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New Program Launch Guidebook

Planning resources for finance and academic leaders

Seeking to grow enrollment, higher education institutions are picking up the pace of new academic program launches. But new market pressures, such as changing student behaviors and increased competition, have created a hostile environment for program launches. Many promising new programs fail to generate desired enrollments, or cost more than initially expected. As a result, campuses experience “profitless growth”—adding faculty, instructional resources, and perhaps some new students, but not growing the bottom line.

To help leaders avoid profitless growth, this guidebook offers ten detailed, step-by-step resources to enhance the rigor of program planning.

Avoid the 10 most damaging mistakes in new program planning

Avoiding profitless growth requires understanding why new programs fail. Through our research, EAB identified that ten damaging mistakes tend to derail new program launches most often:

  1. Relying solely on faculty to organically surface new program ideas
  2. Losing competitive advantage through prolonged approval process
  3. Using one-dimensional market data to evaluate demand potential
  4. Designing programs around academic norms and preferences
  5. Conflating healthy and unhealthy cannibalization
  6. Overlooking indirect, incremental, and knock-on costs
  7. Underinvesting in marketing
  8. Aiming for near certainty in financial projections
  9. Committing inflexible, fixed resources before programs demonstrate demand
  10.  Failing to react to post-launch performance

These mistakes fall into the four categories outlined below. Within each category, we share a set of resources that address these mistakes, helping institutions identify and avoid them.

Institutional planning processes

Mistakes 1 and 2 result from inadequate institutional planning processes. To avoid them, we created two resources to help you become a more market-responsive institution.

Top-down new program opportunity analyses

This resource outlines six analyses to surface promising new program ideas. The analyses guide senior leaders toward in-demand, mission-aligned new program ideas. This ultimately positions institutions to meet annual growth goals by enabling more viable program launches.

Mistake avoided: Relying solely on faculty to surface new program ideas

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Compendium of business case templates

This compendium includes best-in-class business case templates from five higher education institutions across North America. The templates expedite the new program proposal process by helping faculty quickly identify what information to include in proposals. Further, the templates enable senior leaders to more efficiently evaluate proposals’ viability by presenting information in a clear, standardized format.

Mistake avoided: Losing competitive advantage through prolonged approval process

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Market demand data

Mistakes 3-5 involve evaluating the wrong market demand data. Our three market demand analysis resources help you avoid these mistakes and ground financial goals in market realities.

Market demand validation checklist

This checklist details three different types of market demand data—labor market, student market, and competitor data. It improves market demand projections by helping faculty quickly identify the right sources of data to consider when evaluating market demand potential, where to obtain that data, and how to interpret it. Further, it prompts senior leaders to ask the right questions about demand projections to vet assumptions and analyses.

Mistake avoided: Using one-dimensional market data to evaluate demand potential

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Program design checklist

This checklist offers guidance on four types of program design decisions—credential, delivery, admissions, and student experience—to help faculty champions align new program design with market demands. It summarizes important design considerations that may impact enrollment or student outcomes. It also prompts senior leaders to ask the right questions about design decisions to vet assumptions and ensure program design reflects market needs.

Mistake avoided: Designing programs around academic norms and preferences

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Portfolio cannibalization feedback form

This web-based form enables central leaders to obtain faculty feedback on new academic proposals. Specifically, it allows faculty to flag new programs that serve similar market needs as existing programs. The form helps leaders better understand a proposed program’s cannibalization potential and ultimately make more informed program launch decisions.

Mistake avoided: Conflating healthy and unhealthy cannibalization

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New program costs

Mistakes 6 and 7 occur when institutions underestimate or overlook new program costs. To avoid them, use our budget planning templates and guidelines to plan for the true costs of academic programs.

New program budget templates

This resource includes budget planning templates from three higher education institutions. The templates enable more accurate cost projections for new academic programs by prompting faculty champions to consider total costs of new programs. Further, by flagging programs with atypical resource needs, the templates allow senior leaders to plan for necessary new investments before integrating programs into operating budgets.

Mistake avoided: Overlooking indirect, incremental, and knock-on costs

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Marketing investment rules of thumb

This reference details four guidelines for setting academic program marketing budgets. Specifically, the guidelines illustrate how program’s discipline, modality, target audience, and position in the overall academic portfolio impact marketing spend. By following these guidelines, leaders can move beyond “one-size-fits-all” marketing budgets and right-size marketing investment based on specific program characteristics.

Mistake avoided: Underinvesting in marketing

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Monitoring program performance after launch

Mistakes 8-10 result from insufficiently monitoring program performance after launch. To avoid them, we created three resources to help you build in flexibility to adapt to future demand shifts and respond to underperforming programs.

Financial sensitivity analysis template

This Excel-based template facilitates sensitivity analyses for new program revenue, cost, and enrollment projections. Using pre-populated formulas, it automatically calculates optimistic and pessimistic financial results from base projections. The template helps academic and finance leaders evaluate a range of potential performance outcomes and ultimately make more informed, risk-aware program launch decisions.

Mistake avoided: Aiming for near certainty in financial projections

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New program cost-minimization checklist

This tool outlines ten tactics to limit upfront investment in new academic programs. The strategies are grouped by type of expense and span major types of program cost drivers, including instruction, administration, and facilities. The checklist helps leaders minimize upfront fixed costs of new programs by leveraging existing or temporary resources without affecting quality.

Mistake avoided: Committing inflexible, fixed resources before programs demonstrate demand

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Lookback analysis template

This Excel-based template tracks program performance over five years. It isolates key metrics (i.e., enrollment, cost of instruction, total expenses, and contribution margin) on a summary dashboard, which senior leaders review at regular intervals post-launch. It also includes supporting tabs with detailed cost, revenue, and enrollment data. The template helps leaders monitor ongoing program performance by quickly identifying enrollment, cost, or margin trends.

Mistake avoided: Failing to react to post-launch performance

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