Business Consulting Assignment: Regent GroupPromoting Thinking into Character (TIC) Program
Question
Task:
The scenario to be examined in this business consulting assignment is that you have been instructed by your client to produce a report demonstrating your understanding of the client project through the use of secondary research. You are not required to provide a set of solutions to the client’s problem at this stage.
Using the client project brief which you have been allocated, answer all three of the questions below.
Ensure work is supported with evidence from research (academic theory and company research)
A brief introduction and conclusion are also required which is included in the word count.
Further guidance on research sources will be provided in Week 8’s class.
Word count is 1,500 (+/- 10%) from 1350 and 1650 and 10 References plus In-text Citations
1. Clarify who your client is, and what is the problem they are facing
2. Using research, break the problem down by critically analysing and presenting areas of importance to the client such as competitors, target customer market and influencing factors from the external environment ( PESTEL)
3. From your above analysis, what are the top three issues that the client is facing?
Answer
1. Introduction
It has become essential for colleges and universities to focus on fostering a supporting learning environment for the students. This positive learning atmosphere helps the students in being more interactive, attentive, sharing stories and supporting each other for building a collective community. It helps in enhancing both hard and soft skills in the students, thereby increasing their employability for the future career (Tentamaand Abdillah, 2019). Alongside this learning environment, various courses or programmes are also being introduced for ensuring their personal and professional development. The report aims to analyse the external environment of Regent College for promoting its transformational programme Thinking into Character (TIC).
2. Brief Background Details About the Client
The fundamental aim of Regent College is to provide students with support for enabling them to succeed academically, professionally and personally in their lives. In this regard, a transformational programme named Thinking into Character (TIC) has been developed. This programme focuses on developing skills, habits, discipline and growth mindset in the students so that they can emerge as winners in every aspect of their lives. This a free digital course for the students of Regent College (Thinking into Character, 2021). It consists of various other associated programmes for developing better character and confidence, reducing non-productive habits, developing resilience, persistence and self-belief and ultimately building a successful career.
3. Client’s Problems
TIC is a new transformational programme that has been launched in the Regent College. With the rapid growth in technology, internet and digitalization, various online courses have been introduced by different colleges and universities for enhancing professional and personal development of their students. It is essential for Regent College to develop a new marketing campaign for promoting the brand for Thinking into Character (TIC) so that students get enrolled in this programme. There are various marketing tactics available in the market. Thus, it is challenging to identify one key event that will be best suitable for this transformational programme.
4. Critical Analysis
4.1 Target Markets
The target market of Regent College for TIC programme consists of all the college students and further students and professionals of other institutions. The programme is present on the digital platform on the website, which can be availed by the students based on their convenience (Hora, Benbowand Smolarek, 2018). Here, students mainly in their graduate or university curriculum will be mainly targeted as they are preparing for future professional careers. Besides, professionals willing to enhance their personal and professional development can also undergo this course. Thus, the target market consists of various types of audience or clients that the college will have to consider.
4.2 Competitors’ Analysis
Competitor analysis should be carried out before developing any marketing campaign for knowing about the products, services, programmes or others offered by other brands in the industry (PontualRibeiroand Golovanova, 2020). This insight helps in better building strategies for differentiating oneself from such competitor brands in the market. There exist various universities and colleges offering students with professional development programmes aimed at developing different soft and technical skills. These programmes further contribute largely towards their professional and personal development. They are offered in both online and offline platforms, thereby providing convenience to the students to engage in them as and when required. Along with these programmes, e-learning companies are also present in the UK market for providing students with different online professional courses. These consist of CIPD, Loop, LEO Learning, Swift eLearning Services, Titus Learning and others (Smith, 2020). The e-learning companies offer professional training along with other personal development options. They help in improving and offering various products and services for the students. Such programmes can be availed either free or with affordable prices. Thus, there exists intense competition in the UK market because of both other universities and e-learning companies offering various professional programmes to the students.
4.3 Market Trends
The rapid growth in digital technologies has been changing the landscape of university education. Various digital programmes are being launched by universities so that students can learn everything online, have doubt clear sessions and undertake assignments for evaluating their learnings. This has encouraged several investors to enhance their investment in education technologies in the universities. Furthermore, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has further changed the entire scenario by introducing online classes resulting from lockdown and closure of colleges and universities (Watermeyer, et al., 2021). Apart from learning and taking classes through online platforms, students have also been preparing for online examinations. These students include those studying at colleges or universities and preparing themselves for their employable career. Digital courses or programmes launched by colleges have also been on the rise.Thus, this has further paved the way for introducing various digital programmes aimed at improving personal and professional development of the students.
4.4 PESTEL
Political- There are various political factors influencing both higher education and universities in the UK. Government policies have been undertaken for rising degree costs, increase in tuition hikes and other fees. This puts pressure on the universities in providing free courses to its students (ICEF Monitor, 2021). Besides, there exists perceptions about university programmes not being attractive like other countries. However, the government has also been focusing on expansion of the university sector where TIC programme can become more relevant for the students.
Economic- The economic stability of UK determines the environment for universities because of the impact on funding, student expectations and competition. The outbreak of the pandemic has led to economic downturn in the UK during 2020. It has also resulted in deep recession in the UK economy. This has made higher education institutions like Regent College more vulnerable towards certain policies related to reduction in government funding and market forces (Cox, 2021). This makes it difficult in providing free digital courses like TIC to the students.
Social- The pandemic outbreak has changed the way of universities and colleges engaging in education of the students. They have started providing online learning platforms with an advantage to TIC for introducing it to the target students (Fazackerley, 2020). The social distancing norms and lockdowns have made digital learning a new trend in the UK universities. However, the demographic shift in student population in the UK can become a threat for the colleges or universities planning for introducing new programmes (Cox, 2021). This is because of the decrease in the percentage of student population in the country since past few years.
Technological-British universities and colleges are undertaking various innovative technologies for enhancing the education for their students. The use of different IT products and services has made the knowledge sharing and impairment easier for these colleges (The Telegraph, 2018). However, the students’ access to modes of teaching, search and learning largely determines the success of such programmes launched by the universities.
Environmental- Various environmental issues are prevalent in the UK economy related to climate change, waste, flooding, overpopulation, air pollution, global warming, emissions, deforestation and others (Statista, 2021). These issues are harmful for both society, universities and students. It is the responsibility of the universities to increase awareness of the students about such issues so they can contribute towards addressing them while venturing into the professional career.
Legal- The UK colleges and universities need to abide by various laws and regulations put forward by the government about digital learning and programmes. In this regard, privacy and confidentiality of students’ information should be maintained along with offering equal opportunity to each and every student for this purpose.
5. Top Three Priorities
Regent College needs to undertaken an online advertising campaign for reaching out to the students and promoting the TIC programme. This will be first priority of the college. The advertisement campaign messages can be promoted on various digital platforms like the college website, social media and other media aiming to reach the maximum number of customers (Balaand Verma, 2018). The second priority of the college will be efficient allocation of resources for ensuring that the free digital programme is being offered to all students either graduating or looking for employment opportunities. In this regard, the college might have to increase its own financial resources as government cuts are expected with the economic downturn caused from the pandemic outbreak. The third priority of the college will be using various technologies for enhancing the TIC programme for meeting changing students’ expectations, competitive landscape and current market trends.
6. Conclusion
The report focused on analysing the external environment of Regent College for promoting the TIC programme by suggesting a suitable marketing campaign. In this regard, it first provided a brief background on the college and the Think into Character (TIC) programme introduced recently. Furthermore, it discussed about the client’s problems of developing a suitable marketing campaign for promoting this programme to the students. The report further carried out critical evaluation for identifying target markets, analysing competitors’ offerings, determining market trends and evaluating the external environment with PESTEL model. Lastly, it identified three top priorities that the college needs to focus on for promoting the TIC programme.?
7. References
Bala, M. and Verma, D., 2018. A critical review of digital marketing. M. Bala, D. Verma (2018). A Critical Review of Digital Marketing. International Journal of Management, IT & Engineering, 8(10), pp.321-339.
Cox, J., 2021. The higher education environment driving academic library strategy: A political, economic, social and technological (PEST) analysis. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 47(1), p.102219.
Fazackerley, A., 2020. Complete shutdown of UK universities due to Covid-19 'impossible'. [online] TheGuardian. Available at:
Hora, M.T., Benbow, R.J. and Smolarek, B.B., 2018. Re-thinking soft skills and student employability: A new paradigm for undergraduate education. Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, 50(6), pp.30-37.
ICEF Monitor, 2021. The impact of government policy on British universities. [online] Available at:
PontualRibeiro, E. and Golovanova, S., 2020. A Unified Presentation Of Competition Analysis In Two?Sided Markets. Business consulting assignmentJournal of Economic Surveys, 34(3), pp.548-571.
Smith, J., 2020. Best 20 eLearning Companies in UK. [online] Available at:
The Telegraph, 2018. The future of tech and media. [online] Available at:
Thinking into Character, 2021. Home. [online] Available at:
Watermeyer, R., Crick, T., Knight, C. and Goodall, J., 2021. COVID-19 and digital disruption in UK universities: Afflictions and affordances of emergency online migration. Higher Education, 81, pp.623-641.
