Years ago, I approved a new academic programme that looked, on paper, like a sure thing. The business case was optimistic, the champions persuasive, and the university’s reputation in the field strong. We invested more than £100,000 in development and marketing. It was the next big thing.
It recruited nobody! Not a single student. I learned more from that failure than from my successful launches.
Across the UK sector, under significant pressure, universities' portfolio mix, market agility, and strategic alignment are changing rapidly. Yet when you look closer, many portfolios are quietly underperforming. The problem is rarely a lack of ambition; the mechanisms for choosing, sustaining, and retiring products are still built for a more predictable age and where change happened much more slowly.
In my experience, portfolio strategy fails for three main reasons: poor data, cultural inertia, and undifferentiated provision. Together, they leave institutions, making confident guesses rather than informed decisions.
Poor data, confident guesses
Most universities operate with fragments of information scattered across systems, and access to data often relies on knowing the right person with the right Excel spreadsheet (!!!).
Recruitment, conversion, cost, and workload data seldom connect, so leaders rely on partial views. Headline numbers, applications, open-day traffic, and online impressions can give an illusion of demand, while the real economics at the course level remain opaque.
Very few teams can state the actual contribution of a course once staff time, estates, digital costs and even capital expenditure are factored in. Without this clarity, underperforming provisions hide in plain sight.
The fix is simple but culturally challenging, mainly because it goes against education as a public good: establish a course-level economic view and track the funnel from lead to enrolment with granulated actuals against assumptions. It is profoundly uncomfortable and deeply unpopular, but decisions become grounded in performance, not sentiment. There are many reasons mission-driven reasons to cross-subsidise a programme, but at least know what that will cost.
Culture and myth
Data issues are compounded by culture. In many institutions, portfolio development is shaped less by market demand and more by what the university has historically been known for. Statements such as “we are known for X” can become self-justifying, even when competitors have overtaken that niche.
Decision-making can drift into deference, with approvals made because a senior advocate supports them rather than because the market does. Once created, programmes rarely die; they become “zombie courses,” consuming resources and attention long after demand has faded, even if they existed. It also provides a barrier for colleagues to create innovative new provisions because there is no gap in the portfolio.
Addressing this requires a different discipline: applying a clear mission-fit screen and a stage-gate process for every proposal. Programmes should be judged not by tradition but by how they advance purpose, serve place, protect reputation and include diverse learners. Heritage matters, but it can’t be the business case at the level of individual programmes.
The problem of sameness
Even when data and governance improve, many universities still struggle to articulate what makes their offer distinctive. No, saying you are “world-leading” generally does not cut it because everyone makes that claim.
Course titles, structures and claims about “industry alignment” or “research-informed teaching” are often identical across the sector. This was particularly a problem in areas like Business Schools (my former parish) where many programmes feel photo-copied from a nearby neighbour.
From a prospective student’s perspective, the differentiation is minimal. In competitive markets, especially international ones, such sameness is fatal. Candidates make quick comparisons based on value clarity: employability, pathway, prestige or price – which is it?
True differentiation demands specificity: named employers, defined learner segments, tangible outcomes, and visible assets that others cannot easily copy. In short, “why us?” must be answered before approval, not after launch.
The UK’s double bind
All of this is surrounded by growing strategic tension. Governments across the four nations have sharpened their industrial priorities, health and care, advanced manufacturing, data and AI, net zero, and the creative economy, and expect universities to align (and let’s not get into the changing research space…). At the same time, sustainable growth still depends on global reach and the international student market.
Balancing the two means designing dual-value products: programmes that address regional skills needs while signalling portable, globally recognised expertise. Increasingly, providers must satisfy local industrial missions and the expectations of international students seeking career mobility. Few institutions manage this balance well, yet it’s where the next wave of competitive advantage lies.
The diversification dilemma
There is also an unspoken dependency on undergraduate income. Genuine diversification, into CPD, executive education, micro-credentials, apprenticeships or transnational partnerships, is hard work. It demands new pricing strategies, longer sales cycles and professionalised business development support.
Successful institutions treat diversification as a portfolio discipline: small, well-tested pilots with precise data, stage gates, and the same ROI and differentiation standards applied to every other product.
A more disciplined future
It is about designing fewer, stronger, more distinctive offers that build reusable growth capabilities. The mechanics are straightforward: insist on course-level economics, introduce clear kill criteria at the outset, build cross-cutting capabilities (modularity, hybrid delivery, employer co-design) and test price and value before launch.
The harder shift is cultural, moving from protecting the past to investing in what’s next. That means retiring legacy provision, rewarding evidence-based decisions and treating programme design as a strategic investment.
The bottom line
Portfolios fail when information is patchy, culture outruns evidence, and products are indistinguishable. They succeed when institutions combine data discipline, cultural honesty and distinctive design. The challenge for UK higher education is to build portfolios that serve local economic priorities and remain globally attractive.
Charles Knight is the Director of Leadership, Governance, and Management at Advance HE. He works with senior leadership teams to understand the complexity of higher education and help transform their organisations to be fit for the future. Before joining Advance HE, he held leadership roles in a series of UK Business Schools.
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