Change main screen/section of product depending on user progression with product

Question

Is it possible to create a product where the main section (where users land after login) changes depending on the progresses made by the users with the product?

I'm currently working on a career development product, which main goal is to provide supports from mentors for enterpreneurs. This support will be provided in a "Progress dashboard", where users add long-term goals and mentors will evaluate the progresses of the enterpreneur towards these goals.

Users (enterpreneurs) don't have mentors by default; in order to create a "Mentors panel" they can browse a network of mentors (with which they're matched depending on profile preferences/details collected during the signup).

Users can use the progress dashboard even without having added a mentor in such dashboard, but ideally they would firstly find the mentors, and THEN start using the progress dashboard.

Here's a simplified flow of the journey (first use):

It seems to me that this product will have two distinct life cycles:

1. "Browse mentors" is primary section: finding mentors in an "Explore mentors" section, and then adding them to their dashboard; this may take from 1 to 3 week averagely;
2. Progress dashboard becomes primary section (they will always land here after login): weekly/monthly use of progress dashboard, where the selected mentors can provide feedback and will evaluate users progresses towards their goal.

Is there any best practice or real life example of products where a so-called "Main section" changes depending on the position of the user in the product life cycle? Is it too confusing to have the "Browse mentors" section as the primary one, and then make the "Progress dashboard" the primary one? Is it ever been done?

I'm not excluding that this necessity demonstrates an underlying issue with the overall product life cycle and user journey.

Answer 1

Adding mentors as your primary screen after registration is fine, many platforms do the same to personalize the experience for the user. For example, Pinterest asks the user to select topics of interest before continuing to the feed, to show relevant posts to the user.

In your case, adding mentors from the very start seems reasonable but a bit too much to ask from users. This would be perfect if the user knew the mentor beforehand, but selecting a mentor without knowing them seems to be a very hard task (reviewing the mentor, their background, etc) to start from the beginning.

It is acceptable for Pinterest because the cost is low and the choices are easy, but selecting the wrong mentor comes with higher costs and the choice is harder. Might be too hard for a fist time user, resulting in drop-off. Of course, if the user has no choice or are already paying for the service, this is less of an issue, but still a hard task. It would depend on your situation. You could add messaging assuring users they can change mentors anytime, or simply send them to a generic progress screen, and asking them to select mentors. Depends on your product.

As for dashboards tracking your progress, there are many examples in language learning apps such as Duolingo. For apps with progression, it is expected to have dashboards informing the user of their current state or happenings. The complexity will depend on your product, but ask yourself what the most common user goals are when logging in and surface those functions to the dashboard.