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Success Stories

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International School

Type International School
Location Europe
Areas of Engagement
Governing Board Development Governance Review Governing Board Policies

Project Details

Our client identified a need for sustained board development, and engaged Westlake to provide a series of structured workshops over 2.5 years, ensuring clear links to accreditation standards from two agencies, and supporting the requirements for the school’s curriculum authorisation body. In addition to the workshops, we attended 5 full board meetings and 15 committee meetings, providing coaching to board members in real-time.

The client also identified a long-overdue need to condense, simplify, and restructure its board policy manual, including follow-up work with the senior leadership team to inform their work of implementing those policies in ways that made sense to their three campus contexts.

This was a fully bilingual assignment (English/French).

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Restructuring and resourcing for financial stability

Type Independent School
Location North America
Areas of Engagement
Business Model Chief Advancement Officer Chief Operating Officer Chief Risk Officer Fractional CxO Services Merger & Acquisition

Project Details

Our client required immediate assistance with financial sustainability, relative to findings in their accrediting body’s report. We analyzed 65+ documents, historical as well as current, to understand their foundations, then collaborated with the finance and audit committees, development committee, committee on trustees, board leadership, and the school leadership team to create a plan to identify and mitigate risks and provide immediate stability to operations, allowing the school 12 to 15 months to restructure its business model and pricing, fundraise, enhance its value proposition, and explore alternatives, such as merger or acquisition.

We worked with the audit committee to lead the process to hire a new auditor for the school, and supported the finance committee in outsourcing the school’s core business office functions to a CFO services provider. In addition to supporting and coaching the board chair and the governing board, we also advised the business office and head of school, with special attention given to operations, fundraising, and quality decision-making practices.

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Operational analysis for enrolment growth

Type International School
Location Middle East
Areas of Engagement
Business Model Concept Development Operational Audit Staffing Ratios & Projections

Project Details

Our client wanted to understand how planned enrollment growth over the next few years would impact staffing, including an analysis of whether current staffing ratios were in-line with schools of a similar size and calibre.

The client also engaged us in concept development around the area of learning support, identifying several scenarios for how an increased provision of learning support could look and work. Importantly, the school had been considering expanding its enrollment catchment area, which was anticipated to increase the demand and opportunity for learning support.

We fashioned a headcount model to meet the needs of enrollment growth, and recommended a centralisation of administrative support, smarter employment of teaching assistants, and the addition of a deputy head position in order to free up the head of school to engage in strategy and external relations work.

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Strategic restructuring and market positioning

Type International School
Location North America
Areas of Engagement
Concept Development Digital Marketing Feasibility Studies New Revenue Streams

Project Details

Our client school, identifying as an international school as well as an independent (private) school in a highly competitive urban environment, approached us with a multi-layered scope of work, including restructuring their co-curricular programming; performing an analysis of the local and regional market to identify highly differentiated summer programming opportunities; developing concepts around three potential revenue generators—including competitor landscape mapping, categorical feature analysis, business model creation, and risk analysis. We assisted the client in creating a new business unit under the umbrella of an LLC as a means of addressing campus use constraints, catalysing further opportunities for growth.

We performed this work over six months, modeling multiple scenarios, holding focus groups with parents to understand the parent experience, and preparing a digital marketing plan to promote one of the new programmes.

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Operational governance framework for a start-up system

Type School System
Location Middle East
Areas of Engagement
Concept Development Framework for Operational Governance Programme Development Risk Analysis

Project Details

Our client, a start-up system of schools, was seeking informed guidance on a framework for operational governance of their system (including structure of a PropCo, an OpCo, and the central functions of the Education Office) in a way that would meet current needs, as well as allow for scale over time. The client engaged us in additional work around concept development for a Centre for Teaching and Learning, a bespoke Leadership and Entrepreneurship programme for students, and a full service college/university guidance programme to be rolled out over four years, with all concepts analysed for risk.

This 12+ month engagement called in for in-depth analysis of structures and trends in the region, identification of leading practices around the world and whether those practices were applicable in this context, multiple competitor analyses, formation of a visual competitive landscape, and a recommendation for market positioning to ensure the foundations for a strong launch and future success.

Testimonials

  • We engaged Westlake Global to help The KAUST School (TKS) with its business plan and operating model. They prepared our business plan and financial projections, which proved valuable in informing our strategic thinking about seeing what is next for the school, and paved the way for transforming TKS. Our consultant was efficient, insightful, and flexible. Westlake’s approach to understanding the organisation and making customised recommendations relevant to the context of the organisational culture and future readiness has been greatly appreciated by all stakeholders at TKS. Westlake provides content knowledge and industry benchmark data augmented by culture and organisational understanding.

    Mahmoud Muati

  • As the Education, Research, and Innovation Sector has come into being at NEOM, we needed a firm that could understand and embrace our start-up culture and its desired aims: learning by doing, combining knowledge, creativity, and critical thinking with the latest technology and a digital mindset, in order to solve the problems of tomorrow. The partnership with Westlake Global has been optimal for us, as we develop our learning ecosystem. They understand the region as a whole, as well as the Saudi context specifically, exhibiting the intercultural literacy that is so critical in our work, informing their approach to operations, finance, and risk. Drawing on expertise in organisational culture, and possessing a deep knowledge base across independent and international K-12 schools worldwide, their collaboration on envisioning infrastructure for teaching and learning, governance, and more is critical, as we grow and develop. That they are aligned philosophically with what we are looking to accomplish from a sustainability perspective is a bonus.

    Christopher R. Tompkins

  • We engaged Westlake Global to do an in-depth analysis of our co-curricular programming, and to explore opportunities that would expand the educational footprint of our school. To say we were elated with the quality of the work is an understatement! While the scope of work outlined for them was not highly specific, Westlake Global intuited the information that we would need, based on their deep experience in and with schools, from granular operational detail to leadership requirements to board-level governance. Westlake provided a detailed business plan, financial projections, milestones, and job descriptions for the new structure– essentially, they delivered a turnkey solution. It is rare to engage a firm that gleans insights with such clarity.

    Suzanna Jemsby

  • Ecolint (International School of Geneva) identified a need for forward-looking guidance on governance that required updating policies and procedures so that they would be fit for purpose in the years ahead, as well as providing structured board development workshops and interactions with committees to support governing board members in the exercise of their duties and practices. Westlake Global was the ideal partner for this work, which called for a deep, analytical understanding of organisational culture, knowledge of governance practices across international and independent schools, and a strong measure of intercultural competence to appreciate the school, its context, and cultural underpinnings of behaviours and practices, complemented by the ability to deliver this 2 1/2 year assignment bilingually (French/English).

    David B. Hawley

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