Business Consulting Assignment Analysing External Business Environment of Regent College

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 is 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

Executive Summary
The growing competition in the business environment and rapid globalization has made it essential to analyse the external environment. The business consulting assignment has aimed at analysing such external environment for Thinking into Character (TIC) programme. It has first provided a brief background of the programme, followed by identifying client’s problems. Then, it has provided an analysis of the problems by identifying target market, competitor analysis and PESTEL analysis. After that, it has recognized three top priorities that can generate huge impact on the programme.

Introduction
With the rapid growth in globalization and competition in the business environment, companies are facing various challenges from their external forces. This globalization has led to economic integration, policy transfers across borders, knowledge transmission and diffusion, cultural stability and discourses of power (Zeibote, Volkova&Todorov, 2019). Businesses now facing increasing challenges as they operate in the global context and get impacted by problems or ongoing conditions in the foreign markets. This has made it essential for such companies to identify their problems and analyse business environment to understand the pressing issues. The purpose of the report here is to analyse external business environment of Regent College for solving the problems associated with the programme of Thinking into Character (TIC).

Brief Background
The CEO and Co-Founder of Regent Group, Dr. Selva Pankaj, created a group of transformational learning programmes known as Thinking into Character. These programmes are developed for helping in the personal growth and professional development of the students by enabling them to improve their potentials exponentially (Thinking into Character, 2021). Alongside attaining better grades or qualifications, these programmes help in building confidence and character, eliminating non-productive habits, overcoming anxieties, developing resilience, self-belief and persistence and building a successful career. Various products offered under this programme are digital platform for learning, book, workshop, the Power of Learning from DAD Digital Platform, DAD book and Think and Grow Rich Digital Platform. Different services involved here include mentorship programme, thinking circle, wealth creation programme and wellbeing programme (Thinking into Character, 2021). Thus, these products and services have been designed not only for college or university students but also for professionals willing to enhance their career.

Client’s Problems
The rapid advancement in technologies along with the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the year 2020 have given rise to various issues for the TIC programme. Some of the key challenges facing the college and leadership teams include change in student expectations from the programmes, digital and technology innovations providing the norms, operating in a global context, changing the programmes based on student expectations, attracting and retaining the best talent, linking estates strategy and the student, making research more sustainable, rising costs and shifting funding (Deloitte, 2021). In addition, the rising competition has also made it challenging for the university to enhance the awareness about its TIC programmes.

Analysis of Important Areas
Target Customer Market
The target market of TIC includes all students and professionals across all sectors. This has been possible because the 12-week online personal and professional development programme is available on the digital platform of its website (Bonsu, 2019). The programme extensively focuses on character development by enabling individuals to achieve both personal and professional goals that they previously thought impossible to obtain. The programme is also available to the students of Regent College London for free while other students and professionals can enrol into it with some fees. Thus, the target market of this programme involves all individuals willing to improve their personal and professional lives.

Competitors
Various top universities are offering students, graduates and professionals with learning programmes that can help in improving their personal and professional development. These programmes are available both online or digital and classroom training. Along with these programmes, coaching, mentorship, training and development are also undertaken under various universities. Besides, there also exist different eLearning companies in UK offering skills development, regulatory or legal compliance, online health and safety training. These include Swift eLearning Services, CIPD, IKHYA, Walkgrove, Loop, Titus Learning, GLAD Solutions, LEO Learning, The Learning Rooms, Brightwave and others (Smith, 2020). Apart from providing personal development options, they also provide professional training. These companies offer products and services for improving and facilitating on-boarding, talent management, staff training, succession planning and others. Thus, this shows that there exists high competition in the market from both universities and e-learning companies in the UK.

PESTEL Analysis
This is a strategic framework for analysing the external environment where the programme in being offered to the target customers. PESTEL analysis focuses on analysing key factors including social, political, economic, technological, legal and environmental (Rastogi& Trivedi, 2016). These factors help in identifying possible threats and opportunities existing in the business environment, thereby enabling the companies to come up with suitable strategies.

Political- There are various factors under the influence of the UK government that can progress or hamper the growth of educational, learning or professional programmes in the country. These include tax policies, employment laws, trade restrictions, tariffs, reforms, political stability and other regulations (Charity Commission, 2021). The UK government has been focusing on improving these professional and personal programmes for benefitting the individuals through their career advancement. This helps in enhancing further awareness for TIC and attract more target customers.

Economic- Despite being the sixth largest economy of the world, UK has been facing issues in its economic growth since the event of Brexit. Besides, the pandemic outbreak has further resulted in catastrophic effects on the economy. It has resulted in economic downturn, thereby forcing governments and universities to reduce their funding for extracurricular courses aimed at improving professional development for the students (Santander, 2021). Moreover, the investments have also decreased, thereby making it difficult for e-learning companies as well to introduce more products and services.

Social- The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was not only evident in the health infrastructure or economic system of the country, but it also largely affected schools, universities and educational institutes. The UK government had to introduce social distancing norms, travel restrictions and closing down universities during the first half of the pandemic, which directly affected these learning programmes (Fazackerley, 2020). However, companies or universities with the provision of digital learning were able to continue providing their services. Despite this, on-the-job training services could not be provided.

Technological- Innovative technologies are flooding British classrooms bringing in revolution in the education system. The extensive use of IT products and services is now not only limited to the companies but have also expanded to learning companies, universities and other educational institutes (The Telegraph, 2018). This booming tech market must be effectively utilized for introducing new technologies in the programmes as well. It would help in ensuring that such programmes are using technologies for personal and professional development of the students and professionals.

Environmental- There are various major environmental issues persisting in the UK economy. These mainly include dealing with waste, global warming and climate change, flooding, over-packaging of consumer goods, overpopulation, air pollution, future energy sources and supplies, emissions, deforestation, natural resources depletion and others (Statista, 2021). These issues are causing harm to both society and environment. Thus, the universities and e-learning companies must also introduce programmes for enhancing awareness and knowledge of students in these areas.

Legal- Both universities and e-learning companies in UK should abide by any regulations or laws associated with the introduction and implementation of training and learning programmes for the students and professionals. In this regard, everyone should be provided with the equal opportunity and their interests should be protected in such programmes. These regulations would also apply to the companies for their training and development programmes.

Three Top Priorities
From the analysis, three top priorities can be identified that have major impact on the TIC programme of Regent London. The first priority is intense competition from both universities and e-learning companies. Various other universities provide learning programmes for students and professionals either free or paid, while e-learning companies focus mainly on the professional development of the individuals. These institutions provide competitive rivalry to the TIC programme. This has made it essential to improve and launch new programmes under TIC for meeting rising and changing expectations of both students and professionals.

Furthermore, with the outbreak of the pandemic, UK has been facing economic downturn. This has the possibility of reducing government funding for these learning programmes, thereby making it difficult for the university to introduce more courses. This is because with reduced funding, the college would have to increase its own resources for funding such programmes provided for free to the college students. In this regard, it needs to increase the number of other students and professionals who enrol in thr programme by paying certain fees.

In addition, the third top priority for the TIC programme in the changing and advancement of technologies being introduced in the learning and education sector of UK. With the inclusion of more digital tools, it has become essential for the university to use them as well for improving TIC products and services being offered to the students and professionals. The university should further use such tools for increasing access to its programme to more students.

Conclusion
The report aimed at analysing the external environment for Thinking into Character to identify three top priorities for the programme. For this purpose, a brief background of the programme was provided in the first section by identifying its offerings, products and services. Furthermore, the client’s problems were also analysed in the second section by looking at different challenges. Besides, the report also focused on the target market, competitor analysis and external environment analysis through PESTEL model. Thus, this analysis helped in recognizing three priorities as intense competition, economic downturn and technological advances.

References
Bonsu, A. (2019). What is Thinking into Character Retrieved from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-thinking-character-akosua-bonsu Charity Commission. (2021). Tool 3: Risk management. Retrieved from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/550691/Tool_3.pdf

Deloitte. (2021). Seven global key challenges faced by universities and their leadership teams. Retrieved from https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/pages/public-sector/articles/seven-key-challenges-faced-by-universities.html Fazackerley, A. (2020). Complete shutdown of UK universities due to Covid-19 'impossible'. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/mar/11/coronavirus-complete-shutdown-uk-universities-impossible

Rastogi, N. I. T. A. N. K., & Trivedi, M. K. (2016). PESTLE technique–a tool to identify external risks in construction projects. Business consulting assignmentInternational Research Journal of Engineering and Technology (IRJET), 3(1), 384-388. Santander. (2021). United Kingdom: Economic and political outline. Retrieved from https://santandertrade.com/en/portal/analyse-markets/united-kingdom/economic-political-outline

Smith, J. (2020). Best 20 eLearning Companies in UK. Retrieved from https://www.etrainingpedia.com/elearning-companies-in-uk/ Statista. (2021). Most important environmental issues in Great Britain 2020. Retrieved from https://www.statista.com/statistics/865223/great-britain-most-important-environmental-issues/

The Telegraph. (2018). The future of tech and media. Retrieved from https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/tips-for-the-future/future-of-tech/ Thinking into Character. (2021). Home. Retrieved from https://www.tic.uk.com/ Zeibote, Z., Volkova, T., & Todorov, K. (2019). The impact of globalization on regional development and competitiveness: cases of selected regions. Insights into Regional Development, 1(1), 33-47.