Service organizations are encouraged to consider how staffs achieve at the client / front line boundary as a means of gaining a good advantage. The behavior of the employee requires “emotional work “where the operative of the front line (academic) must either conceal or manage real feelings for the benefit of a successful service. This does not essentially mean equality or mutual benefit, but consumer satisfaction (student) and administration profit. The paper discusses whether this three-way relationship is being liberated by the academic. To illustrate this dispute, data gathered from in-depth interviews at a higher education institution are used. The research is of value as an aid for the management and support of hypothetical staff in an age of managerialism and to the notion of the student as customer.