Student satisfaction and quality of service in Italian universities

Purpose In order to face the new competitive scenario, Italian universities are involved in a change process and are trying to adopt an entrepreneurial approach to better serve their customers/students. The paper aims to assess university performance by testing student satisfaction. It tries to provide universities with some solutions to improve its performance. Design/methodology/approach The case of the University of Bari has been analysed by interviewing a random (but well stratified) sample of students in order to test their satisfaction concerning services provided and quality perceived. Reasons why students decide to enrol at the University of Bari are also investigated. Findings Universities have to concentrate their efforts on the improvement of quality of teaching and non‐teaching services, in order to promptly respond to the target, and foster a stronger relationship with surrounding economic and productive systems. Research implications/limitations Universities need to adopt a customer centric approach. Future research should analyse the reform period experienced by the Italian University system, in order to investigate student satisfaction concerning recent changes. Moreover, a cross‐country analysis of student satisfaction, through the servqual questionnaire, would be interesting. Practical implications Student satisfaction at the University of Bari is higher for working students that are not interested in “additional” services. On the contrary, several improvements are perceived as urgent concerning non‐core services provided, in which regular students are very interested. Originality/value This paper provides a wide analysis of the services perception tested and viewed through student eyes.