Her name was Karen.

Her name was Karen. She was a showgirl. Okay, no, not really. But now you have Barry Manilow playing in your head. Haha!

Actually, her name was Karen. She’s a United Express flight attendant. And she’s the best flight attendant (FA) I have experienced in a long time. As you know, when you fly into a hub airport, the FA does one of three things. Often, it’s nothing. Sometimes it’s to tell you to check the monitors when you land for connecting gate information. And sometimes they interrupt work, sleep, reading and conversation to read off connecting gates for ten minutes over the PA.

But not Karen. Karen went row by row and provided tailored information to each individual passenger with a connection. She also inquired if each passenger was familiar with Dulles International. When not, she gave detailed directions on how to navigate the terminal upon arrival. From my advantage, I saw lots of smiles and thank you’s for Karen’s tremendous service and hospitality. I certainly appreciated it and was in awe.

The cost to United Airlines for this remarkable service? $0.00, that’s what. The cost to Karen? Maybe less time thumbing through her special “Royal Wedding” edition of People magazine. And the benefit to Karen? Also none. This was one of those 20 row planes that only has one FA. Nobody but us passengers (i.e. customers!) to witness and appreciate her efforts. No colleague or supervisor for whom she was putting on a show. It was Karen just being Karen.

So if you’re a loyal reader of this blog and my musings (thank you, if you are!), you know what is to follow: a question with no answer. The question: How do we identify and hire the Karens of the world? What question can we ask, either of the candidate or their reference, to learn who is a Karen and who is not?

Whether they are on the road, out on tour, standing behind the table at a fair, or behind closed doors in an interview (or serving alone in an airplane cabin), trust is a key component with our staff and in our operations. Much of their work is done in solitude. Our people are our best admissions tool and no website or viewbook or social media endeavor can reverse the effects of a bad staff member. We need to treasure and nurture the good ones, but we have to first figure out how to identify and hire them.

Hey Karen! If you’re reading this, there’s a job for you in Canada.


And on a personal note: Congratulations to Shelia Bogan from Dublin School on her move to NYC and to day school admissions. The likes of boarding schools—and NYC!—will never be the same. It’s a lucky school that will benefit from her aversion to sleep and her addiction to work. Congratulations also to my former colleague and friend Emily Surovick (a Karen if there ever was one!) at Chestnut Hill Academy. Emily is expecting her second child and leaving our profession to be a stay-at-home mom. They are unlikely to find someone with as much poise, style, grace and dedication as Emily. She’s a class act and it was a privilege to work alongside her for a year.

35,000ft over the Atlantic

I had to be in Africa on Wednesday. I had to leave Tuesday evening to get there on time but couldn’t leave any earlier as I had a VIP visitor on campus on Monday and Tuesday. My “go to” airline, United, flies my exact route…six days a week. Yup, Tuesday is their off day. So I flew Lufthansa for the first time.

Now in 2010 I flew 149,137 miles (tracked on www.flightmemory.com). I am hardly a novice flyer. But on Lufthansa, I couldn’t figure out how to work the seat, where to plug in my Bose headset, or how everyone but me seemed to have socks and eyeshades. “This shouldn’t be rocket science,” I thought, too embarrassed to ask for help while subtly checking out the actions of fellow passengers for the clues I craved.

I found my airline seat all at once familiar but foreign and found my predicament humiliating, frustrating, depressing, maddening…memorable.

And then I thought about our prospective families and their first visit to our campuses and offices. It’s just visiting another school, right? It should be rather familiar. But I imagine it can also feel rather foreign. What do we do to make our guests’ experience go well? Go memorable, in a good way?

Surely we have the big things covered like visitor parking and good signage. Right? How about a comfortable place to sit that allows a family to be together? And after a possible long ride, is it obvious (to them, not us!) where to find a bathroom or something to drink? Are we careful not to use school-specific acronyms or lingo? What is an OR after all? At my school, it’s an Old Ridlean. To the outsider, it’s nothing more than a reminder that they’re an outsider.

I knew within two minutes of taking my seat on that A340-300 that I was out of my element and my comfort zone, even though flying is perfectly routine for me. It would have been a great help and comfort if a flight attendant had come over and subtly whispered to me, “Is this your first time flying Lufthansa? If so, let me know if you have any questions. I’m here to help.”

Thankfully United is taking me home from Africa. But when I return to campus, my staff will be discussing a, “I’m here to help” perspective with our guests.

(By the way, I found my kit with eyeshade and socks eight hours later when I packed up to deplane!)