SOAS University of London is a distinctive institution with a global remit and a specialist academic mission. With around 6,000 students, 1,000 staff and a turnover of £115m, it operates within a challenging environment shaped by central‑London costs, international competition and a uniquely broad Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences academic portfolio. As SOAS delivered a successful strategic plan - growing income and student numbers by 25% and strengthening financial resilience - it became increasingly important to continue its trajectory by understanding its position within the wider sector, and the financial factors that sat beneath the headlines. To do this, SOAS partnered with Etio to bring clarity, context and strategic focus to its long-term financial planning, helping ensure resources are aligned with an excellent student experience and high-quality teaching and research.
After five years delivering a strategic plan under new leadership, that has strengthened recruitment and income, and supported a stable, more sustainable financial position, the adoption of Etio’s Benchmarking at SOAS was not a crisis response but a proactive commitment to continuous improvement. Coming from outside the sector, SOAS’s CFO, Justin Smith, recognised the value of structured comparative insight in a complex operating landscape.
“We’d had a very good five or six‑year run, and we’re focused on continuing to grow and develop in a way that’s true to our mission. So, we use benchmarking proactively to ask: where can we make practical improvements that free up time and resource for what matters most? It’s not just about being efficient; it’s about the choices we make around priorities like access and participation, and how much we invest in the student union.”
Rather than focussing on cost reduction, SOAS sought to understand how operational decisions - historic and current - shaped performance, and where adjustments could strengthen long-term sustainability, while keeping the focus on delivering an excellent student experience and supporting high-quality teaching and research.
Etio’s methodology provided the structure SOAS needed. Its clear operating model, detailed breakdowns and flexible peer grouping approach allowed SOAS to compare itself meaningfully against national benchmarks, but also with tailored sub-groups that reflect the diversity of the institution – a London sub-group of universities and a Research-Intensive competitor benchmark group. Because SOAS is comparatively small within the sector, understanding how fixed costs and scale effects show up in the data was crucial - and Etio’s approach revealed these dynamics with precision, extending the standard outputs to include bespoke analysis showing spread of Professional Services costs versus size of institution.
Justin reflects on this clarity:
“It gave us very good comparatives - on things like outputs and how effectively we’re using our resources - but also a sense of what’s appropriate for our scale. It’s been really helpful for fine‑tuning our model. We can understand the detail of how we compare and what we can do - what levers we can pull.”
The insights confirmed areas of strong performance, particularly in academic activity contribution, while also highlighting where changes in ways of working could help the university make best use of its resources in targeted parts of the organisation.
Etio’s benchmarking validated that SOAS performed above average in key academic metrics and operated broadly in-line with sector norms for support costs once scale was accounted for. However, the real value emerged in the detailed diagnosis of specific areas.
“Under the hood, you can see which academic areas are performing strongly and which need more attention, and that feeds into the curriculum and how we structure our modules and courses.”
In Estates, for example, unusually high per‑square‑metre costs were traced back to historic insourcing decisions. With clear benchmarking evidence, SOAS could inform contract renegotiations and objectively adjust staffing structures. In HR, higher‑than‑average expenditure was linked to an expanded remit in welfare, EDI and industrial relations - areas now being streamlined without compromising quality, something Justin was very clear on,
“Of course, we explain to people that this is purely a financial benchmark. It doesn’t say anything about the other dimensions at play, such as quality or service, or how well we manage risks.”
The exercise also highlighted areas of spend that were above the benchmark, such as legal fees, where new governance controls quickly improved oversight and reduced unnecessary cost. Conversely, benchmarking revealed underinvestment in marketing and IT, enabling stronger, evidence‑based cases for building more capacity and capability in these functions.
These insights were not simply informational - they drove measurable change, as Justin observes:
“What Etio delivered was far more than a set of numbers. It gave us the ability to see exactly where we were strong, where we needed to sharpen our approach, and where our historic choices were quietly shaping how we used our resources. We were able to identify issues we simply couldn’t have spotted from our internal data alone - like legacy staffing arrangements or over‑reliance on external services - and then act on them quickly. Benchmarking with Etio has directly influenced how we structure budgets, how we prioritise investment and how we hold ourselves to account. It’s had a tangible impact on how we operate as a university, while staying focused on quality and on the experience we provide to students.”
Across SOAS there has been acceptance of the methodology and the findings. Benchmarking outputs are structured and visually engaging, and Etio Consultants work hard to ensure the interpretation lands correctly and is well received. Justin also has access to the raw data through the Benchmark+ platform which enables further deep-dive scrutiny. All this enables SOAS to communicate findings confidently across the institution. Executive leaders, finance committees, faculties and trade union representatives have all received the analysis in accessible formats, making it easier to explain why certain decisions were being made and how they connected to wider institutional goals. This transparency helped build internal trust by grounding decisions in independently benchmarked evidence.
Because of the success of the exercise, Etio benchmarking is now embedded into the university’s new strategic plan as a biennial discipline.
“We’ve written it into our five-year strategic plan. We want this regular review to help shape budgets and how we work, so we can keep investing in what matters most.”
With such a well-defined methodology, and a standard format for higher education accounts, Etio’s model is a low-burden approach to deliver and map, and, for SOAS, their Finance Business Partners were able to inform the mapping process, minimising the input required from academic and administrative departments. As SOAS completed its second cycle, it found the process even more streamlined.
With experience across two cycles (2022/23 and 2024/25 datasets), Justin has become a strong advocate for Etio benchmarking within his university networks.
“It’s great what Etio does – we continue to benefit a lot from this line of thinking. It’s an authoritative benchmark; it’s proportionate in cost; and it helps us make better-informed decisions. Why isn’t everyone doing it?”
He is also of the opinion that the combination of Etio’s framework, with sector body representation to further enhance and disseminate interpretation, could underpin a consistent, sector‑wide approach to benchmarking - one that is rigorous, comparable and meaningful.
For SOAS, Etio’s benchmarking is now part of how the university steers its financial future. It validates strengths, pinpoints opportunities, sharpens strategic planning and builds internal alignment to the wider mission. As SOAS’s experience demonstrates, benchmarking - when done well - is not simply about cutting costs, but about enabling smarter, more sustainable decisions which support the mission-critical priorities of an organisation.
You can also hear more about the development of a sector-wide benchmarking approach at this year's UUK Transformation & Efficiency Summit: