Overview of De Montfort University
SWOT Analysis
De Montfort University is located in England and it is a public university. The UK department of Education has awarded this university in 2017 under the category of Gold rating for delivering Teaching Excellence Framework. The university has ranked the education sector on a new phase from being consistently amazing and outstanding. There are many factors that has been undertaken to analyze the SWOT analysis of the university. The same is mentioned below.
Strength
One of the greatest strength of the university is the image and reputation of the university itself. The university has successfully delivered highest quality of education in the UK. According to the Research Excellence Framework, it was found that 60% of the activities that takes place are internationally excellent. Thus, the university has been focusing on delivering the excellent environment across the globe as well.
Weakness
Since the university has its own brand value and image across the globe i.e. it has ranked itself as one of the leading university so the fee structure offered by the university is very high. It is not affordable for those who wants to study but are not financial stable to pay such huge amount. Apart from this, the university has several criteria that must be entertained to study there.
Opportunity
The university has offered wide range of courses for undergraduates and post graduates and the students from India, China and Malaysia are also given an opportunity of study there. The university has also offered distance learning mode for those overseas students (De Montfort University, 2015).
Threat
The major threat for the university is the increasing number of competitive universities and the quality of education they offers. There are lots of other many universities as well who offers the same courses along with the higher excellence. De Montfort University has to focus more on minimizing the environmental impact and maximize sustainable enterprise.
From the above analysis, it can be found that despite of creating well reputed image in the marketplace, De Montfort University has to focus more on maintaining its leading position. The university has already gained an excellence and created an opportunity for many overseas students who wants to study and complete their degrees. In addition to this, the university has also aimed at creating awareness internationally. Moreover, it is also found that De Montfort University is one of the most improved university found in UK which is innovative and ambitious that has successfully created a platform for all the students. The university is a perfect set of award winning teaching, excellent students and top class facilities (Altbach, P.G. and Knight, 2007).
Strengths of De Montfort University
However, there are some internal and external factor such as threat and weakness which can be overcome if few recommendations are to be taken under considerations.
Since the university has its own brand value, the fee structure offered is not easily affordable. So, in order to increase the number of international students, the university must work on its fee structure which can be easily affordable by other many students as well. Additionally, some extra benefits must be provided to those students who wishes to study but they do not strong financial condition.
In addition to this, the university must revise its courses time to time because of the increasing number of competitors. The university should also try working on small projects and education sectors that will create an opportunity for middle income range people and create more awareness. The university must make every student aware about the number of courses offered by them because there are still many countries who are still unaware about the university and they do not bother to study there even if they wish because of the complex criteria to get admission (Jones, Ramanau, Cross and Healing, 2010).
Objectives related to Angherns’ ICDT model
Angherns’ ICDT model helps to provide help in designing online business strategies which creates s hope for the business to enhance their business activities by redesigning and redefining their products and services. The model consists of four different areas such as Information Space, communication space, distribution space, and Transaction space. The three major objectives that the university must focus on are mentioned below (Angehrn, 1997).
- The university can increase its overall profitability in increasing revenues. Revenues can be further increased by either way. Increasing the number of students by reaching new students segments and geographies. The university should focus more overseas students and encourage them to choose De Montfort University.
- Apart from this, the university can emphasis on reducing the vague costs such as inventory replenishment and promotional spending as well. The resources should be effectively utilized and well managed.
- The university should focus on creating communities in the internet market space where likeminded people can easily interact and exchange bundles of information. Creation of community will inspire other students as well to return to site more often and serve in creating more demands for the universities positioning and cultivating students’ loyalty as well (Pashby and Oliveira Andreotti, 2016).
De Montfort University has faced lots of issues regarding culture and trust which has created several negative outcomes and the university has successfully used few communication tools to manage such issues and find out the potential students and target them. The communication plan is implemented and managed by IC team who supports the communication team as well. The plan is further evaluated and a two way communication feedback channels must be implemented. In order to reduce trust issues, proper response to actions must be taken place. There must be exchange of information within the university. The use of internet has already captured the market place and created a best opportunity which has unhindered the physical and geographical constraints. In addition to this, De Montfort University has also aimed at creating a digital platform for those students who are highly involved in distance learning. The use of Emails, Usenet discussion groups and chat room are some most commonly used methods which can be widely used by the university to retain huge number of internationals students (Inman and Schütze, 2010).
Other way to maintain its online stability is following “Follow on Marketing with Mailing lists”. This includes that the university will update its direct content on a daily basis on social media and its websites which will create awareness of students visit the site for once.
A new communication tools can be used such as lobbying, influencing opinions, negotiating collaborations which helps in the development and overall performance of the organizations. One of the most commonly method used for the students to communicate is Emails. Emails can be used to ask questions and provide feedback as well. But simply having links to email is not the exact solution for any university to contact through, but the university must be able to handle all the incoming emails and give a prompt respond to all of them. In order to test the email handling operations, a mail is sent to the university that must be responded within 48 hours and the inquiry is conducted further. The test calculates how efficiently any organization responds to emails. Therefore, all the emails must be treated as telephone calls and they must be taken on highest priority. If in some cases, the university fails to solve the query of the students in a very quick time, then the university should at least state that the query is received and the solution to query will be expected as soon as possible (DMU, 2012).
References
Altbach, P.G. and Knight, J., 2007. The internationalization of higher education: Motivations and realities. Journal of studies in international education, 11(3-4), pp.290-305.
Angehrn, A., 1997. Designing mature Internet business strategies: the ICDT model. European Management Journal, 15(4), pp.361-369.
De Montfort University, 2015, Sustainability strategy, [Online]. https://www.dmu.ac.uk/about-dmu/sustainability/sustainability-strategy/sustainability-strategy.aspx [Accessed on 31st March, 2018]
DMU, 2012, Internal Communications Plan, [Online]. https://www.dmu.ac.uk/documents/dmustaff/publications/dmuinternalcommunicationsplan%284%29.pdf [Accessed on 31st March, 2018]
Inman, P. and Schütze, H.G. eds., 2010. The community engagement and service mission of universities. Leicester: NIACE.
Jones, C., Ramanau, R., Cross, S. and Healing, G., 2010. Net generation or Digital Natives: Is there a distinct new generation entering university. Computers & education, 54(3), pp.722-732.
Pashby, K. and de Oliveira Andreotti, V., 2016. Ethical internationalization in higher education: interfaces with international development and sustainability. Environmental Education Research, 22(6), pp.771-787
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