University of Strathclyde continuous improvement journey
11th June 2025 | 4 min read
Background
In 2013, the University of Strathclyde (UoS) had an ambition to be recognised as a leading international technological university by driving operational excellence through their culture.
12 years on, they have achieved this and more including £8m in savings and several recognition awards that validate the extent to which continuous improvement has become a part of the UoS’ culture.
The Business Improvement (BI) team, now Continuous Improvement Team, that was created through Unipart’s initial activity within the university continues to reap significant gains year on year by maintaining learned best practices.
The Challenge
Our initial focus was aimed at increasing the conversion of offers to enrolments in programmes, but quickly UoS saw the value in driving a wider continuous improvement culture, to enable long-term operational excellence.
Unipart was selected as the partner to develop internal capability in continuous improvement to ensure long-term operational excellence.
The Solution
Unipart worked with UoS staff to map, analyse, and redesign the Postgraduate Taught (PGT) application process, focusing on driving efficiency and enhancing student experience.
Unipart helped to train teams both ‘in-the-line’ (i.e. those who deliver the operational service) and a central team of Business Improvement (BI) practitioners.
This meant that UoS had the right team mix to both sustain the improvements in the PGT process, but also to begin to deploy the improvement capabilities into wider areas across the university. Through this, the team began improvements across several back office functions including HR and Finance.
1,004
additional hours
The Impact
The initial project delivered significant improvements, including:
- Reduced average application turnaround times from 18 to just 6 working days – improvement in process efficiency, but also in student satisfaction which is an important facet in student retention and future student acquisition
- Increased capacity (1,004 additional hours) across the PGT process and Finance team
- The project delivered £12m of additional revenue between 2014 and 2018, with an ROI of 10:1
- £0.5m generated in efficiency savings each year
- 80% reduction in application errors
- 56% reduction in time to review applications and offers
- 31% increase in international student income
- 15,000 hours of staffing capacity released each year
- As of February 2018, the University of Strathclyde has engaged 21% of the university’s administrative population in continuous improvement activity
- 24 other Universities have visited the CI Team showcase area to learn how they can drive continuous improvement (CI) initiatives across their universities
- Improve and roll out continuous improvement and benefits training programmes to more staff with the rigour and structure of the training programmes cascaded organisation wide.
- Create a network of Strathclyde CI champions across the university.
- Run masterclasses, workshops and showcasing events to strengthen and support the continuous improvement network.
- Share the Strathclyde journey with other Higher Education providers: Strathclyde has an active participation in Lean Higher Education (HE) communities. By actively engaging with the Lean HE community and sharing their experiences, Strathclyde has become internationally recognised for its work and is contributing to the broader adoption and understanding of Lean principles within the global higher education sector. In April 2025, John Hogg was appointed as the Global Chairperson for Lean in Higher Education.
- Roll-out CI methodology across all professional service areas by 2025. This has successfully been introduced, however, they have shifted to a “pull” model where they offer support and expertise to departments who actively request assistance with continuous improvement initiatives.
- c£8m in incremental revenue
- c66,000 hours of staffing capacity released each year
- c7,000 attendees at CI training sessions and/or workshops
- £2.2m non-cashable financial benefits
By 2018, further benefits were recorded
The University of Strathlyde has achieved four industry awards which validates the extent to which continuous improvement and operation excellence has become a part of UoS’s culture. The university recognises that continuous improvement is strategically important and objectives that were set in 2017 and have now been achieved:
Sustaining change in 2025
In 2025, the university’s focus and approach has evolved alongside their changing priorities. Whilst process improvement remains a key enabler, there is a renewed focus on revenue generation, not necessarily through increased activity, but by maximising existing opportunities. To support this, the CI team at Strathclyde are also now supporting strategy development and implementation activities across the organisation to help ensure alignment to, and facilitate the delivery of, the organisational strategic priorities.
Examples of some of the other benefits achieved by 2025 are outlined below:
