Setting priorities: Essential vs. Desirable in schools

When you’re running a school district, you have to make a lot of tough decisions about what’s “nice to have” and what you need to have. And as the K-12 environment continues to evolve, a tool that helps you provide superior customer service, automate workflows to save staff time, expand accessibility to ensure you’re meeting every family where they’re at, and bring the power of generative AI beyond the classroom to your districtwide operations is something you increasingly need to have.

Today’s parents and teachers have Amazon-level expectations and little patience for organizations unwilling to adapt. There’s a new template for success that requires a new method of thinking but promises positive outcomes for any school district willing to extend the effort.

Failure to leverage technology as a method for meeting these expectations would be a big miss. Technology tools can amplify existing resources and staff efforts — and those efficiencies are no longer nice to have. It is the best way to balance the budget!

Let’s Talk reduced the cost of providing excellent customer service in Pasco County Schools by 41%. For every dollar they spend on Let’s Talk they receive $1.68 in benefit!

There is a new standard for district strategies: An intelligent, automation-driven tool that can streamline inquiries, create efficiencies through workflows, and answer questions 24/7 with generative AI.

With this solution, school districts are able to manage coverage for the same amount of conversations with fewer people and overhaul over-complicated backend processes that previously led to angry parents, confused board member priorities, and distractions from what really matters: Student safety and success.

These leading school districts are catching on to the amplifying power the transformation of internal workflows and customer interactions can have. Here’s what they’re experiencing:

The reallocation of time previously spent on duplicative or inefficient processes, helping staff “do more with less” and increase productivity without additional hires.

“Let’s Talk is saving countless hours for our team. It’s allowing us to ensure we’re responding quickly and that messages don’t get lost in an email thread. The enhanced customer satisfaction thanks to fast and accurate communications is a priceless value add from Let’s Talk. Other leaders in our district have mentioned cutting Let’s Talk, and I said ‘No way’.”

Dr. Scott Menzel, Superintendent, Scottsdale Unified School District (AZ)

A collapse in their tech stack, removing outdated or inefficient solutions that contribute to the tangled web of districtwide communications.

In fact, Indianapolis Public Schools was able to cut six systems that didn’t talk to each other in favor of one, unified, AI-powered alternative: Let’s Talk.

Streamlined communications into a single, unified inbox that was designed to encourage interdepartmental collaboration and real-time updates. Insurance that the right person is always answering the right questions thanks to automatic keyword-based inquiry routing. The ability to answer customer questions 24/7 with a generative AI-powered chatbot that launches in days and offers automatic Spanish translation. A strategy for identifying negative customer experiences and resolving them immediately, boosting district morale and keeping customers satisfied in an era of declining enrollment and school choice. Data to help drive decisions like insights from a comprehensive data dashboard.

Dr. Joe Gothard, who used Let’s Talk in Saint Paul Public Schools (MN) and continues to use it in his new role at Madison Metro School District (WI) saw Let’s Talk transform customer service through technology and help his team make data-based decisions for optimized operations and improved student outcomes.

Ready to get started? Get in touch with someone from our team to take the next step. We can have Let’s Talk implemented in your school district before the back-to-school rush begins!