2026 Pamplin Executive Education Team

The Challenge

Pamplin College of Business wanted to move into executive education but first had to decide how to enter the market. The student team's guiding question asked how the college could launch an executive education program that strengthens its reputation, increases revenue, and differentiates it from competitors. Executive education reaches working professionals through two very different formats — custom programs built for a single organizational client, and open enrollment programs sold to individuals — and each carries its own cost structure, audience, and demand on faculty time.

The Solution

The student team worked in three phases: analysis, recommendation, and conclusion. In the analysis phase it built a benchmarking dashboard, ran a segmentation analysis to identify the audiences Pamplin is best positioned to serve, and fielded a survey. The recommendation phase paired a SWOT analysis of the two formats with a business model canvas, showing that custom programs draw on fewer resources because one organizational client can anchor a focused program, while open enrollment depends on higher participant volume, broader content, and more faculty and marketing capacity.

That comparison led the team to recommend starting with custom programs and then scaling with open enrollment, which it translated into two enduring frameworks. The custom program value cycle is client-first, moving from discover and co-create through scope and tailor, review and refine, and deliver, with an eight-point UT PROSIM checklist guiding design around understanding the client first, technology, Pamplin alignment, results, organizational fit, shared co-creation, instructional quality, and made-to-fit content customized to client context. The open enrollment value cycle is faculty-first, running from build and refine to deliver, interest and demand, and feedback, screened by a six-point HOKIES test covering design quality, opportunity demand, skill building, impact, engagement, and strategic fit.

The Impact

Together the frameworks give Pamplin a repeatable operating path rather than a one-time answer: diagnose client need, design with UT PROSIM, then deliver, measure, and improve; or source opportunities, screen them with HOKIES, then launch, learn, and refresh. Sequencing custom programs first, validating them through client partnerships, and only then scaling to open enrollment lets the college build revenue and reputation without overextending faculty, content, and marketing resources, and the tools stay useful whichever path Pamplin pursues first.