Senior Consultant (Student Recruitment)

Role: Senior Consultant (Student Recruitment)

Location: UK, London

Job type: Full time, Permanent – Hybrid  

Applicants must have the existing right to work in the UK. This role is not eligible for visa sponsorship.

This position offers a hybrid work model, allowing flexibility between working from home and our office. Typically, employees are expected to work 2 days in the office per week.

Why QS?

At QS, we believe that work should empower you. That’s why we foster a flexible working environment that encourages every employee to own their career whilst flourishing personally and professionally. Our company values underpin everything we do – we collaborate, respect and support each other.

It’s our mission to empower motivated people around the world to fulfil their potential through higher education, ensuring that everyone has access to opportunities that change lives.

Our diversity makes us stronger. By sharing our experiences, we learn from one another and achieve more together, driving progress across the sector.

At QS, you’ll be responsible for implementing real change in the international higher education landscape. You’ll take on meaningful challenges that see a positive impact across the business and the wider sector.

We’re confident you’ll feel right at home here. QS was named as one of Newsweek’s Top 100 Most Loved Workplaces® in the UK (October 2023), recognising the respect, trust and appreciation that drive our culture every day. And as a gold-accredited Investors in People organisation – putting us among the top 28% of workplaces globally – it’s official: QS is a place where everyone can thrive.

As a Senior Consultant, this is what you’ll be doing:

QS is seeking an experienced, innovative, and results-driven Senior Consultant to join its high-performing higher education performance consulting practice. The practice, comprised of highly skilled team of seasoned higher education experts, is dedicated to delivering strategic insights and advice of exceptional quality to education institutions and policymakers globally.

The Senior Consultant will play a crucial role in: effectively leading multiple student recruitment and transnational education advisory projects for UK and global institutions; project managing complex engagements to the highest professional standard; working with colleagues across consulting and the wider QS organisation to ensure positive delivery outcomes; directly and efficiently liaising with key university stakeholders throughout the engagement process; proactively contributing to the development of the student recruitment advisory offering.

The ideal candidate will possess experience in senior student recruitment and/or transnational education roles within the Higher Education sector and will demonstrate deep and detailed content knowledge of the student recruitment life cycle.   

Role responsibilities

• Consulting Engagement: Takes end-to-end ownership for the delivery of a complex portfolio of client workstreams, exercising strong programme and project management discipline to control scope, manage risk, meet accelerated timelines, and deliver measurable outcomes.
• Business Development: Actively contributes to business development by actively contributing  to scoping calls, producing proposals, and engaging confidently with senior clients to articulate market challenges, risks, and opportunities with authority and commercial awareness.
• Thought Leadership: Produces and applies robust, forward-looking insight that challenges client assumptions, informs strategic decision-making, and strengthens the QS organisation’s external credibility in student recruitment and transnational education.
• Customer Experience: Maintains high standards of delivery and client confidence under pressure, adapting rapidly to shifting priorities and compressed timelines while ensuring consistency, quality, and professionalism.
• Ambassadorship: Represents the QS organisation with authority and credibility, building trust through expertise, sound judgement, and delivery excellence, and acting as a visible and reliable advisor to clients and partners.
• Product Development: Drives the evolution of our advisory offering by translating delivery experience, market intelligence, and client feedback into scalable, high-impact solutions.
• Sector Expertise: Maintains deep, current expertise in the full student recruitment lifecycle, including transnational education models, and demonstrates authoritative understanding of the challenges facing UK and global institutions, using data and insight to shape both operational delivery and strategic direction.

Key skills and experience

We’d love to hear from you if you have most, or all of the following:

• Proven experience at senior level across the full student recruitment lifecycle within a higher education instituion, including a strong understanding of transnational education models and their operational and strategic implications.
• Demonstrated ability to manage and deliver complex, multi-stream portfolios, with strong programme and project management skills and experience working to accelerated or shifting timelines.
• Deep understanding of the challenges facing UK and global higher education institutions, with the confidence to articulate insight clearly and credibly to a senior client audience.
• Strong analytical capability and experience using data and insight to inform operational decisions, prioritisation, and longer-term recruitment or portfolio strategy.
• Experience working in a client-facing or consultative role, with the ability to challenge constructively, influence decision-making, and take ownership for delivery outcomes.
• Excellent communication, presentation, and stakeholder management skills, with a track record of building trust and maintaining quality under pressure.
• Professional fluency in English; proficiency in Arabic, Spanish, French, or Portuguese is advantageous.
• Excellent teamwork ethic – capable of leading complex assignments and supporting the wider team with autonomy and collaboration.
• Advanced proficiency in data processing and visualization (Excel, Tableau, R).
• A confident and creative approach towards problem-solving and strategic development.
• A track record of maintaining and surpassing high standards.
• High standards in concise, professional, and insightful report writing.

Please note, if you don't meet all the criteria but believe you have the skills and passion to thrive in this role, we encourage you to apply.

So, who are we and what do we do?

QS is the world leader in higher education services, analytics, insights and intelligence. From consultancy to student mobility, academic partnerships to branding solutions, our services power both institutional and individual success.

We’re behind the world’s most widely read university rankings (Meltwater 2023). Our QS World University Rankings® reach hundreds of millions, shaping decisions and guiding futures.

Since launching in 1990, our impact and influence have only grown. Today, we work with more than 2,000 of the world’s leading higher education institutions, over 12,000 employers, and governments seeking change and socioeconomic development through higher education.

Join QS and you’ll join an 800-strong community of problem-solvers, creators, collaborators and change-makers based in 40+ countries and 11
international offices, including Australia, Malaysia, India, Romania, Singapore, France, Germany, the USA and our headquarters in London.

With every talented new hire, business acquisition and bold initiative, we’re strengthening our reach and delivering even greater value to institutions and learners worldwide. Are you ready to shape the future of higher education?

We take investing in our people very seriously.

As standard you will have:

• Competitive base salary
• Access to an annual bonus scheme (for qualifying roles only)
• 25 days annual leave, plus bank holidays – increasing to 27 days after 5 years’
• Access to a Buy Holiday scheme allowing you to buy up to 5 additional holiday days per year
• Enhanced maternity and paternity leave
• Generous pension through Royal London
• Comprehensive private medical insurance and wellness scheme through Vitality
• Cycle to work scheme
• A vibrant social environment and multicultural and multinational culture

But that’s not all. Outside of these standard benefits we also offer resources to allow professional growth and wellness initiatives to nurture a healthy mindset:

• Free subscription to the Calm App – the #1 app for sleep, meditation, and relaxation
• A focus on welfare which is led by our global wellness team, with mental health first aiders globally
• Access to a variety of diversity and inclusion initiatives and groups
• Strong recognition and reward programs – including a peer-to-peer recognition platform, quarterly and annual QS Applaud Awards, Connect with your Career annual PD event
• Support for volunteering and study leave
• Free subscription to LinkedIn learning – with over 5000 courses and programmes at your fingertips
• Options to join our outstanding global Mentorship programme

Like what you’ve heard? Great, apply now!

As a candidate, we know the application and interview process can be daunting and so it’s important that you have a great experience with us. Our dedicated Talent Team will work hard to ensure you are fully informed at all stages and you are really excited by this opportunity to do meaningful work in the education space.

Equal opportunities

QS Quacquarelli Symonds is proud to be a fair and equal organisation where everyone has the same opportunity to achieve their full potential, irrespective of their background or personal attributes. We celebrate our diversity and believe through sharing our experiences we can learn from one another, be stronger together, and enable our business to thrive. 

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