The turnover of our Commercial Services was EUR 3.58 million in 2018. Training and development programmes customised for companies and organisations accounted for the majority of our turnover. In our fee-based open short course offering, the most popular courses included service design, digital competence, 3D modelling and HRD competence. The turnover of our facilities rental services broke a record during the year of operation.
We focused on strengthening our impact and visibility during the year. Digitalisation of our services continued and we implemented the HubSpot marketing automation application. We participated in eight trade fairs during the year. We developed the mentoring programme in the alumni activities in cooperation with alumni, involving them more extensively in the development of students’ competence and Haaga-Helia. We built a fund-raising concept that enables agile development and launched active fund-raising activities.
The profiling of partners began in order to offer them better targeted, customised services. According to the partner reputation survey carried out in the autumn, companies that engaged in active cooperation with Haaga-Helia, such as Finavia and the Nordic Business Forum, were considered to be the most appealing partners by our students. A total of 81 companies participated in the Duunin.net recruitment fair, and we developed student cooperation with Keuda in connection with the event. At the recruitment fair, 35 students in upper secondary education carried out a video project connected to their studies and completed more than 250 credits through study units and demonstrations. A record number of 5,098 job openings were advertised through the Laura™ recruitment portal, and more than 400 students visited the Urapiste career counselling booth. In addition, we implemented the Tiitus recruitment application pilot, actively worked in degree programmes and on campuses, and prepared the Career Coaching online course for international students who pay the tuition fee.
We launched a path study module designed for the degree education market in Vietnam for a total of 15 students with a local partner and a Finnish consortium. We prepared a concept of tailored training programmes and signed an agreement on tailored training leading to a Bachelor of Business Administration degree with a client in Lebanon. The first tailored training students started studying in the International Business programme in the autumn of 2018. With regard to the tuition fee-based education process, we introduced the first continuous admissions process based on the applicants’ SAT scores. We signed a cooperation agreement on Bachelor of Hospitality education with the Luminus Technical University College in Jordan. In addition, our University of Applied Sciences was accredited by the Jordan Ministry of Education.
In education export, we strengthened our presence in the market in China. The first students graduated from the joint degree programme of Haaga-Helia and Guangzhou Sports Polytechnic in December 2018. The Chinese Ministry of Education granted a permission for the Aviation Business degree programme to be implemented in cooperation with the Chongqing University of Science and Technology. Only 17 programmes were granted permissions in the entire China in 2018. During the year of operation, we signed three new letters of intent on joint degrees and became a member of the Finnish Winter Sport Cluster managed by Business Finland, which aims to strengthen the export of Finnish winter sports competence to China. In addition, we have been actively preparing for the inauguration of an RDI and training centre in the Suzhou region in southern China in 2019.
In 2018, we launched an education project with the objective of establishing an international higher education institution for the hospitality and service industry in Tallinn, Estonia. The concept, partnership model and business model of the institution were developed during the year. The name of the school is Nordic School of Hospitality & Innovation – Haaga-Helia, Tallinn. The curriculum and high-quality instruction of the institution will be provided by Haaga-Helia and four internationally recognised higher education institutions: Bad Honnef in Germany, Breda UAS in the Netherlands, Purdue University in the USA, and the Estonian Business School in Estonia. Haaga-Helia will be the coordinating higher education institution. The resolution to the matter is expected in the spring of 2019. The operations are scheduled to start in January 2020 with the first degree students.
The objective during the year of operation was to develop the automatisation and digitalisation of the basic processes in the Commercial Services to better serve the organisation. A CRM system was a key aspect of the reform, and a sales process and a related product register in the system were built. In addition, the customer and partner data were sorted and reclassified. The purpose of the reform was for the system to provide better support for the sales operations. Digitalisation was also promoted in sales with the implementation of the HubSpot marketing automation tool, which helps find sales leads. Through automation, it will be easier to monitor the forms of cooperation Haaga-Helia has with customers and partners and how they are realised in the results.
During the year, Haaga-Helia raised a total of approximately EUR 360,000. One of the key development targets was Haaga-Helia’s new fund-raising concept, which was designed and implemented together with students. The goal of the concept was to provide increased support for new studies and learning environments by promarily allocating the donations directly to teaching as well as learning environments and platforms. The sales laboratories SalesLab and eComlab are good examples of this. The new concept also enabled making donations via SMS.
