Emma Lancaster, CEO, Study Group, UK
Published 07/03/2019
In an exciting start to 2019, Study Group have brought in new talent, had a majority stake acquired by Ardian, and CFO Emma Lancaster taking over from David Leigh as CEO. The PIE News met with Lancaster to discover her plan, and how she got to where she is now.
The PIE: Your last five years have been spent as CFO at Study Group, when you said you worked under David Leigh’s five-year plan. Do you have your own plan to deliver over the next three to five years?
Emma Lancaster: Yes, I think we are really focused on being a leading provider in international education. It’s kind of what we do and really to think about things that drive that, so we are doing much more a focus on things like students’ success, students’ successes huge anyway.
“There is no question we are having way more conversations with universities than usual”
Our progression rates are in the high 90’s. That is as a key differentiator, we want to make sure that’s really the focus. A real focus on operational excellence [is another goal]. That’s making sure that we are being as efficient as we can be but, more providing the best experience for our students, and frankly our partners.
Some of it is not dramatic it is just really focusing on driving all the different things that when you are using different players perhaps getting into as deeply you should.
The fourth thing is growth. We are looking into growing our existing partners. We will be looking into new partners particularly in the US, then really looking at what else we could deliver to our partners. That is one of the reasons for Rajay’s appointment is to start to think about as university’s needs change, how can we mould with it?
The PIE: The relationship with agents is often quite testy in North America, and although Study Group isn’t an agent, are there any issues connecting with North American institutions?
EL: I think there has been a bit of confusion here, as the industry body, probably about five years ago said that it’s okay to recruit via agents. The issue was never with us, they never regarded us as agents, but clearly, we use agents so there is some issue. But that’s gone.
I think the macro factors you see in Australia and the UK are only in play in the US insofar as universities are in need of international students in a way they never used to be.
Suddenly there is a lot more appetite for international students and for pathway programs. We had four launches in the fall of 2018. There is energy around it. There is no question that demand is there, there’s is no question that students will want to go, so the only challenge at the moment is the immigration environment.
But we have worked in environments where the immigration [rules] was not great and we still grew student numbers. And the pipeline into the US is really strong actually. So, I think that is where we see growth but, it is much more a longer-term play.
The PIE: Do you have offices in North America?
EL: We do have an office in Chicago, but we are quite dispersed. Without looking we have 12 partners in the US.
The PIE: And they’ve spread across, from both coasts to Texas…
EL: I have to say, whenever I go to the US you always forget [how big it is]… I can do five centres in a week in the UK as I can easily get around, but actually, no you can’t do that [in the US] as it’s so big. So, actually it is a bit of a hub in Chicago and then we got people obviously based in different centres.
The PIE: You mentioned the immigration environment, and James Pitman has been quite vocal on the UK immigration and international students’ policy, as a voice for the sector. Does Study Group have the ambition to do something similar in all its markets?
EL: Clearly we will always have the ambition [to lobby government], but the pathway sector in North America is tiny. As much as we would like to have a voice, I think the reality is we won’t be heard. But in the UK and in Australia, absolutely.
We all have a passion around it. I think the UK could be so much more welcoming however, it is still pretty welcoming right now.
“We opened an office in Sao Paulo, trying to drive diversity in our student body”
I think if the UK could deal with some regulatory issues it could become an Australia.
The PIE: On the topic of regulations, could you tell me about the conversations you’ve been having with universities lately? What are the concerns looking at 2019 and all that brings?
EL: I think they are all worried about the same thing which is ‘okay, [Brexit] is going to come in some shape or form, so how are we going to be able to deal with this?’
There is no question we are having way more conversations with universities than usual. We are reasonably discerning as to which [HEIs] we talk to, as we have a very strong position in the UK, so we need to be very careful with managing our portfolio.
They are coming to us and asking ‘Could we run a pathway?’ But equally some of our existing partners are asking ‘what else can we do? you’re running this pathway but how can we stretch it, do it a different way, in getting international students from different areas, could we do something in the summer?’ There is much more push to be innovative around the area of international students.
The PIE: What does that innovation look like?
EL: If you rather just run a standard foundation program, then innovation might just be doing an international year one, at one end, for some conservative partners. But others it might be thinking about, ‘can we do one semester online?’.
We are doing some really interesting stuff, but I can’t tell you about it yet! We are working on new things that I do think will be seen to be innovative.
And we are looking at online a little bit. If you think about the US, and you think immigration is tough, then is there something you can do to do more of it at home, and think about it in that way.
The PIE: Changing the subject a bit, could you tell me a little bit about what brought you then into the education sector and what led up to this CEO role?
EL: I worked with David [Leigh] at a private equity-backed business. It wasn’t in education, it was in assessment but, the commonality is that it was a very diverse business spread across a number of countries.
In education, is sounds a bit clichéd, but you are doing good for the world. I started my first job out of practice with working [in] a fascinating industry but, not really feeling like you are giving a lot back. Whereas there’s nothing like meeting a student who’s just graduated, and you begin to realise that these 18-year-olds, wherever they come from, have these amazing stories about how hard they work and the rest of it.
The PIE: How often do you get to meet those students and tour those campuses?
“Suddenly there is an appetite for pathway programs in the US”
EL: We have 48 campuses, so I try and target 12 a year, one a month on average. I have just done a lot more since I’ve taken on this role partly because I have been trying to spend more time with our people. You learn so much.
It’s all very well sitting here in…not quite an ivory tower, but sitting here in central London. And when you go out and talk to teachers about what they are facing or what the issues are, I always come back with something or I go ‘hmm didn’t know that’.
The PIE: You have mentioned the growth in North America and Australia. Are there other markets that you are looking into? Is there anywhere exciting this year?
EL: I think I referenced it a bit earlier but, I think Canada. There’s no question that Canada is somewhere where I think there are really driving [growth].
They are pushing professionally, they need lots of people to do lots of jobs, and as a consequence, they are running big campaigns and we think it is perfect.
New Zealand is another area. We signed a partnership with Waikato last year in Hamilton.
And potentially in Europe as well. We already have our Holland hub but, there’s an opportunity there.
We are looking to push those destination markets. I think compared to our competitors we are already more evenly spread across the UK, Australia, North America but having a couple more strings to our bow would be quite helpful.
The other piece is source markets, and traditionally along with all of our competitors, a big chunk of our students come from China and they will continue to come from China, because there is no question its [economy] is growing and they have more students studying abroad more than any other nation.
Having said that, what we are starting to really think about is how we can get growth from different places. We opened an office in Sao Paulo last July, trying to drive more diversity in our student body. It is what the university partners want and it drives a better experience for our students actually.
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