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Customer relationship marketing creates the perfect relationship between the seller and the buyers—between the school and its students. solution in the fourth phase. In fact, the trajectory of person- al involvement and satisfaction over time should continue upward, until the commitment phase peaks in Stage 3. At that point, if the seller can maintain the buyer's satisfaction, it can delay any decline of the relationship for an indefinite time. For an institution, what's required is taking meaningful action to maintain high satisfaction over the lifetime of each student and alumnus. The relationship can continue to expand as students or alumni seek additional services, such as a graduate program, continuing education, or participation in university events. Commitment also can continue to grow as students choose to come back to the university for services they could very well obtain from others, and as they offer donations and other support to the school. CRM Committees CRMtechniques are not only useful in student relations; they also can be used to restructure themanagement teamat a uni- versity. In July 2003, Virginia State University began to re- engineer its School of Business, moving from organizational and functional perspectives to the CRMmodel. Under this new model, faculty committees fall into one of four groups, each one corresponding to a phase of customer relationshipmarketing. This new structure demonstrates that most of the school's time and energy is spent on Stages 2 and 3—periods during which the school needs to invest a great deal in both students and faculty. As a result, the committees involved in those phases now absorb the lion's share of the school's financial and human resources. When CRM is applied to a school's organizational structure, it can help administrators more properly allocate funds. At VSU, the categories work like this: Stage 1: Recruitment. Served solely by the recruitment com- mittee, this phase covers the time when the school markets itself to students and their families. Stage 2: Student and Faculty Development. Four committees— the student services committee, the faculty composition and development committee, the curriculum committee, and the instructional resources and technology committee—provide services directly to students and professors. Stage 3: Retention and Progression Management. Three commit- tees—retention, intellectual contributions, and recognition— provide support for successful program delivery. Stage 4: Graduation, Placement, and Alumni Affairs. The school works to launch students into careers or graduate school, while maintaining positive relationships and fostering post- graduate loyalty. Two committees—the career planning/ placement/life transition committee and the alumni relations and development committee—support this phase. As faculty members become more familiar with the new committee system, links between groups will grow stronger. Responsibility for students will pass from committee to com- mittee as students move through their own relationship tra- jectories. The expectation is that both students and school will benefit from this sense of interconnectedness, and stu- dents are likely to have longer relationships with the school. The new committee structure also is expected to benefit the School of Business as it pursues AACSB accreditation, since the committees reflect and support AACSB accredita- tion standards. For example, the faculty composition and development committee assesses faculty resources, recom- mends essential faculty recruitments, and develops programs to ensure that faculty maintain their skills while they uphold their teaching, research, and service responsibilities. Crucial changes implemented so far have included significantly high- er performance standards for faculty and department chairs, expansion in research and professional development funds, equipment and infrastructure upgrades, and comprehensive accountability reporting. Accreditation standards have been cross-referenced to committees, which administrators believe will help the school to meet all AACSB requirements and maintain accountability. Specific human resources have been applied to each major element of the organization, ensuring broad, interdisciplinary participation. Likewise, the committee structure ensures that all faculty members have focused roles in their committee service. Long-Term Model The CRM model helps business schools manage their rela- tionships with students from the day they first inquire about a program to the day they make their last donations. It helps the school adapt its relationships with individuals over time— meeting their needs first when they're students, then when they're alumni. Customer relationship marketing ensures that business schools build a loyal base of committed alumni who fondly remember their time at the institution and who recommend the school to friends and family. In short, it creates the per- fect relationship between the seller and the buyers—between the school and its students.■ z David Bejou is professor of marketing and dean of the School of Business at Virginia State University in Petersburg. He is also founder and editor of the Journal of Relationship Marketing and senior editor for Relationship Marketing Books. BizEd MARCH/APRIL 2005 47