This interview, with a former manager of TBI Kelapa Gading, covers the early history of TBI Kelapa Gading and explores why it lost most its early customers within 2 years. What can you tell us about the establishment of TBI Kelapa Gading? The school was opened in 2006 as a Franchise school. It was sold…
In this interview we look at the real power politics, the endless turf war between Ning Anhar and Mariam Kartikatresni, which paralyzed TBI for years. We interview the former manager of TBI Kuningan, the biggest school in the company, for insight into the toxic relationship of these TBI heavyweights. I was once asked by a…
According to psychologists, all people have an element of narcissistic self-love. It dates from our early childhood days when we are highly egocentric and unaware of the needs and rights of others. In a healthy individual a little bit of narcissism helps them weather difficult life experiences, and is part of our defense systems, but…
I resigned as manager of TBI Kelapa Gading on February 29th, 2012, after a week in which the owners had lied to me many times and back-flipped on half a dozen promises (especially about making TBI Kelapa Gading finances more transparent). This was the culmination of a long struggle to get them to “go straight” and register…
For the first month of Eny’s time as school manager, Lipi was also there. She ended up leaving Kuningan too, fed up by the lies which Eny and Luke had fed her, but in that 1 month she gave us a detailed report of what Eny’s new management style was going to be like, and…
Towards the end of 2011, Luke made a number of poor decisions at TBI Kuningan. First he had let Rani, the highly successful Corporate Sales manager, leave. She was bringing in something like $20,000 of business a month on a salary of less than $400 a month and he decided to let her go! Furthermore,…
When Eny was first appointed as School Manager of TBI Fatmawati in the wake of Chris Needham’s spectacular failure at the school, TBI Head Office pumped almost one billion rupiah (Rp 1.000.000.000) in advertising and promotion funds into the school. This was an unheard of amount for TBI to invest in marketing. For most of…
By the end of 2012, there had been signs of major distress within the TBI Mafia. Their long-time queen, Mariam Kartikatresni, was gone, replaced by Reza Suriansha, who was much less of a narcissistic drama queen and more of a behind the scenes guy. In today’s post we want to look at some peculiarities in…
We can now confirm that TBI Semarang has shut its doors and gone bankrupt. This is the second TBI school which has closed down within the last two months, exposing the current management mafia as inept, clueless and directionless. It is a particular slap in the face for Luke Preece, who campaigned ruthlessly in 2010…
Even in a language school known for its atrocious management, the story of TBI Semarang is well below average. And, as always, the usual suspects are involved. We used to think they were incompetent; now we know that they simply have no standards or integrity in business. When TBI Semarang opened the TBI Franchise Manager,…
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