How Teachable Generated 16 New Company Initiatives in Just 10 Days
Last month, Teachable hosted an internal company-wide event called Teachathon to give employees time and autonomy to spot opportunities and build creative solutions for Teachable. After ten days of pitching ideas, forming teams, and ordering pet bandanas — more on this below — we ended up with 16 fully scoped projects to help customers and employees. Some of these have already gone live.
Teachathon received overwhelmingly positive reviews from employees (4.5 stars!) and we plan to run similar events in the future. But before I share what employees loved most, let’s back up.
How did we do it? Where are the puppy photos? And importantly, how did this begin in the first place?
Why Teachathon?
First, let me introduce myself. I’m Melissa, Teachable’s Head of Marketing Engagement and the woman insane enough to pitch and organize Teachathon.
One of my favorite things about working at Teachable is the diversity of thought and experiences employees bring to the table. I’m constantly learning from my peers, and I noticed that countless coworkers had ideas outside of their “day job” description. Marketers had ideas for features, customer educators had ideas for social media campaigns, but no one had a dedicated outlet to spend time on those projects.
This seemed like a massive opportunity, and so the idea was born. With the support of our leadership team, we brought Teachathon to life.
Is this a hackathon?
Sort of. Hackathons typically focus on creating new technology, like apps, websites, features, or product MVPs. We’re a SaaS (Software as a Service) company, so tech is a major part of our jobs, but the majority of Teachable employees aren’t developers. We knew we needed to expand our goal and make the event more inclusive, but beyond that, we also wanted to encourage creative thinking beyond our existing roadmap.
Encouraging ideas beyond technology
To include more skillsets and encourage diversity of ideas, we introduced three Teachathon categories:
- Hack the mission: At Teachable, our mission is to enable anyone to monetize their expertise. Ideas in this category were all tied to instructor success.
- Hack the company: Teachable is a great place to work (hey, we’re hiring!) but we’re always striving to grow and improve.
- Hack the bottom line: Great products are most powerful when they’re in the hands of great customers. How can we reach more great customers in new ways? Alternatively, are there creative ways that we can earn more or spend less?
We announced that we would crown one winner per category instead of one overall winner. (We also confirmed that there would be no cash prizes, just bragging rights.)
Coming up, I’ll spotlight some of the winning ideas. But first, let’s learn more about how we formed teams, since we took an unusual approach.
Pitch the ideas
Employees had one week to submit their ideas in advance of the event kickoff. We had a whopping 28 ideas submitted, and everyone gathered in our office to hear the creative proposals.
Each person (or pair) had two minutes — Shark Tank style — to share their idea, with the hopes of convincing fellow coworkers to join their team. Afterwards, all employees ranked their top five choices, and we assigned teams based on those rankings. Not every idea moved forward, but by some miracle combination of diverse interests and luck, everyone was assigned to one of their top two choices.
Couldn’t you have assigned random teams?
Random teams are the standard approach for company-wide workshops, but we chose another process for two main reasons:
- People tend to get excited about projects when they’re excited about the idea behind them. We worried that engagement would drop if employees didn’t love their team’s idea.
- All of our skills are valuable, but that doesn’t mean they’re equally useful on all projects. We didn’t want anyone to end up on a team where they felt that they couldn’t contribute.
Was our method more difficult and time-consuming? Absolutely. It took hours to play team tetris and make sure everyone got one of their top two choices. But to quote one employee, their favorite part of Teachathon was, “Everything. Getting to work closely with people from different teams in a new context; the chance to work on ideas I’m passionate about. Building something cool.”
Putting the projects together
With teams in place, it was time to get to work. Teams either worked on a relaxed schedule (a few hours per day) or an intensive schedule (three full days) to turn their idea into a working project.
For some teams, that meant creating a working MVP of a feature, but for others that meant creating sample videos or budgets. The key to the project phase was to create something that actually worked, not just make a plan to do something later.
Team presentations
At the end of the week, the whole company reconvened to see everyone’s final presentations. Each team had five minutes to present, and they had total creative control. Some people used slide decks, but some went above and beyond with video production and even a live skit. (Who knew our developers could act?)
After the company submitted their votes, we went out to celebrate a week of hard work with beers and a spontaneous hot-pot adventure. Then the following Monday, we gathered for our Closing Ceremonies where we announced the winners, along with some fun superlatives like “best team name” and “#AllTheFeels.”
The Winners’ Circle
I was truly blown away by the quality and work that went into all 16 group projects. Although I can’t share every group’s final presentation, I’m excited to spotlight three of our Teachathon winners: one of the main category winners & two superlative awards. (The pet-bandana moment has arrived.)
“Hack the Company” overall winner, “Pawesomeness”
Our VP of Finance, Tabitha, pitched an idea that was both adorable and data-driven: pet benefits. Not only are pet benefits a great recruiting tool (we’re hiring!) and cultural differentiator, but 33% of current Teachable employees have a pet or are contemplating bringing a pet into their home in 2018. We’re always looking for ways to support our employees and their ability to do great work for Teachable, so pet insurance and more pet-friendly events seemed like a win-win.
Alongside team members Casey, Elle, and Steve, Team Pawesomeness ran extensive research comparing benefits, surveying current employees about their needs, and finding pet-friendly events for Teachable to attend in the upcoming months. They also ordered pet bandanas to throw into the crowd as a real entertainment wow factor.
After taking home the win in their category last month, Team Pawesomeness has already secured the budget and approval to add pet benefits to Teachable’s extensive employee benefits package, along with some upcoming pet meetup events (for both pet owners and pet enthusiasts). We even have a Confluence page.
Overall, it’s safe to say this project is off to a meow-velous start.
“Best Pitch” superlative winner, “Who’s in Life Blight?”
First, some backstory. We recently moved into a beautiful new office in Manhattan, and there’s a conference room called Life Blight. Unlike all other conference rooms, Life Blight doesn’t have a glass door, which means you can’t see if there’s a meeting going on without interrupting.
This is the kind of problem that will break an office. Patrick, a senior software engineer, spotted this right away. For Teachathon, he pitched the only reasonable solution: a motion detector with a monitor outside the room. (How obvious is it that we’re a tech startup?)
After a deadpan pitch that brought the company to tears, Patrick and two recruits (William and Artashes) got to work on this completely necessary technology. In the end, they created working tech that shows whether or not Life Blight is occupied.
“Funnest” superlative winner, “#TeachableTriesIt”
Jess, one of our customer care shift leads, comes across awesome Teachable schools every day. She knows how much hard work goes into course creation, and she wanted to find a way for Team Teachable to take instructors’ courses. She also felt like we could do more to show our customers our passion for online learning.
That’s how Jess came up with “#TeachableTriesIt,” a fun online video series where Teachable employees try free Teachable courses. Along with team members Aquilah, Honor, and Morgan, these Teachaladies found courses on everything from bouquet arrangements to a natural glowy makeup look, and they documented their fun adventures on video. Here’s a sneak peek:
#TeachableTriesIt is working with our content team to try turning this series into a regular feature on Teachable’s social media. (Stay tuned!)
The keys to our success
These projects highlight just some of the work continuing after Teachathon. But beyond the projects, our employees really loved the Teachathon experience, enough that we’re planning to make this a regular event. But why was it such a success?
- We thought about logistics. A lot. We were proactive about communication and we thought through all details in advance, down to how employees would rank teams and afternoon snacks. (SurveyMonkey and Levain cookies, by the way.)
- We considered all employees’ needs. It was critical to make sure that all employees felt equally included, so we emphasized options for different employee schedules, skills, and interests.
- We encouraged cross-team collaboration. One of our biggest praise points from employees was the opportunity to work with other department members. We’re a growing company of 60+ employees, and everyone loved the chance to think creatively with a new set of teammates.
But all that said, I think the key to our success was much simpler than logistics. In short, I think Teachable hires great people, and I credit Teachathon’s success entirely to the brains and heart that our employees dedicated to the event. To quote one eloquent employee, “Every project was incredibly thorough, showed a ton of promise, and put on display the sheer vision of everyone at Teachable. Every presentation had personality, and each one was super entertaining. The process was well-run and it was awesome getting to know everyone on my Teachathon team.”
What’s next?
Teachathon was an incredibly fun opportunity to work together, but ultimately, this was more than just a team workshop. Our goal was to find new ideas that would meaningfully influence the future of Teachable, and that work is just getting started.
Now it’s up to each team to carry their idea forward. Some teams met with our VP of Product to see if (and when) their feature makes sense on our roadmap. Other teams have asked managers for either a budget or the time to continue working. And some teams (like mine) realized during Teachathon that our original idea didn’t make sense for Teachable after all. And that’s okay! What your business chooses NOT to do is as important — if not more — than what you choose to do, and any research that helps Teachable make a decision is still valuable. (But any research that brings more pups to the office is the most important of all.)
I’m excited to continue this new Teachatradition with both our current employees and the new hires coming our way in 2018 and beyond. (Maybe you’ll be here next time. Teachable is hiring, you know.)
