Product versus experience is the wrong debate. In education, experience is not the wrapping around the product. It is an essential part of the product.
When a university talks about modernising its portfolio, the conversation usually starts, and often ends, in the same place: new programmes, credits, modules, content, delivery modes and learning outcomes. All of that matters. But it does not, on its own, explain what students experience, value or recommend.
The programme is what the academic committee approves. The product is what the student experiences.
Updating the curriculum is not enough
A university can update a syllabus, introduce tools or add modules and declare that it has modernised the product. The student may notice almost nothing.
They may still arrive through a generic website, go through a transactional admissions process and receive an induction that amounts to finding their login details. Then study alone, ask for help from departments that do not talk to each other and finish without a stronger professional network than the one they had at the start.
Academically, the programme may be excellent. As a product, it will still be incomplete.
This does not diminish the importance of academic rigour. It forces us to ask what turns that rigour into value: context, judgement, feedback, connection, confidence and visible progress. Adding content does not necessarily address any of those needs.
Experience is not a collection of pleasant details. It is how the institution helps students move forward and delivers on the promise it made before enrolment.
The four layers of the educational product
1. The academic core
Curriculum, lecturers, assessment, learning outcomes and rigour. This is the foundation. Without it, there is no defensible educational offering.
The question is what students should learn and how they will demonstrate that they have learnt it. A good experience does not replace that answer or make a weak programme sound.
2. The experience architecture
Induction, study rhythm, interaction, support, live sessions, mentoring, community and visibility of progress. These help students move through the programme, not merely enrol in it.
The question is what they need to get started, sustain their effort and ask for help in time. It is not enough for a service to exist. It needs to be accessible when it is needed.
3. The professional value layer
Applied projects, relevant certifications, contact with employers, careers services, alumni and networks. These help connect learning with the context in which people want to use it.
The question is how they will apply and demonstrate what they have learnt, and whom they need to connect with. This is not about promising a job or adding certificates like decorations to a Christmas tree.
4. The operating system
Data, technology, processes, communication and accountable people. This is the least visible layer, and the one that determines whether the promise can be delivered consistently or relies on heroic individuals fixing failures at the last minute.
The question is who delivers each part of the experience, with what resources, and what happens when something goes wrong.
These four layers do not compete with academic content. They turn it into value that students can use.
A master's degree, the same curriculum and a different product
Consider a hypothetical example: an online master's degree for working professionals. The curriculum meets their objectives, but the experience provides little guidance at the start, few connections between participants and support that is difficult to find. This is not a client case or an observed result: it is a way of examining the design.
Without changing the modules, the team could design an induction that connects the programme with each student's professional goals. It could organise meetings with lecturers and alumni, structure mentoring, facilitate connections by sector and make progress more visible. It could also review how students ask for help and who intervenes when someone stops progressing.
The answer is not to implement the entire list. Nor to add an app, a virtual tutor and round-the-clock chat so that it can be called innovation. It is to choose what solves a specific need and can be sustained at a good standard.
Each proposal requires an operational decision: whom it serves, who is accountable, what it costs and what signal would show whether it is helping. Mentoring needs mentors and coordination. Promised support needs capacity and response times that match that promise. Technology can make delivery easier; it does not replace the accountable person.
Some improvements can be made without redesigning the curriculum. Others will require academic approval or deeper changes. It is worth distinguishing them before turning every improvement into a wholesale reform or, at the other extreme, promising that changing the platform will fix everything.
Undergraduate and postgraduate students do not need the same experience
The opportunity exists in both. The response need not be identical.
A master's student may seek specialisation, professional connections, recognition and immediate application. An undergraduate may need more guidance, structure, confidence and support in building their path. These are starting points for research, not universal profiles: age, background, mode of study and personal circumstances also matter.
The shared principle is to design around what the person needs to achieve, not the organisational chart the institution inherited.
The problem lives between departments
The academic team controls the curriculum. Marketing frames the promise. Admissions manages entry. Student Services resolves cases. Technology runs platforms. Careers Services connects learning with the next step.
If each department optimises only its own part, the complete journey may be left without an owner.
Students, of course, do not experience departments. They experience a university.
That is why product design needs cross-functional authority. There is no obligation to invent a Chief Experience Officer, although the title would brighten up a few meetings. There does need to be someone who can prioritise friction, coordinate decisions and insist that the promise can realistically be delivered.
This is not about taking responsibility away from the academic team. It is about ensuring that decisions on experience, operations and budgets are not suspended between departments working to different measures.
Measure progress, not just satisfaction
If experience is part of the product, an end-of-programme survey is not enough to understand it.
We need to observe what happens along the journey: activation at the start, time to the first meaningful interaction, participation in community and mentoring, problem resolution, persistence and academic progress. Then, the use of careers services and the continuity of alumni relationships.
Not every activity needs to become a metric. What matters is defining what progress means in that programme. Logging in does not necessarily mean becoming engaged. Opening a message does not mean a difficulty has been resolved. High participation does not, on its own, demonstrate more learning.
These signals support investigation and decisions. They do not automatically prove that an intervention caused an improvement. They need to be read in the student's context, alongside their reasons, and checked against what actually happens before results are attributed.
The question is not simply whether they liked it. It is whether the experience helped them progress, connect and use what they learnt.
Where to start: review one programme, not the whole portfolio
Choosing a specific programme moves the conversation from good intentions to decisions. Before adding another module or buying another tool, I would put these questions on the table:
- What does the student need to achieve, and what evidence of progress should they be able to show?
- What do we promise before enrolment, and where is that promise delivered or broken?
- What do they need at the start, when they encounter a difficulty and at the end?
- Which relationships would help them progress, and how do we make them possible?
- Who is accountable for the whole journey and able to coordinate changes across departments?
- Which improvement will we prioritise, with what resources, and how will we examine whether it is helping?
Then we decide what belongs to the curriculum, what belongs to the experience and what belongs to the system that must deliver it. Not before.
A programme without experience architecture is not a complete product. It is academic content connected to a sequence of departments.
The programme is what we teach. The product is everything that turns that teaching into progress.
Let's talk about your programme
Which part of the experience is limiting the value of your programme today? Let's discuss how to review it with your team.
Adapted for GloCal from an article by Benjamín Castro.