, along with the vaccination itself, has been degraded from number one priority to a standard presupposition. They never budget even for the nominal fees and sometimes they disappear, using another clinic for their annual booster jab.

The big challenges vaccination clinic owners come across are:
1) How do they prove that their clinic is the best compared to the competition in terms of good service, complete side-effect control, pleasant environment, and compliance with hygiene standards?
2) How do they manage the public?
3) How do they educate the public, as the consortium had to do decades ago, for them to understand that good health is ensured partly through vaccination, but without proper nutrition and on-going health care, good health cannot be guaranteed?

In that world public health is depending on such a system and expecting such answers. In a parallel world, the Greek ELT, education is expecting similar answers too.

Dealing with adults

2005-07-15T19:37:00.000+02:00

Since the beginning of our co-operation with schools it has been pretty obvious that the adult students’ issue is rather a painful one. Adult classes are necessary, but at the same time they are problematic, actually for the same reasons throughout the country. We started our 2005 annual market research focusing on the adult market and here are some interesting and useful results, I hope, ideas.
First of all, this year’s research methods became a bit more sophisticated. We approached a respectable sample of about 1200 employed adults as well as a smaller sample of about 800 tertiary education students. However, our research did not consist of only a set questionnaire, but an amazing 40% of both samples accepted to fill in a more in depth personal questionnaire, along with a short placement test in English!
It was amazing to see that 48% of the employed adults and 68% of the university students claimed to hold a B2 certificate, while 24% of them held a higher certificate as well, equal to C1 or C2. The average time since they took the examination successfully was about 11 years ago.
The shocking results of the second, more in depth research that took place exclusively amongst the adults that had a certificate, showed that their certificate hardly reflected their level of English! More specifically, the placement test we gave them showed that part of the sample could slightly reach B1 level, with the majority to confidently perform up to A2. Only 4% of the sample that moved onto the secondary level of our research proved to know in practice the foreign language up to the level that their certificate reflected.
The tasks given were highly related to their specific needs of using a foreign language, i.e. dealing with everyday and work environment spoken language requirements, and written forms to be encountered in a work and social environment, like application forms, short reports, faxes and e-mails. The tasks for the university students community included application forms, cover letters, letters of reference, CVs and short essays.
Interviewing managers or employers with activity in other countries, we saw that very few of them were confident enough to rely on their knowledge of a foreign language. Usually, when they travel, they have an employee who speaks the foreign language better with them, but with a lot of compromise, or sometimes a hired interpreter, or a non-official interpreter. Actually, about 70% of the managers/employers we asked do not mind the amateurism of a relative or an acquaintance, either for on-site support or translation of documents. This is, of course, so indicative of the business practices in our country, relating to the complete lack of competitive advantages in every professional field.
Another shocking conclusion from our research was that 100% of the sample do recognise the importance of speaking at least one foreign language well, but when we moved on with the more in depth questionnaires and placement tests, the vast majority of the sample answered the following:
a) They are highly interested in examinations and certificates only if and when these are pre-requisites for employment or a promotion either in the public or private sector or for studies abroad.
b) Almost 100% of the secondary sample replied that they do not relate or connect examinations and certificates to the good knowledge of a foreign language.
c) They do not feel that the good knowledge of a foreign language is in substance so important to them, and when they need it every now and then, they think they can get by with limited knowledge or help by somebody else.
d) They do not see the good knowledge of a foreign language as a real personal competitive advantage in finding a job, as most employers do not pay the necessary attention to foreign languages proficiency.
e) They do not recognise any foreign language knowledge standard in certificates apart from their role as an official qualification if and when required by employers or agencies.

This entire attitude, if not mentality, reflects both the tendency of Greeks to consider private foreign language education a necessary evil and the lack of responsibility in business and state initiative, ambition and success. However, it also shows the need for this nation to be trained in realising what the international environment we are part of is like and what it requires. The role of the foreign language teaching community has not been exploited to the full as, apart from teachers, we should all be carriers of another mentality, promoting cultural awareness, international communication and promote or design measures against our national isolationism. As a field, we take the need of knowing and speaking a foreign language for granted and all we advertise is that we teach foreign languages at our school, and sometimes that we also do it well! Our exclusive focus on the children’s/pupils’ community, which as long as the certificates are recognised can be taken for granted, has limited our scope into how we can help our students “finish English” in as few years as possible. However, we forget that young learners themselves hardly make the decision to go to a foreign language centre by themselves. And if the situation stays as such, then the only criteria in choosing the best foreign language centre will be just the distance from home and how cheap the tuitions fees are. Not to mention of course, that 38% of foreign language centre owners have not even been to the country of the language they teach even for a week…

Issues of representation - Your power is your market

2005-02-15T19:30:00.000+02:00

Greece has never had a particularly good reputation for collective activity and representation. All professional fields are represented by their chambers and associations but participation and contribution becomes an issue only in times of difficulty or crisis, which in most cases proves to be too late. Besides, everybody wants to be a president, and usually the elected president is the one who has the time to be one.
Times, facts and prospects are changing drastically. The EU is exercising pressure on the State for a big change in FLT in our country: further incorporation of the CEF standards so that in a few years time we will not be talking about ‘foreign languages’ but about the ‘languages of Europe’, some of which must have been incorporated in the national curriculum as optional communicative and teaching tools. On top of that, the KPG will have to reach the point of compliance with the standards of a national bac level certificate.
If such a big change occurs, the role of language as a teaching subject, but also the role of our schools, ourselves as business owners and teachers, our associations, the publishers, the franchise chains and especially that of the examinations, will have to transform.
The various reactions to the above statement could be that it is all based on rumours; that the relationship between the Ministry of Education and the relevant authorities in the EU has been constantly developing and rather blurry throughout the years; that the State has proven to be to slow and that no comprehensive reform has been seriously considered over the past few years while the trade power of international examinations corpora has “saved” the day so many times.
However, this is exactly what the main weakness of the ELT field in Greece consists of: institutional uncertainty.
The relationship between the private ELT sector and the State has so far been based on a major inferiority complex. The State preserved and encouraged the development of the field as long as everything worked towards its interest. Compliance with the terms of a free market, a widespread tax source, a piloting field for the definition of needs in foreign language education, a productive field for training students towards the internationally recognised certificates, everything in fact that the State could not provide for about 40 years, was generously provided by the private frontisteria FL certificates industry.
At the same time the State, with all the political adventures of the ‘70s and the ‘80s, could not tame and recognise private businesses that literally offered what it was not in a position to offer. Especially when no major organisation can build a curriculum with an orientation to certificates that one day will be competing with its own one. The ultimate truth is that the State would never give fair credit to the private frontisteria sector.
The above oxymoron led the field to compete solely on an institutional basis. For years and years the local associations and the federation fought for several levels of institutional recognition. The recognition of the PALSO examinations and of the frontisteria as a primary instead of an auxiliary productive force, together with the setting of criteria and levels of social security, salaries and tuition fees, created the arena that literally gave the associations the role of a Union instead of that of a Chamber of FLT providers.
The result of the above misunderstanding was an even bigger oxymoron. One of the biggest national responsibilities, the foreign language training of so many generations of students, was born by a clearly private sector and its market, whereas the institutional principles and relevant legislation were defined by an observer. This private sector grew unfettered as everybody was mainly concerned with the institutional issues. School owners neglected their mission and quality standards, as long as the specific target of preparing students for the certificates was met. Publishers relied too much on this clean and specified market and let inflation overrun their publishing plans.
I know there is an end to this vicious circle. Our power is our market! The market trusts the field, as for foreign language acquisition there has been no other field around. The big issue is that the market is changing and so are its needs. Institutional changes will affect its needs even more. What do we really know about our market and how do we cater for our big responsibility towards it?
Here comes the important role of the representatives of the field. Research and overall marketing of the field should be within the main duties of every association representing tens of professionals. So far the main role of the board of each association has been how to ensure the income of the association through the organisation of events and the examinations. There were also attempts to unify and standardise the market through regulating tuition fees, free lessons and fairness of competition, overlooking, however, the market reality. What is the point of restricting the potential competitive advantages of a member, when this member is being suffocated by the promotional tricks of non-members? What are the protection and competitive advantages that the association offers to this member? Is it the assurance of higher quality? The communication to the parents of what it really means to be a PALSO member? The communication to the parents of why the tuition fees are higher and what they cover? Maybe the communication about the damage that private lessons can do to a student under certain circumstances? Is it really strange that school owners’ interest in their associations is getting less and less, while new associations are being formed under the light of common targets such as better examining conditions or quality assurance?
The existing associations should redefine the dialogue they have been holding with the Greek community, but instead of addressing themselves to the State, they can now turn their heads to the market. Greeks have proven that they are willing to pay, as long as they know that what they pay for is worth it. The problem with parents is that they take frontisteria for granted, almost as much as the public schools. We take parents and what they know about us for granted, so, in their turn, they take us for granted as well.
The messages we have drawn from the year-long market research that was published in the last ELT News issue point out that the role of the associations should focus on the following issues:
a) Define from scratch a realistic and down to earth code of practice and quality for their members and most importantly communicate this code to the parents, with all the competitive advantages that this code gives them. A client must be very clear about his/her benefits. All international and local quality assurance schemes are of private initiative and their power solely lies on the communication and marketing behind them. The only nationally driven code is the criteria the State sets for the licence of operation of a frontisterio. Such movements of associations in the UK and Spain were pointed out in my letter to the federation last summer.
b) Set specific targets for the field that will point out the long experience, know-how and expertise obtained over the years and how these can prove to be useful for the creation of a national curriculum in co-operation with the State. However, for this to happen, the field must obtain the necessary communication power within the community, with serious research and use of existing resources, that will lead to informative campaigns in the public sector and further support.
c) Expose their members to realistic legal and financial developments and techniques that will contribute to their viability. There is no point in organising seminars and commercial presentations by business consultants introduced by local chambers, when the funding programmes they present do not include private FL schools. This is rather sadistic, especially when there are legal and financial transformation plans afoot that would legally qualify a school owner for funding from the EU.
d) Create a PR department that would gather information and rally the media to contribute to their communication plans.
e) Create a research department to specify know-how export opportunities. Our market is powerful but a little bit too small.
f) Realistically face the inevitable and make friends. A healthy State system will contribute to better national functions, the elimination of black economy for the community, the resetting of targets and the creation of a clearer landscape of needs in foreign language education. The private sector will become more diverse, research and competition will boost the quality of services and lead to specialisation according to geography and target markets. Then teaching, or better tutoring, will again become a respectable service worth paying for.
g) Create a long-term business and communication plan for each association and the federation, based on the criteria of private institutions, to ensure resources for research, action, mobility and eventually viability.
The above issues can form a guide of reform for the private sector as well. These are institutional changes that take a long time to bring about and even longer to fruit. However, we should look and plan ahead to create the foundations of a strong field that will be flexible enough to meet the challenges and changes of the future. Productivity and competitiveness are only trapped in Greece because of our ‘last minute’ nature. Last minute decisions make us late followers of foreign-driven developments. And I personally dread the idea of Greece turning into the Florida of Europe. A paradise for pensioners.

2004 ELT market research: A guide to creating a client benefit map

2005-01-15T19:27:00.000+02:00

For the market explorer who is devoted to discovering what parents really consider to be benefits, market research is the only tool required in order to create a client benefit map.
A massive ELT market research project, sampling 3,072 parents and adult students from Ierapetra to Orestiada took place during 2004. At the same time, a sample of 720 foreign language schools throughout the country also gave us a clear idea of how school owners actually deal with their market but also other productive forces of the ELT market, mainly publishers.
This time the business powwow column will not analyse market tendencies but provide you with the raw research material and, hopefully, some food for thought.
The research project took place from 17th January 2004 until 17th November 2004, with a special focus on the period of June to September of the same year.
Parents and adult students
47% of the sample came from the two major cities, Athens and Thessaloniki and 53% from the rest of the country. Out of the 3,072 questionnaires, 1,771 were completed by parents, 891 by adults without children and 410 by adults whose children have already joined the employment sector.
The level of education of these people was 18% senior-higher, 22% higher, 45% secondary and 15% basic, while 18% were from foreign/immigrant populations and 82% locals/Greeks.
Among children aged 8 to 17, 59% learn a foreign language at an independent FL school, 22% at a branch of a franchise chain, 17% take private lessons, 2% rely on the public education system solely, while 6% take private lessons while also studying at a FL school.
Among students aged 8 to 12, only 38% learn a second foreign language, while this percentage reaches 54% among students aged 12 to 17.
41% of the main (8-17) age group have a PC at home and 27% have easy access to the Internet, so the 69% of these students who expressed a high interest in computer lessons is not surprising.
As far as the criteria for choosing a FL centre are concerned, 33% pointed out the success rate of the centre, 74% proximity to residence, 81% cost and level of tuition fees, 76% admitted to base their decision on personal recommendations (word of mouth), only 21% on advertising and 18%, especially in the provinces, on social obligations and personal contacts with specific school owners.
The reasons that 17% of people choose private lessons are outlined by the 80% of them who replied that their children had been overloaded with work at their previous FL school, 92% who believe that their children enjoy better supervision, only 18% because of specific learning difficulties and 42% for reasons of prestige (because they can).
As far as the people who have chosen a chain are concerned, 87% of them said they trust that chains are better organised, and 45% that payment terms are more appealing.
What is really important is that 88% of those who chose an independent FL centre, 97% of those who chose a chain and 73% of those who chose private lessons never investigate the qualifications of the teachers and the methodological targets of the lessons provided.
Also, with a trust rating system from 5 (very poor) to 1 (excellent), the three categories of FL providers, excluding the public sector, were rated by their users as follows: Independent FL centres 3, chains 4 and private teachers 2.
They all agreed that the public sector is insufficient overall (31%), incapable of orientating students to the recognised international certificates (82%) and that public teachers are not interested enough (24%).
As far as learning difficulties are concerned, 91% had never been informed by anybody about such difficulties, and 96% had never experienced such problems with their own children. 62% would expect only the private sector to provide them with guidance, as 89% do not know for sure who they could ask.
77% of parents declared that they do not get enough regular updates on their children’s progress and only 17% of those parents admitted that they have not devoted enough time to respond to the school’s calls.
56% of parents do not identify a certificate with language acquisition, while 69% are not happy with language education in Greece, but believe that the service provided by an FL centre is the best they can get.
Quality in an FL school for parents is: close supervision of each student (98%), well-trained teachers (95%), frequent parent updates (85%), good books (61%), good, safe environment and organisation (87%), and a quality certificate (only 44%).
62% of parents do not know their children’s teachers and agree that maybe that is why they insist on the school owner teaching their children, and 91% do not know their children’s books but remember how much they paid for them.
Among parents 34% could not give us the name of a FL publisher, 7% knew Express Publishing, 28% Longman and 31% Oxford University Press.
Similarly, 18% knew about PALSO, 34% knew nothing about it and 48% knew the PALSO exams.
If foreign certificates stopped being recognised, 38% would still send their children to an FL centre, but the vast majority of them only after their children were aged 12 or over.
46% judge the language level of their children from how they respond to real life and time situations and only 12% from the child’s level of satisfaction or the school’s updates.
Adult market
From the adults that participated in our market research, only 38% could speak a foreign language well, but 59% admitted that they would like to learn one or improve the one they speak. Unfortunately only 28% would like to learn a second one.
56% need to learn or improve a foreign language for work reasons, but 26% for the Internet. Only 11% require it for further studies.
44% would choose private lessons or a small group and only 21% an independent FL centre, while 27% believe that one major problem is that there are not enough adult-specialised teachers around.
Only 33% of the adult market declared themselves to be active PC users and 41% believe in computer-assisted learning, especially with the wide use of Internet resources. 81% of the adults had never heard of in-house funded training, but only 48% would be interested in finding out about it.
77% admitted that they would consider starting a foreign language and that the main criterion would be the funding.
Foreign Language Centres
Out of the 720 independent FL centres sampled, 170 had less than 70 students, 340 had from 70 to 150 students, 190 had from 150 to 400 students and 20 had more than 400 students.
Rating the biggest problems from 5 (not important) to 1 (major), overall they gave 2 to competition and field saturation, 2 to lack of adequate representation from their associations, 1 to private lessons, 2 to chain branches, 3 to demographic problems, 3 to the relation of low tuition fees against high expenses, 4 to non-paid fees, 4 to the public sector. However, 67% of school owners admitted to have actively given private lessons in 2004 themselves.
Their criteria in choosing books lie with marketing and support by the publishers by 91% and sample copy policy by 77%, while 24% pointed out the cost of books and 38% the methodology and CEF-R compatibility.
72% work with a maximum of 3 publishers, 21% with as many as they know well enough and only 7% say that they do not have any particular preferences.
As far as business practice is concerned, only 11% enjoy what we could call a “regular entrepreneurial fee”, while 47% admit that they need support with administrative and business organisation and planning and 79% with their marketing. 2% say they are satisfied enough but 8% see no future in the field. However, 64% are expecting the next generation in their family to take over in the next few years.
36% of the school owners teach from 15 to 25 hours weekly and 21% more than 25 hours weekly, while 45% of the total number does not use an accountant.
12% do not believe that anything could change in the long run in the ELT field, while 38% believe that market-driven major changes have already started to take place. Only 8% believe that publishers or foreign language certification providers can affect changes in the market.
55% of the school owners are initially interested in quality certification, but 81% of them only for marketing reasons and only 17% to enjoy the benefits of a better organised school.
88% of the school owners do not believe in collective representation any more as 62% are disappointed with the lack of focus.
72% of the school owners believe they are far better than their competition and only 2% admit to be average with lots of space for improvement.
Hyphen does not pass judgement on the above answers. We perceive the above map as a reality we all have to deal with and make the best of. We will be happy to send out the actual charts showing many more questions and answers and easy-to-read figures. Just e-mail me at info@hyphen.gr.