More Porter Vice Chancellor? (3)

We are all consumers.

We consume products.

We consume services.

Most products we buy can be returned for a refund if they do not suit us, the only proviso being that we have not used them.  If they break within a reasonable space of time we can get them replaced or repaired.
Services that do not come up to our expected standard can achieve compensation - but you cannot unenjoy a holiday, so there's a challenge here in estimating the compensation to pay.

Higher Education is a different matter.  For a start we have a problem defining who the "consumer" is:

• The Student
• The Parent
• The Employer
• Wider society

For the purposes of this blog we'll call the consumer SPEW (acronym of above).

So, Porters "powerful"  buyers have choices, ease of switching and the whole purchase is not a major part of their spending.  Powerful buyers can group together and bargain, they have plenty of information available to them to make optimal choices and they are incentivised not only by the benefits they gain but also the sensitivity they have to prices and the source of the funds.

This "heat-map" attempts to ilustrate the strength (red) or weakness (white) of buyer power in the UK HE undergraduate marketplace. In the HE market, the employers and wider society, represented by government, have the greatest power. Students have incentives but lack the ability to act together and lose choice and sensitivity once an offer is accepted.  Parents are bemused onlookers.

So, is it any surprise that Universities model their undergraduate offerings to satisfy the more powerful buyers?