Business Development Manager

Role: Global Business Development Manager
Location: Remote (Applicable only for Global candidates)
Who You Are
You are a commercially focused business development professional with UK and global student recruitment expertise, strong agent networks, CRM experience, and a proven ability to lead teams and drive growth.
About Us
Regent College London is a leading independent higher education provider, offering flexible and inclusive learning across multiple London campuses. We are student-focused, digitally forward, and committed to academic excellence.
The Role
Lead UK and global student recruitment by managing agent partnerships, developing new business, improving conversion and compliance, and supporting teams to achieve growth targets.
Key Responsibilities
1. Key Activities and Responsibilities

• Report management – ensuring that daily reports are up to date and sent out to all partners/agents daily or until the SLA set with partner.
• Manage between 12-18 agent/accounts and ensure they are meeting expectations and are providing the quality of learners that is expected.
• Identifying potential new agents/accounts/businesses to further develop UKBDL and UKDL student recruitment and any other global remit.
• Managing junior business development executives and supporting teams – Ensuring their activities support the objectives of student recruitment.
• Providing a smooth journey for both the agent/account and students, ensuring the application process is efficient to support improved conversion. This can include getting feedback from relevant parties to continuously improve processes.
• Have a detailed understanding of all systems used by both agents and students to ensure advice and guidance in this area is clear
• Ensuring KPI’s set by the Head of Business Development are met. This includes delivery of targets set via agents/account, onboarding new business, improving conversion rate from application to enrolment, and improving brand awareness in existing and new markets.
• Proactively support all colleagues in pursuit of the University’s central objectives and values within the business at all levels.
• Gathering intelligence and data to propose new initiative to further develop new and existing UK and global opportunities. This will include – interpreting of data, and articulating key messages, and publishing papers for relevant committees.
• Ensure that the University’s reputation is protected by getting all agents/accounts to adhere to the University’s processes and acting with integrity internally and externally. Part of this to ensure existing and new agents/businesses recommended have a good track record in HE
• Adhere to the universities admissions processes and regulations ensuring a clear audit trail for training and compliance purposes.
• Ensuring all students recruited through agent meets the required levels of progression/AU benchmark, this will include the continuous auditing of students referred via agents.

2. Analysis and Reporting

• Identify gaps or shortfalls in recruitment strategies and identifying how to solve these issues.
• Analyse data/statistics, interpreting and reporting patterns and trends and highlighting and prioritising any issues for further investigation to support informed decision making.
• Provide daily reports on student activity to agents and partners.
• Provide reports and updates to key commercial leads within the business.
• Analysing agent performance not only from a recruitment perceptive but from a student engagement perceptive as well.

3. Customer/Service Support

• Provide advice to peers and partners to respond and independently resolve a range of standard and unforeseen issues, within pre-determined operational limits.
• Support and lead Business development Executives, support teams, and other relevant departments.
• Advise and update the team on regulatory/compliance/product/process changes providing appropriate training as needed.
• Ensuring the partner/agent is receiving the best support and is being provide the best service to the standard the University requires.
• Diagnose and rectify any problems with sales processes and systems.
• Feedback to the agents/ Partners on performance of students.

Planning and organising

• Plan and organise own activities to ensure that routine operations and ongoing KPI’s deadlines are continuously met.
• Support in the development of team structures.
• Prepare a plan agent/partner training both face to face and online.
• Ensuring SLA’s are met and that partners are happy with service being provided.
• Participate in or co-ordinate student recruitment projects or development activities.
• Make recommendations about resource planning.

5. Liaison

• Communicate and build working relationships with agents/partners to ensure they are happy with the service being provided and that they grow within the business.
• Attend meetings, as requested by manager, to support departmental activities and to report back on main discussion points.
• Liaising with key stakeholders, such as admissions, quality assurance and student support.
• Regular communication with the Business Development Team, providing feedback on Agent documents that are being submitted.

6. Continuous Improvement

• Advise on and propose changes in procedures, planning and systems to improve operational efficiency to improve quality of service in student recruitment.
• Keep skills up to date and develop depth or breadth of knowledge in student recruitment practice by learning from colleagues and exposure to a range of activities, training and networking opportunities.
• Continuing to improve conversion rate and enrolled numbers coming from each partner.
• Make recommendations on how to improve the University’s brand and make it more commercially attractive.
• Look at ways of improving current processes, especially when looking at growth within the team and recruitment numbers.

7. People Management

• Co-operate with other colleagues (either individually or in a team setting) to contribute to the achievement of departmental objectives.
• Train and develop junior staff members, and ensure direct reports are performing their duties and meeting their KPI’s.
• Managing the agent/partnership relationships, ensuring they are clear on all admissions procedures and are meeting their quality requirements.
• Show sensitivity and consideration and emotional support to other people’s/student’s needs and feelings, which often include dealing with signs of obvious distress.
• Dealing with culture differences, for example when dealing with overseas staff remember they may be used to a different working environment than we are in the UK or other global countries
• Deliver guidance and support in a calm, discreet, diplomatic and professional manner.
• Support agents/partners and provide referral and signposting pathways for students in crisis to internal and external support function and organisations.

8. Personal and Professional Development and Training

• Identify and address development needs to ensure continuing professional development.
• Communicate and share best practice.
• Proactively identify new opportunities and work with management to develop solutions.
• Work in accordance with the University’s Values Framework.
• Maintain strong empathy for the university's commitment to equality of opportunity and equality of treatment for colleagues and students.

9. Other Responsibilities

• Any other duties as appropriate to seniority and role.
• The post-holder will be required occasionally to travel to other locations for meetings or training.
• Attendance at appropriate internal working parties as required.
• To always ensure the University’s name and brand is never brought into doubt and that externally we are seen as professional and a pleasure to work with.

Essential:

• Analyse market data and trends, to assist and advise faculties, departments and senior management within the University on the development of UK and global recruitment strategies, new programmes, or policies on UK activities where appropriate.
• Liaise and engage with key stakeholders and internal and external contractors to influence opinion, delivery and reputation of services.
• Influence and contribute to the scoping and resource planning across a range of activities at operational level to meet organisational objectives, including contributing to business plans and strategy documents where required.
• Implement processes to manage the integrity and security of all commercially and professionally sensitive and personal data.
• Analysis & problem-solving capability
• Well-developed written and verbal communication skills and interpersonal skills
• Ability to manage partners expectations and provide training sessions to ensure quality
• Ability to prioritise tasks and delegate tasks to direct reports.
• Represent the University at education expositions, Universities, schools, and colleges, as a University
• Influencing Senior Colleagues/external partners.
• Develop external relations, identify and develop opportunities for communities of practice, employers, alumni and donors via extra-curricular activities and increased levels of participation with a view to positively impact student recruitment.
• Build and sustain an influential network of contacts both internally and externally to influence and promote reputation, including relevant education institutions, Embassies, Consulates and sponsorship bodies.
• Keep well informed about the University in all relevant aspects of its work through engagement with relevant committees, attendance at workshops and events, and networking with University colleagues. This will include submit committee papers helping to aid UK recruitment.
• In collaboration with finance business partners create business cases to validate commercial opportunities for the university
• Contribute to operational leadership teams and decision making to shape the nature and level of support services.
• Provide expert professional subject and/or managerial expertise at an operational level to support UK/Domestic student recruitment, including achievement of UK/Domestic student application targets, increasing the quality of the student intake, increasing conversion rates from application to registration, and increasing diversity in terms of ethnicity, subject of study and recruitment from under represented community groups.
• Experience of working with complex sales processes and CRM software
• Experience of working/responding independently and dealing with unforeseen problems and circumstances
• Comprehensive knowledge of the work practices, processes, and procedures relevant to the role.
• Clear understanding of the standards and regulations set for the conduct and output for the role.
• Understanding of the activities of other areas of the University relevant to the student recruitment function.
• Experience in successfully managing partners/ agents.
• Experience pulling reports and providing them to key stakeholders.
• Ability to analyse reports and sales figures to identify trends within the agent market, and share/articulate intelligence to drive change.

Desirable:

• Extensive UK and global network including agents, institutions (i.e. British Council, QS, local education ministries, etc)
• Post Grad/PhD (or candidature), Previous account management experience.

Working Hours & Flexibility

• 40 hours per week
• 100% Remote - Working from any other country apart from UK

Compliance Statement

Successful applicants will be required to complete pre-employment checks, including a criminal records check, two references, ID and Right to Work verification, and education confirmation. We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity and inclusion, selection for employment is based solely on an individual’s skills, qualifications, and experience relevant to the role.

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