Systems Thinking Report-group11

Attracting current undergraduate City University students towards the postgraduate programs – A holistic approach

Prepared by: Group 11 Alba Ruco Alisha Kothari Izabela Perseng Jocelyn Uthayakumaran Sylvain Fresia

12. APPENDICES

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1. ACKNOWLEDGMENT.......................................................4 2. INTRODUCTION.............................................................5 3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY....................................................5 4. BACKGROUND ON CURRENT SITUATION .........................5 4.1 Primary Research..............................................................6

5. A MORE HOLISTIC APPROACH.........................................8 6. COMPETITORS ATTRACTING STUDENTS ..........................8 6.1 Postgraduates courses....................................................11 6.2 Communication Software.................................................11 6.3 City University Website....................................................11 6.4 Events............................................................................11

7. ACTION PLAN: IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM SOFTWARE. . . .13 8. ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS ................................16 8.1 The City University “house”.............................................17

9. INVESTMENT AGAINST COSTS.......................................18 9.1 Outcomes........................................................................18 9.2 Incomes .........................................................................19

CONCLUSION...................................................................20 This report analyses the current situation at City University in terms of targeting current students in order to retain them for post-graduate studies and recommend appropriate ways and incentives to achieve this goal. It was found that only 29% of students in City wanted to stay for Postgraduate studies, with still 42% undecided and 29% negative answers. One of the aims of the report is to reduce these undecided in order to keep 50% of City students for Postgraduate studies. Further data was researched about other universities to be able to see what incentives or improvements could be made to retain students. It appeared that university websites is holding an essential role to communicate with students and offer them information. Also offering students discounts and combined 2

courses was a great encouragement for them to select a university. In order to capture information about current students and be able to target them better during marketing campaign, the implementation of CRM software appeared to be essential. These campaigns would include different types of events and open days designed for current students. After analysing the costs implied it was concluded that, if asking for an important investment for the university, it would create a high return on investment on a longer term and provide City University with a competitive edge............................................................20 10. REFERENCES.............................................................21 12. APPENDICES______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 21

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1. ACKNOWLEDGMENT We would like to thank Jenny Rampling, for the time and effort, and the guidance given to make this study possible, and Misha Hebel for giving us the opportunity to work on a consultancy project that is close to us. In addition, we would like to thank Stephanie Shaul staff of the student centre, and the marketing team of City University, for providing us with some relevant information to carry out extensive analysis.

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2. INTRODUCTION Analysing research recently carried out regarding postgraduate studies, it has been found that 60% of current undergraduate students at City University are interested in studying a postgraduate course once they are done with their undergraduate. However, further analysis shows that although 60% are interested in doing a postgraduate course, only 38% would consider City University as their place of study. In addition, the actual conversion rate is found to be much lower than 38%. The aim of this report is to analyse the current situation at City University, in order to grow the market as well as the revenue stream further and to create an appropriate balance in undergraduate and postgraduate student numbers. In order to achieve the above objectives, qualitative and quantitative research has been carried out, in order to identify how other universities attract current students to continue a postgraduate course at their institutions, following which, research will be carried out regarding how City University can capture information about those current students who may potentially be interested in pursuing the university’s postgraduate course. Finally, analysis will be carried out to identify appropriate ways to market the university, and the costs of implementing the means recommended will be outlined. 3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Primary research conducted at City University shows that a majority of students were aware of the university’s courses through the internet. Therefore, City University must continue to advertise its courses through the internet, as it is found to be a successful informing approach. However, this also shows that the advertising campaigns must be revised in order to further reach out to a larger potential market. It is found to be lack of variety and lack of combined courses offered by City University. This restricts the choice available to students who may wish to study courses from two different faculties of City University. Therefore, this should be analysed further and City University should consider introducing more combined courses. Based on similar initiatives that higher ranked universities have taken, it is recommended that City University introduces customised CRM software in order to capture the relevant information about students, to identify trends and finally target them by designing appropriate marketing activities. The recommended steps have been illustrated using a more holistic approach known as Soft Systems Methodology (SSM). In addition to the above, a framework has been designed to show the benefits of implementing the recommended options for City University. This framework will also cover the additional recommendations that have been identified in the report that follows. 4. BACKGROUND ON CURRENT SITUATION In order to get an insight of where City University stands currently, some primary and secondary research has been conducted. The gathered information helped in understanding the situation of the current students from their perspective and analysing the key issues arising from it. 5

4.1 Primary Research A survey was conducted within the City University student community in order to see what their point of view was about City and what their plans were for post-graduate studies. The data collected was based on a 97-student sample from various faculties of the university. Please note that some questions of the survey were multiple choices, which explains the percentages adding to above 100% on some questions. Firstly it was observed how the students heard about the University. It appears that 48% of them have heard of it through the Internet. The 2 other main sources where students heard about the University are through their family and friends and their career advisors (respectively 38 and 22%). The newspaper (which includes articles about the university and advertisement included in the newspaper) and advertisements (flyers, posters in the tube for example) options obtained a very low response rate (less than 2%). From this data it is possible to draw the conclusion that City should focus its efforts on the internet as a way to communicate with the students as the advertising apart from being a costly option, does not have a high impact and efficiency on students. On the other hand, the advertising campaigns should perhaps be revised, so that although it is costly, it will have a greater impact on informing prospective students. The second question of the survey was to know why the students of City selected it for their Undergraduates studies. It appears that a majority (72%) of students selected City for its reputation and/or ranking. The courses offered and its central location also played important roles in selecting City, with a response rate of 45% and 40% respectively. Thus it is apparent that the reputation of City University and the variety of courses are crucial in the students view. The third question is one of the most important ones for the study as it indicates the percentage of students who will continue study further at City and who will not after graduating from the undergraduate degrees. It appears that there is an equal 29% of yes and no’s. But still 42% of students are undecided. This project aims at targeting this fraction of unsure students and reducing the number of no’s. An ideal goal for City would be to obtain 50% of yes and no’s. This balance is selected in order to retain a higher number of City students after they graduate. However, it is important to note that it would be best for the university to leave 50% of the remaining students to come from outside the university. This is simply due to the fact that it is always a good thing to allow new students; hence new ideas into the University thus create diversity. It also creates variety within the University and finally enhances competition between external students to enter the university, which would influence the university’s reputation in the right way. The 50/50 balance is a goal that was set for the project, but it is unrealistic to say that it is possible to know/influence all the students choices in advance and avoid any uncertainty. However, the aim of the project is to get as close to its goal as possible. Following to that question, the students were then asked the reason why they would select to study in city in their future. It is found that a major part of the students would select City University as their postgraduate university, for the same reason they 6

selected it for their undergraduate, with 67 and 78 students selecting it for its courses and reputation. It is interesting to note that 57% of the students selected City University due to career opportunities, proving that what the university advertises as being one of the best universities for career prospects is appealing to students. It seems that 42 students appreciate the location of the university. Also about 20 students would select City University for their postgraduate studies due to the facilities and entry requirements. Finally 7% of students have selected City for its tuitions fees, the social life and other reasons. What comes out of this question is that the students are career focused and appreciate high reputation and take interest in courses of the university. It reasonable to assume that answers with a lower response rate are other factors influencing the choice but not the main reason for selecting the university. Another very important matter was to consider why the students did not select the university, or whether they are unsure of their choice, and what would help them make their choice/change their mind. The majority of students (42%) are expecting better courses and/or teaching from the university. Very close to that, students would appreciate financial support (39%) from the university and have other reasons that would influence their choice (41%), which is going to be thoroughly discussed further below. Students would also like to develop the facilities and research within the university (23%) and improve the social life as a student (13%). The last question was an open question relating to what would students want from city if the choice that interested them was not present (students who hence selected “other”).What stands out from this question is that students would appreciate: -A better ranking/reputation of the university -Better quality of teaching/staff (some students advising to recruit famous academics and/or increase research budget in order to “generate” famous academics within City University) -More contact with lecturers and more information provided on courses -Finally, some students would like a presentation demonstrating why they should select City University for their postgraduate studies. What was revealed from this survey is that Students are using the internet as their main source of information about the University. There are still 42% of the students that are undecided and these are the main target, hence, those students who have decided not to further study at City University, can be the second target. But this should stay a secondary objective as it is easier to influence and satisfy students who are not yet sure of their choice rather than turning around students who already made a choice not to stay on. An important fact that comes out from this survey is that most students would like city to have a better reputation or ranking along with the staff quality. Also students would be interested in gaining information on the courses and on a more global basis, to be demonstrated why they should stay on at City. Finally some students have communication issues with their lecturers. Please see Appendix 1 for survey results. 7

5. A MORE HOLISTIC APPROACH In order to view the situation at City University as a whole, it is imperative to include all the stakeholders, identify key issues and recommend feasible solutions through a wider perspective. For this purpose it is recommended that systems approach, also known as the holistic approach as which supports the ideas illustration and provides practical solutions to improve the business situation. In the case of City University, Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) is used to illustrate the major steps of analysis and findings. This approach was firstly developed by Peter Checkland and his colleagues in 1969 and is used in order to deal with more “soft” problem cases and structured issues that take into consideration the main stakeholders and circumstances (Jackson 2000). This systems approach offers students’ perspectives as well as the university’s perspective of the key operations and interactions between them. The SSM approach consists of 7 steps and each of them will be illustrated below in this report according to their relevance with the analyzed content. As a first step of the SSM, the rich picture is one of the most common techniques in dealing with complexity in problem situations, which may involve multitasks and people. A rich picture is initially used to demonstrate the current situation at City University illustrating the interrelation of the key stakeholders in the problem situation. Please see Appendix 2.

6. COMPETITORS ATTRACTING STUDENTS Our qualitative research was based on surveying students from City University as well as four other comparable universities in order to have a representative sample in which we could evaluate what leads students to continue postgraduate studies at their current institutions. The selection of 4 universities was based on similar ranking to City University (Times Online, 2009) and they are the following: University of Westminster, Queen Mary’s University of London, University of Edinburgh, and University of Southampton. One important aspect of the chosen universities is the fact that two of the universities are in London and thus can be closely compared to City University. The city of London itself makes a huge difference for people studying there as it is one of the largest cities in the world and the students will most likely have a different outlook on continuing their studies, which can also affect their career perspectives. This comparison will be investigated further in the report. The main method of research used was a conducted survey distributed to an equal sample of 20 people in each university. (See Appendix 1). The students in the above mentioned universities were contacted in person and through e-mails. It is found that almost 37% of the students revealed that they were made aware of their own universities through the UCAS web-site. A good number of them were informed by friends and/or family relatives. Not surprisingly, almost 20% of the whole sample got information about their chosen universities through the Internet. Taking up a smaller percentage, other sources of information were resulted to be actual location, career advisers, other students and others according to a decreasing order of percentages. 8

The majority of students from other universities, with an overwhelming statistic of 40.94%, agreed that the reputation factor played a considerable role in their decisions to choose their university. Furthermore, 20.81% of them considered the offered courses as an important criterion of decision. However, the results for this question showed that some students considered other non university-related factors for making decisions. These include 17.45% of the people that considered the social life, 14.77% for location and 6.04% chose others. Further into the survey 43.16% of the students stated that they were planning to continue their postgraduate studies at their current university, and 28.42% said they would not. Additionally, 28.42% stated that they were not sure about their choice. These results relate to questions 4 and 5 (refer to Appendix 1), which are very meaningful in finding out how to attract current students to pursue their postgraduate studies. Over half of the people said that it was easy to find information on their postgraduate programs whether it is through career fairs, the university website or a career counsellor. The other half of students was split fairly equal between “No” and “Haven’t tried” options. Unfortunately the larger statistic of “No” comes from the two universities located in London. The following question was “Which factors do you think are most important in choosing a postgraduate program?” The answers to this question were differently distributed; however, “career opportunities” earned the number one spot in this category. After that it was “ranking/reputation” followed by “courses” and “tuition fees”. It can thus be correct to state that when students are looking to pursue their postgraduate studies they are considering the options which will improve their chances for a better career. Furthermore, if theses answers are analyzed individually by the university, the number one answer still remains “career opportunities” which strengthens the answers and validates it even more. Question number 6 asked the students what would make them study further for the postgraduate programs at their current university. The majority of people answered “better courses/teaching variability”. The only university which had a different primary answer was the University of Edinburgh whose students answered “financial support”. The reasoning behind this is that it is considered to be more expensive to study there in comparison to the other universities, especially for international students. One of the most significant questions in our survey was regarding whether people have heard about City University and if yes, in what ways they were informed about it. This question was asked in order to get a general outside perspective of how other students perceive City University and what are the actual effective ways of advertising City University. This leads to a better insight on the university’s reputation in the eyes of the outsiders. According to the surveys’ results, nearly 85% of the students asked were aware of City University. It was revealed that the main source of learning about City University is from word-of-mouth from friends and/or family members. The UCAS web-site has also played a significant role in informing people about City. Apparently, the career advisers also have had a great impact on making people aware of City University. A very small percentage of students said that have heard about City University from newspapers. The last question provides some insights into what 9

outsiders think about City University and not surprisingly most people answered, “My university is better”. However, 18.82% still answered that it has a “good in reputation and courses”. The survey provided a good and general point of view of how other students look at postgraduate programs and also what the most important factors are in considering a postgraduate university/program. This is considered as very valuable information for considering our recommendations for improvements to City University. Going more in depth for each of the universities, research was conducted on the main ways they try to attract students for further postgraduate studies. This can then be compared to City University’s market campaign. Starting with the universities located in London, Queen Mary’s website is very clear and easy to navigate for all the needed information to find particular postgraduate courses. Furthermore, they provide “Employability and Graduate Profiles” which is essential especially because most students answered that career opportunities were a very relevant factor. Although their website isn’t flashy, it is full of detailed information which is what most people are looking for, when researching on postgraduate courses. The University of Westminster takes a different approach by providing various pictures of students on the website as well as frequently asked questions which they give thorough answers to. Just like Queen Mary’s, their website is easy to navigate and the colours add even more clarity through the menu’s and sub-menu of finding tuition fees and application requirements. The photos provide even more clarity as prospective students might gain a general positive idea of what the university looks like as well as the people that study there. Looking at the universities outside of London, Southampton’s and Edinburgh’s websites are very informative and furthermore have a main page entitled “Why Choose Us”. This answers the main question that students are mainly asking themselves “Why would I choose this university over any other one?” As well as giving information about the university itself, these two universities also provide information about the cities themselves, alumni, environmental sustainability, and continuous enforcement of career prospects. This is a noticeable feature as their emphasis is definitely on what happens after the students graduate. Students from both of these universities further stated that getting information about postgraduate programs was straightforward. After the thorough qualitative research, the results can now be compared to the actual market schemes that City University uses to attract current undergraduate students to continue their postgraduate studies. Having analyzed the main operations of actors and the main factors influencing the problem situation by the rich picture, the main human sub-systems have to be listed to offer a better insight of the issues (Jackson 2000). Please refer to the attached Appendix 3. After analysing the gathered primary and secondary data it appeared that issues were raised from 4 main sectors within the university. These are the following:

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6.1 Postgraduates courses There is an important lack of variety and lack of combined courses within the University. What is meant by combined courses is that they are courses that mix subjects from different horizons allowing students to have more choice. An example would be courses that combine Music with Physics/Engineering, or Chemistry and Management for example. Students would then have more options and could learn a subject of interest and combine it with another subject necessary to have the basis to apply the subject in another area. These types of combined courses would encourage students’ interest in the postgraduate courses. Also it would provide City with a whole new range of specialized masters that would appeal to students who want to do specialize in their postgraduate studies rather than doing a general course. Finally there are unclear subjects routes for postgraduate studies, all the information needed by the students are not present and very few master programs offer streams, which further reduces the possibilities proposed to the students.

6.2 Communication Software The main communication software between the students and the staff is CitySpace and there are many issues arise from it. Student and staff actually cannot have advanced interaction through it. They are unable to talk the way they should/want by using the system, and are very limited by it. Therefore, both students and academics suffer from the limitations of a poor blackboard learning system. They are not able to organize it in a convenient way for their needs, which leads to slow utilization and difficulty in finding relevant modules/information. Finally, there is no personalization on the email system. Every email sent in a module space can be seen (questions as well as replies) by everyone who is online. Therefore, customized profiles might be implemented in order to have personal emails and information only available to particular users. 6.3 City University Website The website of the university is a very important issue to consider. Students are struggling to access the information they are looking for. The information is not easily accessible and often requires much time and effort to obtain the data needed. It is not user-friendly and students do not feel encouraged to look for the information they want and therefore might get discouraged to look for postgraduate information. There is also an important lack of interactivity with the web pages compared to what could be achieved with the new technologies available to everyone.

6.4 Events 11

Although City is organizing workshops, open days and events, there is an apparent lack of encouragement to attend these events towards the students who tend to skip them. Especially current students who prefer avoiding open days because they are more focused on external students rather than current students. Thus current students do not attend them because they are not interested in seeing the facilities of the university, which they already known. They would be more interested in having an insight into what studying a postgraduate program at City University entails, through workshops and open days that represent reality and are specially prepared for them. Finally, the students seem not to be well targeted for these events, which lead to students ignoring numerous emails about events that are not relevant for them, sometimes missing events they would like to attend. It would be better to target students and send few emails but only those that are relevant in order to obtain a better response from students. After creating different options for our recommendations, it was realised that the open days could have an impact on the students of the university. In order to verify this assumption, another survey was conducted including 20 students from City consisting of the two following questions: -Did you attend an open day in City? -If yes did it have a good influence on you to select City? It appeared that 60% attended open days and out of these, 66% thought that the open day had a positive influence on their selection of the university. As a result, it has been easier to agree on the fact that open days if well lead could have a positive impact on students making it an important point for this project. This survey was conducted face-to-face in an informal way. This research and its results have thus raised major issues especially related to the IT aspect of the university and to the diversity of courses as well as the organized events that do not appropriately target the current students. The next step associated with the SSM includes the preparation of a set of relevant systems regarding the current situation at City University (see Appendix 3). Afterwards, a “Root Definition” paragraph is prepared for a specific system chosen from the above list of issues in order to analyze it from a critical point of view. As the emphasis of this study is on the process of attracting the current students in continuing their postgraduate degree at City University, the chosen system would be: “A system to retain the current students for postgraduate programs.” Please see Appendix 4. The next step is developing a conceptual model in order to demonstrate the activities mentioned in the system’s Root Definition. This model includes the logical sequence of the activities included in the recommended action plan below. The Root Definition indicates what the system is, whereas the conceptual map shows what the system does (Jackson 2000).

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7. ACTION PLAN: IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM SOFTWARE Organizations nowadays are struggling with capturing changes in their customers’ behaviour. The computerized technologies are used in the recent years to focus on tracking their trends information and then utilize it for Research and Development purposes in the supply chains (Wagner 2006). Customer-centricity concept has been around for almost 50 years and it was first developed by the Practice of Management “Guru” Peter Drucker. He emphasizes that the customers are the ones that determine the success of a business and whether it will grow in the competitive market. Very common software used to track customer information relating to behaviour, and then utilize it across a range of touch points, is known as the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Software. CRM marketing is a business strategy that is aimed at understanding, managing and personalizing the needs of an organization’s current and prospective customers. Its implementation is offered by various software developing companies, some commonly known as Microsoft, IBM, and other competitors such as SAP and Siebel Oracle. Hobsons, another well-known software company develops customized professional CRM software especially for educational institutions. It is imperative for universities to attract skilful students while maintaining the marketing and operations at a cost-effective level. Hobsons’ customized software provides a centralized platform upon which students are managed on the basis of their experience and lifecycle. The Hobsons software therefore allows the university to manage the process of retaining current and attracting prospective students through this centralized system. 13

According to Nicole Engelbert, the author of the study, “CRM in the Higher Education Market” and lead analyst of vertical markets technology, this centralized system helps to assemble three essential areas in higher education: recruitment, retention and development, in order to create “the 360-degree view of the student” (Musico 2008). Keith Hontz, CRM development director of SAP Higher Education and Research (HER), supports the above view and emphasizes that universities have been late in addressing these three key areas. Previously, universities had been focusing on the older technologies from niche retailers, specifically on one of these areas, however they are now taking a more holistic approach by offering fully functional software that connects into the overall CRM system. CRM Software at City University Analyzing the research carried out for this study, there is a recognized need for the implementation of customized CRM software at City University. This would be a cost-efficient way to capture information for the purpose of attracting current students to the postgraduate study. The steps to the action plan for implementation of this system will be outlined below. Step 1: It is imperative to be aware of certain information regarding current and prospective students. This will allow the university to be informed of various students’ personal information, which will be an indication of their interests in City University. When students initially apply for the first year of City University undergraduate programs, they provide facts on their personal statements in the application forms. This data includes information about their backgrounds, such as their nationalities, incomes, career focuses and expectations. Most importantly, it takes into account information regarding their interests and hobbies. Other sources of capturing information in the students’ first year degree will include information related to their attendance in post graduate events such as open days and fairs. In addition, data will be captured from students’ participation in various clubs, societies and other social events. Finally, according to the carried out research, City University will soon be introducing a Course Management System (CMS) known as Moodle system (Hebel 2009). This is an interactive learning system and is based on exchanging information in an open source community. Additional information about students’ viewpoints and behavior will be captured by technologies enabling collaborating sharing of information such as weblogs, wikis, forums and discussion boards. Step 2: This step is predicted to be implemented in the second year of the students’ degrees as they tend to be aware of their future plans, as opposed to their first year. This data will be automatically captured and utilized by the CRM software. It will help to identify trends and categorize students into groups, such as by demographics or psychographics. Therefore, if City University aims to target students with particular personality traits and abilities, which will be suited towards a given course available, the CRM software will find those prospects and deliver their information to the City University research and development team. However, students’ opinions, from the first year of the undergraduate program to the third year is most likely to change, and therefore the trend will be continuously reviewed throughout the three years, such that if eventually the students wish to 14

change their career path, it can be identified, and can still apply to another postgraduate course at City University. Step 3: Having gained the above information, the City University can then concentrate on designing and developing appropriate marketing campaign, in order to target the current students towards enrolling in postgraduate programs. These marketing campaigns should be designed such as to encourage current students to perceive City University differently, which are found to be the underlying problem from the surveys conducted. City University has to take into consideration online ways of targeting the various groups of students as well as direct, face-to-face ways of approaching them. Online means may include campaigning through personal emails, through the communication software (Cityspace) and through the interactive website. The direct, face-to-face ways of the marketing campaign can be used to broadcast to students, the various benefits and advantages of further continuing to the postgraduate programs. In order to capture the image of City University in the eyes of the students, and to ensure that they will consider the university’s postgraduate programs, it is imperative to keep them up-to-date with the latest news and events for postgraduates. Research carried out shows that the events currently taking place is not as informative as it should be, and therefore students may not be as aware of the programs, especially if they wish to change their career paths. Thus, each course should encourage participation in a common workshop by perhaps the course director, whereby the students will be informed on the various advantages and benefits offered to them by City University. Guest speakers who were previous City University postgraduate students can perhaps attend this workshop too. They can share their experience with the prospective students and explain the benefits of going to such a high reputed University, in terms of career opportunities. This may be found to be highly valuable, for City University is known for its high career prospects. The course director may deliver to the students, information to the current degree being studied, as well as advertise new combined subject routes, for example Fashion Marketing. Since a lack of knowledge may exist regarding the other degrees, and subject areas, free brochures will be distributed relating to the additional courses. Moreover, some freebies as well as free food and drinks will be provided, as it will help provide a lasting impression of the event. Students should also be made aware of the continuous advantages of going to City University, which is located in the heart of London, as recruiters might be more likely to employ such students due to the overall exposure available to them. In addition, City University provides different assignments and projects that are mostly linked to real life organizations and situations, thereby reiterating the fact that courses taught at the University, are designed to be applicable to the real world. City University can market this through open days, in the form of lectures or workshops, whereby rather than showing the students the university facilities by tours, they can be assisted through a real experience in the day of a postgraduate student. In addition, when the prospective students attend various workshops and open days, they should be informed of the benefits such as discounts available to them as they are existing City University students. An example of the benefit offered by another competitor for its current students, include London School of Economics offering discounts on text books in the Waterstone’s book store. 15

There is a lack of information easily exposed on the postgraduate programs. Therefore, City University should concentrate on providing relevant information, however it should be noted that too many emails could be possibly viewed as spam and disregarded. Finally, City University needs to change the website, in such a way that it is more appealing, easier to access information and there is more interaction between the two parties. The website should include more advertisements for each degree and each society, in order to increase students’ awareness. Step 4: The last step will be implemented in the students’ final year of their undergraduate degrees, since opinions are bound to change after having spent three years at the institution. Although the last step, it is not the least important and will include reviewing and monitoring the action plan to continuously improve its process. In order to measure its overall performance, different Key Performance Indicators (KPI) has to be taken into account on a long term basis. These KPIs can include the overall number of students graduated from the postgraduate programs, as well as general feedback received from source of information such as the interactive website and conducted surveys. These conducted surveys may include formal and informal ways of gathering relevant information from students’ opinions in their final year. Having analyzed the feedback gathered, this data will indicate possible changes that are required to be implemented in order to continuously improve the process. The Agenda for debate (see Appendix 5) is the next step associated with the SSM approach and it outlines the main changes regarding the problem situation.

8. ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS Having conducted primary as well as secondary research, it is found that City University does provide scholarships for their postgraduate programs. However, these grants are not standardized. The City Law School for example, offers a scholarship of £2000 for its postgraduate programs, whereas the other schools of City University provide a percentage of the tuition fee. This proves to be an uneven distribution, and may have an adverse effect on the image of the City University. Furthermore, attempts to advertise their scholarship programs on posters and banners may fail as it can create confusion in the minds of individuals, if different amounts are offered to different schools of City University. Therefore, it is recommended that the scholarship amounts offered to students should be revised, in order to create standardization and equality. Furthermore, a 20% discount can be offered to all current City University students who are following on to the postgraduate programs. Indeed, City University will need to consider their costs incurred in doing so, and therefore when revising the scholarship programs, perhaps the university can lower the standardized scholarship level set, and in addition offer this 20% discount to all the current students entering the university’s postgraduate programs as well. This may prove to be highly favourable, as current students will be offered a chance to feel valued as students. In addition, the incentive of a discount on the tuition fees will surely encourage the students to apply to the university for the postgraduate programs, and this is verified 16

by the surveys conducted within the university, which proved that money is an incentive that drives students towards a university. In addition, City University can create a partnership agreement with Apple, in order to provide discounts on the purchase of laptops. The purchase of laptops is highly costly, and this form of agreement is not currently incorporated in any university in London. Therefore, if such an incentive it offered, it will allow City University to market itself better. When the current students are applying for the postgraduate programs, and are put onto the waiting list for acceptance, City University should prioritize these currents students, allowing them to receive an acceptance, as they were once current students of the university. Although this cannot be marketed, it should be taken into consideration.

8.1 The City University “house” The above steps of action plan and recommendations are metaphorically compared to the building blocks of a house, which in this case represents City University. This is considered to be the developed holistic approach that demonstrates the key benefits of the suggested action plan steps and activities. This system’s approach is summarized using the following framework:

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9. INVESTMENT AGAINST COSTS 9.1 Outcomes The cost of the customized CRM software cannot be defined easily. The price depends on how many services are required the number of features provided by the software developing company and its users. However, after a thorough research, a minimum price of £25,000 including the implementation of the software, IT expertise and the training for an initial predicted number of 30 users. Implementing CRM systems requires new computer hardware, systems software, network equipment and security software. Hardware The costs of hardware vary according to the features required. In a wide range dependent on the scope of implementation and platforms. However, in mid-sized organizations where CRM are implemented, hardware could cost up to a quarter million dollars. Software Just as the Hardware, the cost of the CRM software depends on the scope of the software, its complexity (number of users, size of the database).The more users there are, the more license the firm is going to need and probably more training too. The cost of the software could then be reduced by reducing either the number of users or the number of features. Training The cost for training depends on the number of users to be trained, and the level of training provided. The more complicated the software is, with many features, the higher the price per user is going to be. Please refer to Appendix 6 for further details on the Software cost calculation. Advertising Advertising campaign includes posters and flyers, and for both of these projected costs different providers have been consulted. An average investment of £2,000 is recommended in order to reach a sufficient number of students. Different sizes have been asked for quotes. A5 Flyers and A4 brochures will be distributed during and before events such as open days, fairs and workshops. Their format will involve A3 and A2 and they will be displayed in strategic emplacement such as main entrances, corridors so they will be seen by a high number of students. These costs are totally projected to be £2,294 (See Appendix 7) Events

18

According to the City University marketing department, an open day currently costs around 2500 pounds. We assumed that there should be 2 open days per year and that they will differ from the original structure of current open days and thus it would cost more than currently. It is predicted to cost around £5000 in total, including provision of freebees (See Appendix 8) and the expenses for the organized workshops instead of the traditional tours. The total costs for the events are projected to be £13,800. Direct Costs Direct costs would mainly include lecturers’ and staff’s salaries for the additional recommended courses. This does not necessarily mean recruiting new lecturers as many teachers with required qualification are already working for the university. Our research and comparisons with other school brought us to these prices. Except a course officer to supervise the course, no extra staffs are required to add a combined course in the university’s program. The average salary of an experienced course officer is around 40,000 pounds. A course is divided in around 30 hours and each hour, the lecturer costs the university around 30 pounds. Thus the annual cost for teaching is around 43,000 pounds. Hence Total direct costs for adding one extra combined course in the university’s program will rise 88,000 pounds. (See Appendix 9). Assuming that less than 10,000 pounds would be invested for equipment and raw materials, the total direct costs are projected to be 95,000 pounds. 9.2 Incomes Ranking/Reputation One of the main factors that students are seeking for their university is a good ranking and good reputation. Thanks to a good internal promotion, current students get a better image of their own university and will tend to give external people a good feedback on their university and perhaps continue their further studies at City. Better customer understanding The aims of the CRM software are to have a better targeting of students, creating and updating their profiles overtime. Thus the university could fulfil the students’ needs and expectations. Students will appreciate that kind of personal attention. They become more than a random student and are subject to a regular attention from their institution. They will feel more secured and will know where to go if they need help. Better Marketing Open days, workshops, flyers and posters help reaching more current students and improve the image of the university in their mind. It is easier to catch people attention when the number of people in the audience is reduced. Thus, by conducting workshop during lectures with a reduced number of participants, students feel more privileged and closer to their university. Strategic goals 19

In order to enhance the institution, City University has set strategic goals that they should achieve by 2012. Different goals in terms of students, alumni, employers, staff and Research have been set. In order to reach these goals, the university is willing to undertake fundamental reviews of their educational offering. All these investments described in this report are in a way part of this review and allow the university to meet goals such as: -

Deliver better and higher quality courses.

-

A better understanding of students needs.

-

Be more students focused and listen to their feedback and their recommendation.

-

Raise standard of entry.

-

Provide a better Management and HR systems.

-

Offer students a high standard of curricular content.

However, two of their priority initiatives for 2010 are the review of their graduate educational offering and the system for academic promotion and reward. Thus, our recommendations are in perfect concordance with their goals.

CONCLUSION This report analyses the current situation at City University in terms of targeting current students in order to retain them for post-graduate studies and recommend appropriate ways and incentives to achieve this goal. It was found that only 29% of students in City wanted to stay for Postgraduate studies, with still 42% undecided and 29% negative answers. One of the aims of the report is to reduce these undecided in order to keep 50% of City students for Postgraduate studies. Further data was researched about other universities to be able to see what incentives or improvements could be made to retain students. It appeared that university websites is holding an essential role to communicate with students and offer them information. Also offering students discounts and combined courses was a great encouragement for them to select a university. In order to capture information about current students and be able to target them better during marketing campaign, the implementation of CRM software appeared to be essential. These campaigns would include different types of events and open days designed for current students. After analysing the costs implied it was concluded that, if asking for an important investment for the university, it would create a high return on investment on a longer term and provide City University with a competitive edge.

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10. REFERENCES Zoho CRM, Price Comparison Calculator, available at: http://www.zoho.com/crm/price-calculator.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 ZOHO. (2009). Create Collaborative Online Wiki Websites. Available: http://wiki.zoho.com/login.do?serviceurl=%2Fregister.do. Last accessed 28 November 2009. Salesboom. (2009). CRM & ERP Edition Comparisons. Available: http://www.salesboom.com/products/editions.html. Last accessed 28 November 2009. Wikipedia. 2009, Consumer Relationship System, available at: (Updated 18 July 2009) available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Relationship_System. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 Wikipedia. 2009, Consumer Relationship System, (Updated 2 December 2009) available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_management. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 Salary.com. (2006). Average Education Job Salary Range and Education Pay Scale.. Available: http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_narrowbrief_ed01.html. Last accessed 18 November 2009. City University London. (2009). Our strategy, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/our-strategy.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 City University London. (2009). Strategic Goals, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/strategic-goals.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 City University London. (2009). Strategic Priorities 2008 to 2012, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/strategic-priorities-2008-to-2012.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 City University London. (2009). Priority Initiatives, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/priority-initatives.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 City University London. (2009). Key Performance Indicators, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/strategy/key-performance-indicators.html. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 City University London, 2009, Financial Statements for the year ended 31 July 2009, available at: http://www.city.ac.uk/aboutcity/dps/Finance_Statements_2008-2009.pdf. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009

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Vistaprint. 2009 Available: http://www.vistaprint.co.uk/personalised-pens.aspx? GP=12/2/2009+6:45:38+AM#here. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 National Pen Ltd. (2009) Available: http://www.nationalpen.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009. Flashbay. (2008). Logo Branded USB Flash Drives - Welcome to the Source! Available: http://www.flashbay.com/. Last accessed 20 November 2009. Yo-Promotions. (2009). Welcome to Yo-Promotions. Available: http://www.yopromotions.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009. Click Promo Gifts. 2009. Available: http://www.clickpromogifts.co.uk. Last accessed 03 Dec 2009 Amstore. (2009). Promotional USB & Custom USB Drives. Available: http://www.amstore-memory.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009. Bespoke USB. (2009). Get noticed - in a flash. Available: http://www.bespokeusb.co.uk/. Last accessed 20 November 2009. City University London. (2009). Why choose City University London?. Available: http://www.city.ac.uk/study/choosecity/index.html. Last accessed 26 November 2009. Queen Mary University of London. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available: http://www.qmul.ac.uk/postgraduate/index.html. Last accessed 16 November 2009. Times Online. (2007). Good University Guide. Available: http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tol_gug/gooduniversityguide.php. Last accessed 16 November 2009. University of Southampton. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available: http://www.soton.ac.uk/postgraduate/index.shtml. Last accessed 16 November 2009. University of Edinburgh. (2009). Why choose Edinburgh?. Available: http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/edinburgh. Last accessed 16 November 2009. University Of St. Andrews. ( ). School of History: Academic Support Officer. Available: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/media/LA263%2009%20FPs.pdf. Last accessed 18 November 2009. University of Westminster. (2009). Postgraduate Study. Available: http://www.westminster.ac.uk/study/pg/student-life/postgraduate-study. Last accessed 16 November 2009. Moodle. (2009). Welcome to Moodle Community. Available: http://moodle.org/. Last accessed 27 November 2009. Hobsons. (2009). Providing Enrollement and Student Recruitment Marketing 22

Solutions. Available: http://www.eduinreview.com/Education-Finder/Hobsons/. Last accessed 30 November 2009. Musico, Christopher. (Aug2008). Making CRM Mandatory for University Administration.. CRM Magazine. Vol. 12 Issue 8 (N/A), p20-20, 1p, 1 chart. Wailgum, T. (2007). CRM (Customer Relationship Management) topics covering definition, systems, software, and more.. Available: http://www.cio.com/article/40295/CRM_Definition_and_Solutions? page=1&taxonomyId=1461. Last accessed 26 November 2009. Jackson, M (2000). System Approaches to Management. 3rd ed. : Springer. 247.

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Appendices Appendix 1 - The surveys Survey conducted at City University (1/3)

24

Survey conducted at City University (2/3)

25

Survey conducted at City University (3/3)

26

Survey conducted at Queen Mary University of London (1/2)

27

Survey conducted at Queen Mary University of London (2/2)

28

Survey conducted at University of Westminster (1/2)

29

Survey conducted at University o f Westminster (2/2)

30

Survey conducted at University of Southampton (1/2)

31

Survey conducted at University of Southampton (2/2)

32

Survey conducted at University of Edinburgh (1/2)

33

Survey conducted at University of Edinburgh (2/2)

34

All universities together (1/2)

35

All universities together (1/2)

36

Appendix 2 Step 1 -The rich picture

37

Appendix 3 Step 2 - Relevant Systems The key systems relevant to City University situation •

A system to transfer the knowledge

•

A system to assess the students

•

A system to market the activities to current and prospective students

•

A system to retain the current students for post graduate programs

•

A system to improve the current facilities

•

A system to recruit skilful staff

•

A system to improve the communication between the stakeholders

•

A system to manage the budget

•

A system to reflect the global environment to students

•

A system to improve teaching quality

•

A system to prepare students for future career jobs

•

A system to provide students with team work abilities

•

A system to offer social societies and organize social events

•

A system to keep up-to-date with the latest IT trends

•

A system to provide reliable Information Communication Infrastructure between the main operations

•

A system to deal with external economical factors, example, economical crisis and governmental funds.

Appendix 4 Step 3 - ROOT DEFINITION A system that enables the City University operations to capture information about current students through gathering personal data, monitoring their attendance in post graduate events, and receiving information from the website in order to identify trends. City University will then target the students by managing the load of data and organizing students in groups of trends, in order to design the marketing activities. Finally, the university will obtain feedback by conducting surveys as well as reviewing the marketing campaign, in order to measure the performance and continuously improve the retention process of current undergraduate students. 38

In order to ensure that this Root Definition covers the main elements in the mindset, a CATWOE (customers, actors, Transformation, Weltanschauung, owners and environment) test has to be carried out. This will outline the main stakeholders in the system and the Weltanschauung view will take different perspectives of looking at the situation.

CATWOE TEST -

Customers – Current students

-

Actors – University operations

-

Transformation –Student personal information transformed into knowledge for university, better targeting

-

Weltanschauung – City University has knowledge to share with the students, retaining them will create a bigger and closer Alumni community

-

Owner – University dean, university operations

-

Environment – Sufficient funds, capable staff for using the CRM software, technology to allow this

Appendix 5 Step 4 - Agenda for debate

Item Map

in

Conceptual Present in the Real Debate? World

Enables the University

City An ongoing process - YES reliable?

Capture information

An ongoing process – YES appropriate?

Gathering personal data

An ongoing process – YES imperative

Receiving information Functional– deliverable from the website

YES

39

Monitoring attendance

their Assessed from the YES online signed in students

Identify trends

Not fully functional – YES the students interests and hobbies are not included

Target the students

An ongoing process – YES appropriate?

Managing the load of Functional– deliverable data

NO

Organizing students in An ongoing process – YES groups of trends reliable?

Design the marketing Functional -appropriate? activities

YES

Obtain feedback

Functional – reliable?

YES

Conducting surveys

Functional – low rate of YES response

Reviewing the Functional- deliverable marketing campaign

YES

Measure performance

YES

the Existing – does it work?

Improve the retention Functional – are more YES process students willing to stay on at City?

40

Appendix 6 Software costs In order to calculate the Software cost, different costs were projected. Training: The price of training is included in the software price. The cost for training one user per month is 42 pounds. Vendor

Price / user / month

Price / user / month

Oracle CRM Ondemand

$70

£42,00

The number of users: We assumed that lecturers were in overall not willing to be trained to use new software and will tend to ask someone more qualified to do the task for them. We assumed that the number of users for the software would be limited to 30 users. Hence, following our recommendation of 30 users, the cost of the software is approximately 15,000 pounds. However, another simulation shows that if more staff from different departments such as Marketing, Finance, and recruitment department would be trained. It would come to a number of 200 users. Thus, the cost would rise to around 100,000 pounds. Indeed, as the number of users is not limited and not a fixed factor, the price could vary, and be adjusted by adjusting this factor.

41

Enter number of users

30

Cost incurred for the number of users mentioned above: Zoho CRM Professional Edition

$4 968

£2 980,80

SugarCRM Professional Edition

$14 400

£8 640,00

Salesboom Professional Edition

$16 200

£9 720,00

Entellium

$18 000

£10 800,00

Salesforce Professional Edition

$23 400

£14 040,00

Oracle CRM OnDemand

$25 200

£15 120,00

42

Enter number of users

200

Cost incurred for the number of users mentioned above: Zoho CRM Professional Edition

$35 568

£21 340,80

SugarCRM Professional Edition

$96 000

£57 600,00

Salesboom Professional Edition

$108 000

£64 800,00

Entellium

$120 000

£72 000,00

Salesforce Professional Edition

$156 000

£93 600,00

Oracle CRM OnDemand

$168 000

£100 800,00

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Appendix 7 – Adevertisment costs Flyers and Posters

Quantity

Unique Cost

Total

A2 Poster

500

£0,60

£298,00

A3 Poster

2 000

£0,16

£316,00

A5 Flyers

10 000

£0,03

£305,00

A4 8pp Brochures

10 000

£0,14

£1 375,00 £2 294,00

Different type of freebies could be taken into consideration, but we focused on freebies that could be used on a regular basis so student will remember easily about City University. Thus, freebies taken into consideration are customized plastic ball pen, customized USB Flash drive, and customized mouse mat. All Freebies will contain the logo of the university. Customized pens We forecast to buy around 2000 pens during the year, in order to cover both open days and workshops. A wide range of pens is available. Different brands, different quality. However, the average unit price of a customized pen in plastic with the logo on it would be around 30p. Hence, the average price for 2000 customized pens would be around 600 pounds. Customized USB flash drive The USB drive is made of plastic and metal. On the plastic part, the logo of the university will be displayed. The unit price of such customized USB Flash drive with a capacity of 512MB is around 3 pounds. The idea is to load files with City University details on the drive so when the student will use the drive for the first time, he will find more detailed information and pictures or video to make him remember City. As this freebie is a bit more sophisticated and more expensive, the number of unit forecasted is limited to 1000 units and will generate a cost of 3000 pounds. It will be only distributed during workshops. Customized mouse mats The unit price of a customized mouse mat is around 60p. It will be distributed during both open days and workshops. Just like pens, the amount of units to buy would be 2000. It would generate a cost of 1200 pounds. The logo of the University and a promotional message will be printed on the mat in four line colours. 44

Workshop Workshop will take place during open days and some workshops will be set during lectures. It will be conducted by a lecturer, and brochures, documentation, freebies drinks and food will be distributed. Freebies are already available and there is no need to buy more. Also as the workshop takes place during a lecture time, it doesn’t generate an extra cost for the lecturer.

Appendix 8 - Events costs Events

Unit cost

Unit/year

Total

Normal Open day expenses (incl.food & drink )

£2 500,00

2

£5 000,00

Customized pens

£0,30

2000

£600,00

Customized USB drives

£3,00

1000

£3 000,00

Customize Mouse mat

£0,60

2000

£1 200,00

Extra Food and drinks for Workshops

£200,00

20

£4 000,00 £13 800,00

Appendix 9 – direct costs Course officer Annual salary

£40 000,00

Lecturers cost Hour rate/lecturer

£30,00

Number of hours per week

30

Monthly cost

£3 600,00

Annual cost

£43 200,00

Total Direct Costs for one course

£88 200,00

45