Principal Advisor supporting The University of Surrey

Title- Principal Advisor supporting The University of Surrey

Experience- 10-12 years

Location- Gurugram, India

The Role:        

The Principal Adviser – South Asia is a senior leadership role and key representative of the University of Surrey across India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. The role is responsible for driving international student recruitment growth, improving conversion performance, and increasing tuition fee contribution in line with Surrey's regional growth strategy.

The post holder will lead the development and execution of recruitment strategies across South Asia, managing agent networks, school and counsellor relationships, sponsor partnerships, and conversion activities for prospective students and parents. The role will also provide market intelligence, competitor insights, and data-driven recommendations to support recruitment planning for Surrey's GIFT City and Guildford campuses.

Working closely with education agents, schools, the British Council, government bodies, alumni, employers, and other stakeholders, the role will help strengthen Surrey's brand presence and expand recruitment reach across the region. Opportunities related to academic partnerships, pathway development, and transnational education may also be explored to support long-term growth.

The role includes leadership and management of Surrey's South Asia-based team, ensuring strong performance, coaching, and operational delivery within a matrix structure. The post holder will work closely with teams across International Student Recruitment, Marketing, Admissions, Global, and Faculties while being employed by OneStep Global to support Surrey's regional operations.

The ideal candidate will bring strong experience in international student recruitment, stakeholder engagement, and strategy execution, along with deep knowledge of the South Asian education landscape. A commercially focused, solution-oriented mindset and strong influencing skills are essential. The role also requires adherence to UK Agent Quality Framework (AQF), UKVI compliance standards, and ethical recruitment practices.

This is a highly autonomous role involving frequent stakeholder engagement and extensive regional travel, including weekends and outside standard working hours.

Key Responsibilities:

1.     Lead Surrey's international recruitment and growth strategy in South Asia, delivering sustainable enrolment growth and market diversification across the region.

2.     Strengthen Surrey's regional market position and reputation, enhancing institutional visibility and competitive strength.

3.     Provide senior leadership to Surrey's South Asia-based team, ensuring excellence in delivery, accountability and performance.

4.     Build and manage strategic relationships with agents, schools, universities, industry partners, sponsors and government bodies.

5.     Drive conversion effectiveness through structured applicant engagement and market-led conversion tactics.

6.     Oversee agent and partnership performance across the region to maintain quality, efficiency and channel ROI

7.     Develop new recruitment pipelines, including corporate, institutional and sponsore student channels to our GIFT City and Guilford Campueses.

8.     Ensure compliance with the UK Agent Quality Framework (AQF), UKVI visa standards and Surrey's own risk guidelines.

9.     Lead country planning, budgeting and resource allocation, ensuring cost-effective delivery and return on investment.

10. Represent the University of Surrey at senior external forums and sector networks to advance strategic objectives across South Asia.

ACCOUNTABILITY, LEADERSHIP & TEAM MANAGEMENT

1.     Provide strategic leadership and day-to-day management of Surrey's South Asia team, ensuring high performance, professional delivery and clear accountability for outcomes.

2.     Set clear KPIs, objectives and performance expectations for all team members across India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.

3.     Build a high-performance team culture focused on delivery, service excellence responsiveness and results.

4.     Provide training, support and professional development to team members to build capability and strengthen recruitment expertise across the region.

5.     Foster a collaborative and inclusive team environment, ensuring effective cross-team working with colleagues across Surrey.

6.     Promote Surrey's values and ways of working across the team, ensuring professionalism and consistency of Surrey's brand across South Asia.

7.     The post holder is responsible for delivering on agreed targets, with a high degree of independence and autonomy, with minimal supervision.

STUDENT RECRUITMENT STRATEGY & DELIVERY

Lead and execute Surrey's international student recruitment strategy across India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal to achieve sustainable enrolment growth and revenue targets through agent management, school recruitment, industry partnerships, and regional collaborations.

Drive in-region conversion activities including parent engagement, offer-holder events, CRM/WhatsApp campaigns, and pre-departure support to improve applicant conversion and enrolment outcomes.

Monitor and manage recruitment pipelines across enquiry, application, offer, CAS, and enrolment stages, implementing targeted actions to address conversion gaps.

Collaborate with International Marketing and Admissions teams to strengthen lead generation, improve turnaround times, enhance applicant experience, and support region-specific campaigns.

Analyse market trends, competitor activity, pricing, scholarships, and regional conditions to improve Surrey's market positioning and recruitment effectiveness.

Ensure compliance with UKVI regulations, Surrey recruitment standards, and the UK Agent Quality Framework (AQF), while tracking and reporting on key recruitment KPIs, conversion metrics, and net fee contribution.

Utilise market intelligence and stakeholder insights to support strategic planning, recruitment investment decisions, and the development of future academic programs and partnerships.

PARTNERSHIPS & INSTITUTIONAL ENGAGEMENT

1.     Develop and manage strategic partnerships across South Asia to strengthen Surrey's market position and support long-term enrolment growth.

2.     Develop academic collaboration opportunities with universities and higher education institutions to create progression agreements, articulation pathways (1+3,2+2, 3+1), and dual degrees.

3.     Build relationships with government ministries, scholarship agencies and funding bodies (e.g. AICTE India, UGC Sri Lanka, NEO Bangladesh, Tribhuvan Nepal) to advance Surrey's access to publicly funded student mobility and education initiatives.

4.     Develop and maintain partnerships with professional associations and skills bodies to support pipeline development, employability messaging and brand relevance in the region

5.     Represent Surrey in key education and policy forums, including ministerial delegations, trade missions and international education conferences, to enhance institutional visibility and influence.

6.     Work with Surrey's Global teams to evaluate future opportunities for joint programmes and TNE development, where aligned with institutional strategy and regulatory feasibility.

7.     Ensure all partnership activity adheres to Surrey policies, risk protocols, UK academics standards and compliance expectations.

MARKETING & MARKET DEVELOPMENT

1. Work in collaboration with International Marketing to deliver targeted recruitmens campaigns that drive brand visibility, enquiry growth and pipeline development across South Asia.

2. Ensure Surrey's positioning, messaging and value proposition are effectively communicated across all South Asia segments (UG, PG, parents, counsellors and sponsors).

3. Lead in-market campaign activation, including fairs, partner events, digital and Surrey- branded engagement activity.

4. Provide market insight to inform campaign themes, creative direction and demand generation strategy.

5. Oversee the localisation and regional relevance of Surrey marketing content and assets for South Asia audiences.

6. Enable agents and partners with marketing toolkits, conversion packs and content that improves Surrey representation and accuracy in the region.

PLANNING, BUDGET & REPORTING

1. Lead annual and multi-year planning for South Asia, including market prioritization and delivery milestones.

2. Manage the regional budget, ensuring efficient allocation of funds and high return on investment across recruitment activities.

3. Monitor Cost to Acquire (COA) by channel and ensure recruitment delivery remains commercially sustainable.

4. Report weekly and monthly performance to ISR leadership, providing insight on pipeline health, conversion and market risk.

5. Maintain robust forecasting models to support target delivery and senior decision- making.

6. Evaluate channel performance and recommend budget reallocation to maximise yield and conversion.

7. Lead and contribute to institutional business planning processes, providing regional expertise and recommendations.

COMPLIANCE, RISK & GOVERNANCE

1. Ensure visa and compliance with UKVI requirements across all South Asia recruitment activity.

2. Embed the UK Agent Quality Framework (AQF) in regional operations ensuring high ethical and recruitment standards.

3. Identify and mitigate market risk, including fraud, reputational threats and non- compliance.

4. Implement due diligence and conduct assurance for agents, partners and in-market activities.

5. Ensure responsible recruitment practices that protect applicant welfare and institutional reputation.

6. Work closely with Admissions and Compliance teams to monitor CAS risk indicators and reduce visa refusals.

7. Lead escalation and resolution of compliance and recruitment issues in-region.