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Benefits Of Market Intelligence In Higher Education
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Higher Education Institutions face significant challenges in strategically marketing and promoting their teaching, learning and research capabilities. A fact highlighted by recent assignments in the UK and overseas undertaken by Oakleigh. In this article, Kay Renfrew uses case studies from UK and overseas assignments to illustrate how HEIs can turn the challenges into benefits by proactively using business and market intelligence to:
- Differentiation from other Institutions.
- Raising institutional reputations.
- Improving league table positions.
- Attracting and retaining the most capable students.
- Identifying opportunities to expand programmes of study overseas.
Challenges HEIs Face
Institutions are operating in an environment where they are required:
- To increase student numbers while maintaining standards;
- Be actively engaged in the widening participation agenda; and
- Plan and manage an effective response to the prospective increase in demand for higher education.
All this, while delivering a high quality education to demanding students. Students who are becoming better informed as access to information, such as performance information on the TQI website and soft information such as student blogs, becomes more comprehensive and readily available.
These challenges are compounded by the growing internationalisation of higher education. HEIs are competing with an increasing number Institutions all trying to sustain viable programmes of study for a highly sought after pool of applicants.
Internationalisation of Higher Education
In 2005 the International Association of Universities carried out its second Internationalisation Survey, attracting responses from over 300 HEIs in 95 countries. It noted that internationalisation can variously be regarded as:
- Conducting activities at an international level, such as, studying abroad or establishing branch campuses overseas.
- Incorporating an international aspect into teaching, learning, research and services provided.
- Achieving an international profile or brand recognition that allows the Institution to be competitive domestically and globally.
The survey discovered that almost three-quarters of respondents put internationalisation as a high priority for their Institution, and that 82% already had a policy in place to address this. Respondents felt that the main rationale driving internationalisation was competitiveness.
Not many would argue with Universities UK's assertion that higher education is an increasingly globalised activity and that international competition for students, staff and research funding is growing.
The International Higher Education Institution of the Future
If internationalisation and an increasingly competitive market for higher education is a truth universally accepted, then what might the HEI of the future look like? Professor RF Boucher, speaking at the Going Global conference in 2005 suggested it might have the following characteristics:
- Numerous overseas campuses serving local and third country markets.
- Diverse models of distance learning at undergraduate and post graduate levels (taught and research).
- A highly international student community on the domestic campus while seeing a high level of overseas mobility of its domestic students.
- Engaging in franchised, validated and twinned provision.
- Collaborating in international networks, with a highly international faculty based on recruiting the best candidates from a global employment market.
Although a what if model, Oakleigh's engagement with its clients in the higher education sector suggests that this model will increasingly need to be adopted in whole or in part to face the challenges in the sector.
How Can HEIs Address the Challenge of Internationalism?
Oakleigh Consulting has worked with a number of HEIs to improve their response to this increasingly competitive market. The following case studies illustrate some successful approaches.
Case Study 1. International Growth for Higher Education Institution
Early in 2007 Oakleigh helped an international Higher Education Institution develop its capacity in the Middle East. Rapid expansion by other HEIs meant strong competition for a limited pool of applicants and the introduction of new programmes had not attracted the expected numbers. Oakleigh's brief was to develop a credible business cases for funding and a means of validating forecasts of predicted student numbers. Thus ensuring the programmes were academically and financially viable.
Working with the senior management team, Oakleigh undertook an independent review of business plans and an assessment of supply-side assumptions, through:
- Information gathering (business cases and supporting data; publicly available statistical data and contextual information).
- Review and clarification of data.
- Development of a statistical forecasting model.
Oakleigh's work enabled the Institution to develop scenarios for a phased expansion into the Middle East, based on market demand. The scenarios were based on the outputs of the statistical model which allowed the forecasting of proximate numbers and likely characteristics of applicants by programme.
As one of Oakleigh's guiding principles is skills transfer we also provided guidance on the systematic collection of consistent, reliable and valid data to inform future reiterations of the model to update scenarios for future strategic planning rounds. The final report enabled the university to have confidence in the integrity of its plans for expansion and to make a case for financial support from its sponsors to deliver the necessary growth.
Case Study 2: Local Competition in UK Higher Education
On the domestic front, a Russell Group University wished to improve recruitment to its own programmes in face of strong competition from geographically proximate Institutions. It needed to differentiate itself and its programmes from those of competitor Institutions to attract the most capable students.
The University was working under the constraints of:
- A lack of coordination and communication on marketing and recruitment activities at different levels in the University;
- A lack of a systematic approach to the collation and dissemination of management information; and
- Little consistency or synergy in the branding of the University.
In this case, we used the HEI's own data in conjunction with data from UCAS, the National Student Survey and the International Student Barometer reports to carry out:
- Systematic analysis of recruitment activities of competitor institutions.
- Critical review of recruitment activities at University, faculty and school level.
- Comparison of policy with practice from the perspective of key national and regional demographics.
The support enabled the University to draw-up targeted and specific actions for recruitment based on data driven evidence rather than anecdotal generalisations; and to face up to and begin to address its internal communication issues.
Benefits of Market Intelligence for HEIs
In conclusion, proactively using business and market intelligence can help Institutions:
- Understand its customers (students, commerce and society), so recruiting and retaining the best students from wherever they are based.
- To develop a market led rather than product led approach by developing programmes of study that are attractive, relevant and reliable and thus positioning itself in a competitive market to best advantage.
- To differentiate itself from others, being aware of what is offered by other Institutions in the UK and overseas; and adopting a recognisable and consistent market presence.
- To identify and develop strategic alliances with HEIs domestically and globally.
References
Internationalization Survey 2005: Preliminary Findings (2006). International Association of Universities.
The International Higher Education Institution of the Future. (2004). Professor R F Boucher, University of Sheffield, Going Global Conference, Edinburgh 2004.
International Strategy 2005. Universities UK
If you have any questions about the subjects covered in this white paper or you would like to find out more about how Oakleigh Consulting could help your organisation, please contact us on 0161 835 4100 or email us.
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