Why Am I Building a Micro School?
A decade ago, I left university and realised I wanted to work within the startup ecosystem. In the last 10 years I have been fortunate to experience working in over 10 different cities across a range of experiences from co-founding a startup to working as a product manager within a range of companies. More recently, I sat on the other side of the table as an investor at Backstage Capital, investing in underrepresented founders across the globe.
When I left university, I was already in the mindset that life was a continuous learning journey which didn’t just start and stop in school. However, I didn’t realise that my knowledge, relationships and capabilities would compound through the various work I have done.
Nowadays, I freelance with startups, scale-ups and corporates on product discovery, planning and execution. Alongside that, I create content for founders to provide the advice and steer I wish I had at the start of my journey to reduce or eliminate a lot of the risks associated with the all consuming journey of starting a company.
Last year, I reached a point of tension given the limited capacity I had between my freelancing clients and preserving family time with my daughter and partner (which I am never willing to compromise). I didn’t (and still don’t) have the bandwidth to catch up with everyone, that “wants a coffee catchup.” I had 30-50 founders contacting me for help every month. Anything from, “how do I validate the problem I wish to solve in a cost-effective way” to “could you review my pitch deck and my product?”
I can empathise, as I have been in their position before, I speak to founders everyday and I actually care and do want to help. But, I recognise the need to find a more scalable and accessible way to serve founders even if I can’t be in the room.
I tested out a podcast and Instagram IGTV series last year where I was sharing advice on specific topics with founders, from finding your first set of customers to understanding if venture capital is right for you. The feedback has been overwhelming and an indication that more of the same is helpful and needed. As a result, this inspired me to create AHVC.School. A new micro school for explorers who want trusted advice on the first steps of discovering whether they should pursue an idea.
AHVC School is the go-to destination for the discovery process and making smarter decisions.
The focus is on discovering:
- Why you want to pursue an idea
- How to validate yourself, your idea and your customer
- Why you are well placed to do this now
- How to make smarter decisions on a consistent basis
This is not a course that will get you from idea to startup in 6 weeks. Most explorers will validate that their idea is not feasible or even that they are not well suited to pursue entrepreneurship right now. We focus exclusively on the first step in your pursuit as we feel there is not enough honest and transparent content or support on this stumbling block so many people fall on.
My promise is regardless if you validate the need to start a company or not, you will learn at a real fast pace!
To make it more accessible and affordable, I have decided to create courses, which comprise of 4-6 short classes on a range of topics such as how to create a roadmap or how to interview users. The first two courses will be:
- Getting started with discovery (online)
- Angel Investing School (in-person pop-up in London)
Most of the courses, content and community will be online, with some in-person pop-up schools. All of the courses will be based off demand and feedback from users who sign up.
If this community sounds like something you would benefit from and you have topics you would love to learn about, then you can join the waitlist here and share what you would like to learn here.