Meet Pollen, a brand new French startup that wishes to supply a greater strategy to study new expertise. As a substitute of working with full-time lecturers, Pollen invitations enterprise executives and high performers within the tech trade in order that they will host a category with a small group of individuals.
Behind the scenes, Pollen was co-founded by Julie Ranty, the previous managing director of Viva Know-how, a well-liked tech convention that takes place yearly in Paris, together with Olivier Xu and Vincent Huguet. And Huguet is aware of a factor or two about marketplaces as he’s the co-founder and co-CEO of Malt, a freelancer market. He’s nonetheless very a lot targeted on Malt however he contributes to Pollen in a non-operational function.
“I’m satisfied that the very best skilled coaching programs in the present day are given by individuals who aren’t trainers but. They’re working professionals and they’re keen to share their secret sauce with you, their expertise, their work methodology and extremely actionable content material – not simply inspiring content material, however actionable content material for the subsequent day,” Pollen CEO Julie Ranty advised me.
And the rationale why Pollen focuses on the tech trade is as a result of it adjustments on a regular basis. When you work for a tech firm, likelihood is you might be utilizing — or enthusiastic about utilizing — generative AI in a technique or one other. Or you could be attempting to implement a brand new, refined gross sales technique. Otherwise you need to tweak your pricing and monetization technique.
Pollen has already attracted 40 individuals working within the tech trade who’re internet hosting courses on Pollen’s behalf. The everyday course is a four-hour course adopted by a lunch break as a way to share suggestions with different individuals in a laid-back environment. It will also be an eight-hour all-day course with a lunch break.
The corporate additionally provides on-line courses, however most individuals favor in-person programs. “With on-line courses, it isn’t an eight-hour Zoom tunnel, it’s two-hour blocks unfold over two weeks. You get 4 instances two hours over two weeks,” Ranty stated.
A market for skilled improvement
There are 4 the reason why some tech staff settle for to create programs for Pollen. First, Pollen takes care of all of the pesky duties that include changing into an teacher.
“An answer like Pollen helps you develop your course and, on high of that, manages the entire admin, gross sales, advertising, buyer relations aspect of issues,” Ranty stated. “It additionally teaches them – as a result of we’ve developed a Pollen methodology with pedagogical specialists – it additionally teaches them the basics of the right way to share their experience.”
The second and third purpose why you’d need to be part of Pollen’s group of trainers is that it will possibly personally show you how to on an expert degree as you seem as an knowledgeable in your area, and also you get to fulfill different instructors and develop your community.
Lastly, Pollen pays its trainers. “They’re paid to do that, nevertheless it’s undoubtedly not the primary purpose why they select to do it,” Ranty stated.
Pollen is positioning itself as an upskilling platform for present corporations. It desires to persuade HR managers that they need to allocate a few of their coaching finances towards Pollen programs.
Within the coming months, the startup goes to use for the Qualiopi certification, which signifies that it’s a severe skilled improvement firm that provides high-quality programs. The startup expects to have the ability to supply 300 totally different periods in 2024 — general, 3,000 individuals might attend a Pollen course in 2024.