Over the past couple of years, and especially this year, we’ve been working directly with schools in order to get a fundamental understanding of the inner workings and the specific needs of educational institutions and school dynamics in particular – Sidebar : I find it near impossible to advise organisations on what they can do to become more effective if I haven’t been immersed if not in the individual’s organisation at least in an organisation that is in the same market. Getting to understand the dynamics of school marketing has been an eye opener. We tend to think they are similar to any organisation – in many instances they are but in many fundamental ways they are unique. One of the key learnings and understandings that we as a team have gained from working in schools, is that their core product touches the most precious in our lives – our children. Most parents make huge sacrifices to ensure that their children have the best opportunities made available to them, and the responsibility to provide these opportunities lie largely with the schools themselves. It is a HUGE responsibility that rests on their shoulders. My immersion into the multi-faceted world of contemporary education has helped me to identify core areas where we, as Talk2Us, can add enormous value. If you continue reading to our looking forward section you’ll see some of the solutions we’ve developed that we can offer educational institutions.
On the flipside we’ve realised that Corporates can learn from schools – we all started in a school so I suppose that statement shouldn’t seem extraordinary. In short schools by and large still have heart – they are compelled to go about their business with compassion, kindness and most importantly tolerance. Education has evolved, from being a production line to supply the world of commerce, trade and industry, into a specialist field that looks at the unique characteristics of the individual.
Finally, there are many areas of overlap but also many areas where there are valuable takeouts that can be shared between the Corporate and Educational worlds that will ensure that we operate in a more effective, person-2-person friendly and productive manner.
And with that summation of 2018 – Eureka a label has popped into my head – 2018 A THOUGHT PROVOKING YEAR!