Project context

Society College is a scale-up that connects young professionals and students with organizations making a societal impact. As part of the founding team, I’ve been involved since the pre-idea stage, helping to shape the concept and strategy for the past three years. Today, I focus on helping scale Society College through strategy, product management, and AI automation.

Our programs focus on three core areas:

• Personal growth: Tailored development opportunities for young talent.
• Learning by doing: Real-world work experience at partner organizations.
• Civic responsibility: Building a community dedicated to a resilient society.

The challenge

Society College operates a unique business model that combines elements of an educational institution, an employment agency, and civic engagement. This complexity requires balancing the needs of two distinct customer groups: young talent and partner organizations.

Key challenges included:

• Channelling our energy: Delivering on our mission while refining a complex, multi-sided platform business and avoiding distractions.
• Staying lean: Operating without external funding means every effort had to count.
• Scaling effectively: Growing without adding unnecessary overhead requires smarter ways of working through technology.

The priority was clear: focus on what matters most -creating value for young talents and partner organizations- while ensuring the organization stayed agile and mission-driven.

The approach

To address these challenges, I combined venture-building principles with AI-driven solutions.

1. Designing the venture and strategy.

• Co-created the vision, business model, and value propositions with the co-founders.
• Developed a growth strategy that aligned with the mission and long-term viability.

2. Aligning the product.

• Continuously refining the offerings to meet the needs of both talent and partner organizations while staying focused on the organization’s core values.

3. Implementing AI-driven automation.

To make the team’s work more efficient, I introduced practical automations, including:

• Sales: Developed tools to identify potential partner opportunities and streamline the sales process, ensuring the team could focus on building meaningful relationships.
• Marketing: Leveraged AI to analyze social media channels, uncovering content opportunities and generating fresh ideas to improve brand visibility and audience engagement.
• Operations: Created an internal tool to optimize matchmaking between young talent and partner organizations, making placements faster, more accurate, and aligned with both parties' needs.

4. Being part of the team.

Over the past years, I’ve dedicated one day per week to Society College. This hands-on time made me real part of the highly talented team, allows me to help with interim roles, and bring in fresh insights from other work.

Results and impact

My key contributions to the team can be categorized as follows:

• Increased focus: Helped the team prioritize high-impact activities and avoid distractions through strategic thinking and doing.
• Improved efficiency: Introduced structured approaches to sales and supporting operations, saving time and energy.
• Scalability through AI: Continuously adding automation to scale processes without adding more team members, keeping the organization lean and agile.

Society College is well-positioned to become an AI-supported, mission-driven venture, combining strategic clarity with efficient operations. All entirely without external funding.