Speak Greek Impact Award

Lean thinking for improved processes and increased revenue

4 April 2023

As there were many Greek tutors offering private or group lessons to students who would like to learn Greek, I tried to identify my unique selling point which I summarised to the motto: ‘Passion for teaching our native language’. Being passionate about my business and equipped with data from analysing what competitors were offering at that time and what customers would like to see on offer, I decided to expand services for customers (students, teachers-competitors, parents, businesses).

Services included free conversation classes for adults, support groups for Greek language & Culture, ebooks, webinars, educational projects, free resources. Despite the range of services available, the number of new students was limited and since 2018 that I included translation services, I found it really hard to attract new customers.

Activity

Experiencing lean thinking started in 2018 but a structured approach towards its tools and techniques evolved later. Within the last 12 months lean was fully embraced to all the operations and lessons. To identify why there wasn’t a steady increase of students to take up my services, I used cause and effect diagram.

Through this process, I managed to visually present myself with areas that required improvement with an immediate action plan. To identify how I could be more competitive in the translation industry as there were more established translators than me with more experience and qualifications specifically for translating services, I used A3 problem solving.

I had to attract some of their customers and new customers by adapting an ambitious approach offering competitive charges that included as standard completion of translation within 24 hours, paid 1st class postage and scanned documents to customers. Once I had more students enrolling to either private lessons or classes, I used flow for adult students to identify clearly how I can support customers through a transition period of limited time for myself to be able to deliver lessons.

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The Impact

By fully immersing myself to lean thinking, Speak Greek® now has a steadily increased income and visitors on the website. Processes that could be automated (enrolling new students, replying to messages with simple queries about availability and prices, scheduling lessons, issuing invoices etc.) are now automated saving a considerable amount of time that is invested in improving quality of services and developing new services.

Also, standardisation of forms (e.g. GDPR consent, Registration form) and fact sheets has led to a reduction of errors and satisfied customers who are becoming our Ambassadors, introducing new customers to our services. Customers are receiving a tailored service and they appreciate the hard work we are putting in to deliver our services.

They also enjoy our commitment to reply to any messages within 24 hours regardless of bank holidays or festive periods/holidays. Customers’ feedback on TrustPilot is amazing, highlighting both the quality and cost-effectiveness of our services: https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/speak-greek.com

Recently, Speak Greek won the SME News Northern Enterprise Award ‘Best Greek Language & Culture Lessons Provider – North West’. Next steps include collaboration with qualified teachers to deliver webinars on specific topics, publishing ebooks of other teachers and introducing customer immersion sessions to become even better!

Speak Greek Impact Award

Lean thinking for improved processes and increased revenue

Activity

The Impact

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Speak Greek Impact Award

Lean thinking for improved processes and increased revenue

Activity

The Impact

A celebration of successful Impact Awards

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Ingeus Impact Award

Sellafield Ltd Impact Award

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