New Gabbitas: ruling the waves again, Irina Shumovitch

Different views New Gabbitas: ruling the waves again Irina Shumovitch celebrates a relaunch

When I was running my own educational consultancy, working in close partnership with young, dynamic tutoring partners, we joked about Gabbitas Education which seemed rather old and archaic, apparently long past its heyday. I may not have been alone in thinking like this and so it seems a good moment to introduce Vanessa Miner who is the old firm’s new managing director.

Vanessa is grappling with the task of modernising a once illustrious institution that had lost touch. She believes that Gabbitas had developed lots of expertise in different product lines, but hadn’t put it together in a comprehensive offer to clients. Everything seemed a tad stale. ‘I didn’t like the old name, the style, the colour - it looked like sepia, stuck in the past. None of it said to me Education, Excellence, Aspiration. The first thing we asked was why do we need to be called Gabbitas Educational Consultants, when everyone refers to us as Gabbitas? We are in the business of education, we have been for nearly 150 years, we don’t need to prove it. So let’s call ourselves Gabbitas – succinct and to the point. My vision of Gabbitas is of a business that makes a significant contribution to changing educational outcomes internationally, and our brand needs to reflect that.’

Having sharpened the name, and reaffirmed Gabbitas’s international dimension, Vanessa also changed the logo. ‘We wanted the logo which gives the feeling of heritage, of history. Our new emblem says: we are in education, we have been for a very long time. We looked at various options of a logo, realised that Red was the colour everyone liked, particularly in China where Red symbolises good fortune and joy.’ The new Gabbitas Logo depicts what looks like a crimson crown, but on closer inspection it is a family, whose embracing hands form a letter G. Underneath, in blue, it reads: Gabbitas, 1873. Sharp, simple, it speaks volumes. ‘Developing the new branding was centred around how we look forward as a business, and how we unite as one Gabbitas to drive our vision.’ That is to take Gabbitas into the 21st century more centred on its clients’ needs. ‘The important thing for me is to take the heritage of Gabbitas and our dedication to excellence into our role in improving educational opportunities and standards internationally.’

Implementing this vision required some restructuring. ‘I looked at all the things we need to do to improve our processes, our offer to customers, our marketing, and the way we work as a team. We have great skills across the team in terms of different nationalities and the different countries that we work in, but we weren’t working as harmoniously together as a team as we could for the future.’

The new Gabbitas offices in Carlton Gardens still feature the images and correspondence of eminent figures associated with Gabbitas, such as Graham Green and WH Auden, once Gabbitas tutors, and a former Gabbitas private music teacher,

Vanessa Miner and David Palfreyman

Sir Edward Elgar. But Gabbitas has also been operating offices in Dubai and four offices in China for over 10 years, establishing ‘schools and families’ teams in those markets. Recently Vanessa Miner took trips to both countries in search of new development opportunities. ‘I see different challenges in those markets, particularly in Dubai where there’s a strong competition for standards at schools, and we are developing a new product - school improvement offer, providing strategic school improvement advice. One of the most important things for me was having a customer-centred operation. We started to think: how do we restructure in order to have the whole team wrapped around the client. Rather than having different product lines managed by different teams, we are going to have one team – schools and families – which will look after our clients and all their needs.’

In China, Vanessa travelled around the country in order to identify new directions for Gabbitas. ‘There’s a huge global demand for teachers, yet recruitment from existing western countries is never going to satisfy that demand. It’s going to be important for the future to offer teacher-development in the country.’

Over its 145 years of existence, Gabbitas has been through many changes. Its current transformation, which includes visual and structural changes as well as development of new business opportunities, is designed to make Gabbitas modern, lean, dynamic, competitive - suited to the digital age.

Irina Shumovitch is Senior Educational Advisor at Gabbitas