Frances Ekwulugo

International marketing of British education: research on international students' perception and the UK market penetration

The study functions as marketing intelligence inputs for the UK Government, the British Council as well as academic marketing planners for constructing their marketing opportunities‐threats audits, it investigates international students’ perception about the UK education and it researches UK performance in the world markets for international education. UK education has been known to be the best in the world. For many years, the UK universities have enjoyed a high reputation and have benefited in accelerating its market penetration worldwide. Unfortunately, this superiority has begun to decline. Other countries are strongly emerging with their quality education. The study shows that UK competitors achieved a remarkable growth of their international students’ enrolment while the UK achieves only a marginal growth with declining market penetration abroad. The findings confirmed the central importance of pricing, product and promotional variables in designing and marketing UK education abroad.

Entrepreneurship and SMEs in London (UK): Evaluating the role of black Africans in this emergent sector

Purpose – The small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) development has been the subject of a growing interest among academics and practitioners, as well as multilateral institutions. However, the interest in the growth of African business evolution has been under‐researched, even as developments and market dynamics are increasingly impacting this sub‐sector, especially in the UK. The urgent need arises for a study that enables practitioners and educators and also lends some insight into the possibilities and limitations in the UK environment, with a view to improving entrepreneurial education that is focused on these minorities. This paper aims to fill that gap.Design/methodology/approach – This study focuses on the development of black African SMEs (BASMEs) in London by examining the various factors that impact their development. A qualitative methodological approach was used to gain a better understanding of the BASMEs.Findings – This research proceeds by developing a conceptual matrix to classify the b...

Allying for quality excellence: scope for expert systems in supplier quality management

Over the past decade, quality managers and scholars have focused increased attention on supplier quality as a key resource for organisations. This paper presents the results of an exploratory study into how organisations rank supplier selection attributes and the extent to which use is made of decision support systems (expert systems in particular) in supplier quality management. Overall, quality was ranked the most important attribute. Paradoxically, decision‐support/knowledge‐based systems are not being utilized in solving the multi‐criteria decision problem inherent in supplier quality management. It is speculated that the lack of robust strategy for combining both human and artificial intelligence in supplier quality integration means that many organisations are making themselves vulnerable as out‐sourcing and strategic partnerships become important determinants of competitive advantage. Consequently, this paper assesses the scope for expert systems, a branch of artificial intelligence that is capable of helping organisations to co‐ordinate and harness potentially diverse sources of input resources in supplier quality management.

The effects of organisational climate on market orientation: evidence from the facilities management industry

Market orientation is widely held as a credo for organisational success. Essentially, this means that organisations that are market oriented tend to perform better than those that are not. As a result of this logic (i.e. market orientation-performance link), scholars from a wide array of disciplines are showing an increasing interest in fleshing out the factors that determine organisational market orientation stances. Based on a sample drawn from the UKs facilities management industry, this paper examines the impact of organisational climate factors on market orientation stances of facilities management firms. The results reveal that organisational climate has a determinant influence on market orientation stances.