How Do You Build Community Around Certification Courses?

Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia is the Founder and CEO of Product School, the largest community of product managers in the world. After recognizing a gap in the Product Management industry, Carlos created a niche hybrid between engineering and business school. From 1 to 1 million, the community skyrocketed in growth over 6 years and continues to educate, train, and certify product managers globally. In 2013, Carlos moved from Spain to Silicon Valley to work on an online education marketplace startup - Floqq. After four years of grinding, he decided to shift gears and focus on what would benefit others and make them happy, resulting in Product School. Carlos wanted to give back and share his knowledge so he created a space for others to access product management resources and began training and educating people at events. Carlos recruited high level product managers from companies like Facebook, Netflix, and Uber, to mentor, support, and teach the community members. Across the world, Cohort classes of 20 students were created to educate and certify eager product managers, with a lead mentor, guest speakers, career support, and networking opportunities. Ninety percent of resources are free - including recordings, templates, and a variety of training courses, with paid certifications available. Product School now hosts 5 conferences a year and 2 events a day. The community of 1 million is made up of 20,000 alumni, inner circle product leaders, and event attendees, and is the ideal place for product leaders to test out new products and features. Who is this episode for?: B2C, Online, Starting 3 key takeaways: - Giving back and educating others with the knowledge that high-quality product managers gained was what made Product School so unique and successful. - The Product School Community became the best place to test out new ideas and theories, because everyone was learning and growing together with the same end-goals of success. - Product School filled the void in the market for product management training, resources, and connections and now has 1 million members benefitting from the program.