The Chopras is one of the largest education counselling companies in India and services inbound and outbound students, as well as offering language training products across its network of 20 offices in India and Nepal. We spoke to founders Naveen and Natasha Chopra about their vision and evolution.
The PIE: How did you both first get involved in the international education industry – I remember that you met in Australia, I believe, or the UK?
NC: I was living in UK and working as a management consultant, and Naveen in Australia running his own business. We married and I moved to Australia and joined Naveen in his business. We were doing well but the recession that hit in the early 90s, combined with an aggressive price-cut driven push of the Chinese in both our business lines, and we lost over half a million dollars due to our clients going belly-up. Meantime we had decided to diversify into the service industry and had become aware of the student flow into Australia as many Indian students applied to us for jobs.
“People were constantly coming to us and telling us that so-and-so has told us to go to The Chopras, and hence the brand”
We spoke to a few Australian universities and they were extremely encouraging telling us that they were fed up with their Indian “Agents’” unethical practices. This led to our move with contracts in hand, to India. We shifted base in 1995 though Sydney continues to be our second home to date along with London.
The PIE: How was the transition?
NC: There were no professional education consulting organisations in India. The market was primarily dominated by small timers with no regulation or watch bodies for quality standards and hence unethical practices were the norm with few exceptions. IDP entered India at the same time. We were amazed to find that there was no career counselling in Indian schools or educational institutions. The career counselling, as well complete integrity and working in the student’s interest, became the core of our business practice and operating philosophy. We changed the market and set benchmarks that are now industry standards, or what many in this line of work aspire towards to be successful.
The PIE: At what age did you start your company?
NC: Naveen was in his mid-forties and I in my late thirties when we started the company that came to be branded as “The Chopras”. In fact it wasn’t us who came up with this brand name; it was the market. People were constantly coming to us and telling us that so-and-so has told us to go to The Chopras, and hence the brand.
“The company’s vision: Shaping Lives and Careers through Education”
The PIE: How has The Chopras agency grown to become the size it is now?
NC: Key factors that have contributed to the growth of The Chopras include our core philosophy of students’ interest first, even before the commercial interest of the company. This stems from the fact and realisation that the business of student counselling and consequent processing for universities cannot be run on sales and marketing platform and chasing commissions. Such an approach would inevitably compromise the students’ best interest as if a student were sent to a wrong course or institution, it would impact negatively on his / her life.
Thus, we have over the years advised for and sent students to dozens of institutions with whom we have no commercial interests and banked the student’s goodwill. Our goodwill bank is very deep, hence a positive word of mouth.
The PIE: What other factors make your company stand out?
NC: The company’s emphasis of caring for its staff and training has resulted in staff retention because they see a future and growth with the company. The emphasis on values; integrity, truthfulness, hard and smart work, quality and striving for excellence as core values has also contributed to the success of the company. The company’s vision sums this up: Shaping Lives and Careers through Education.
The PIE: How many students do you counsel and place overseas?
NC: Our company is currently operating in 20 locations throughout India and Nepal through fully company owned and operated offices with staff strength of almost 500 and growing. In the next 12 months, we aim to add another 6 branches. We also are looking to open an office in the UK most likely London, and in Sydney, Australia in the near future. Each of these locations has classroom facilities for our teaching operation.
The PIE: Tell me about your classroom operation..
NC: The company teaches the US Test Prep products including the GRE, GMAT, SAT, TOEFL, USMLE STEP 1 &2, and more as sole service providers for Kaplan Test Prep Inc., a Washington Post company. In addition we also teach other English competency products such as IELTS and Pearson PTE. The organisation’s floor traffic of students, throughout its office network nationally, enquiring and seeking advice for various countries is in excess of 160,000. Many of these are seeking advice for studying in India too.
We place between 10 to 12,000 students globally in over 13 countries.
The PIE: How have you see the agency industry in India professionalise – and how do you believe it will change in the future?
“The organisation’s floor traffic of students is in excess of 160,000”
NC: There are three or four organisations that have size, scale and professional approach. Most of the smaller players have to look at their businesses differently to survive. There has to be a constant evaluation and consciousness of value addition (apart from the degree) that the students are looking for.
To survive in the legitimate student counselling market, which is becoming increasingly sophisticated, is going to require a high degree of professionalising and has to be knowledge- and IT-driven with a strong touch of caring that the students cannot attain from portals or by applying directly.
Those that caters for students in what we call the “grey market” who look to gain entry into Western countries with the intent of working full time illegally or otherwise misusing and abusing the system, is another story and the same rules do not apply.
“There has to be a constant evaluation of value addition that the students are looking for”
The PIE: What has been the secret of your success, do you think?
NC: We could never have imagined that our combined experience of having studied, lived and worked in so many countries would package itself into a successful business. This experience is unmatched in the industry as both of us are able to advise based on facts. The secret to success is always to enjoy what one does. For us, our genuine passion to be able to assist young people to progress their career path and become successful global individuals is very rewarding. Counselling is an art and requires counselors who are always updated with knowledge.
The human resource is a very important element of student recruitment and our investment and focus in training and retention of our team that is loyal and has been with us for long periods are part of our success story.
The PIE: Any future plans for your company that you would like to share?
NC: We see a huge potential in student recruitment, as more and more countries are moving across borders in their drive for international students. TNE is also expected to be a huge growth area. Hence a move to set up offices in other countries to capture this interest is imminent.
The PIE: How is Indian student demand changing?
NC: UK universities have witnessed a significant drop in their Indian numbers progressively since 2011. Apart from the recessionary economic climate, the changes in UKBA to curb visa abuse candidates, has translated to impacting negatively on a larger proportion of the number of genuine students, who are now finding the UK to be unwelcoming.
“The reality is that universities too now have to assess their own SWOT analysis to enable them to compete more effectively”
At the same time the drop in recruitment has been picked up by other countries, particularly Australia and Canada. Both because of the opportunity of PSW and attractive work opportunities. There are other emerging destinations such as France, Germany, Spain, Denmark and Sweden, who are all vying for the Indian student and are attractive destinations given that their fees are far more economical.
The reality is that universities too now have to assess their own SWOT analysis to enable them to compete more effectively in the business of Education Export.
