The Queen’s Renew Program is supported by international consultancy firm, Nous Group, which has worked with many top institutions around the world. The Nous Group will analyze our operations and recommend long-term improvement opportunities.
By harnessing their extensive knowledge and expertise, Queen’s can ensure that it is moving on evidence-based recommendations, making thoughtful change, and tracking progress as we go.
NousCubane's UniForum benchmarking program
Queen’s has joined UniForum, a NousCubane program that enables its members to assess and compare how professional services are delivered across member universities. This will help us learn from other institutions’ experiences, confirm what we are doing well, and identify opportunities to improve.
By participating in the benchmarking program, Queen’s gains access to results from top institutions around the world, including many U15 research-intensive universities. We will know how we compare on the delivery of our professional services. This is similar to the way universities are ranked for academic and research accomplishments. This will help us learn from other institutions' experiences, identify areas where we are doing well, and where we have opportunities to improve. Due to proprietary and competition reasons we are not able to share the specific subscription cost of this program, but can confirm that it is less than $500,000 per year.
The UniForum program consists of the Service Effectiveness Survey and Activity Data Collection.
Canadian UniForum members include:
- Dalhousie University
- McMaster University
- Simon Fraser University
- University of Alberta
- University of Calgary
- University of British Columbia
- University of Ottawa
- University of Saskatchewan
- University of Toronto
- York University
Phase 1: The initial phase of the collaboration with Nous Group – to launch the survey, perform data collection, and provide analysis and reporting and develop recommendations for change – is six months.
Ongoing: The next phase of the program will focus on longer-term tracking. Because of the longitudinal and comparative nature of the program, the Queen’s program office will work with NousCubane on annual UniForum benchmarking surveys over the next few years.
About Nous Group
Nous Group (Nous and NousCubane) is an international management consultancy that has worked with more than 100 universities in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the U.K., Ireland, Mexico, and the U.S. to transform their ways of working, within both academic and administrative units. NousCubane, specifically, is a leading provider of benchmarking services (through their UniForum program). They support clients across the public sector to make better strategic decisions, improve service delivery, and invest in their core missions.
NousCubane began as Cubane Consulting in 2009, and through its UniForum program, established itself as a leader in higher education benchmarking services. In 2021, Cubane joined with Nous Group, which provides broader consulting services across the private, public, and community sectors. They became NousCubane in 2023.
The total cost of Queen's contract with Nous is $288,000 before taxes for services provided from February 22, 2024 with targeted completion date of July 12, 2024.