Getting students excited about services: Providing a context for applying their newly acquired knowledge

Students make investments every semester when they spend their tuition credits, time, and limited opportunities on elective courses. Naturally, they expect reasonable returns in terms of the knowledge and skills they can gainfully employ immediately or in the near future. Their investments in general-purpose competencies such as information technology, software engineering, design, and management science are further augmented when provided with specific contexts for creativity and problem-solving. A graduate program at Carnegie Mellon University has been introducing students to a body of knowledge in service management by providing them with a layer of concepts, principles, and methods. Guest lectures from business executives and managers complement the instruction with practical insight, thereby removing any remaining causal ambiguity and also revealing new challenges and opportunities to be addressed.