Talent Academy

Talent Academy is an HR Tech that empowers people to drive their own professional growth. Our people success platform combines multiple tools that help individuals continuously assess their purpose, potential, and development, while generating personal development journeys, tips and insights for users, leaders, and faculty. 

We were born with the purpose of revolutionizing talent development worldwide, awakening the best in everyone and giving prominence to the greatest asset of organizations: its people. We are the first startup in the world to launch a test for people to understand their ikigai (an ancient Japanese concept to understand their purpose) and the first in the Americas to launch an AQ (Adaptability Quotient) test, inspired by MIT Prof. Otto Scharmer´s U Theory. Based on individual results, our platform generates automated personal development tracks for each person according to their development needs, with curated content from the best open sources in the world, such as TED, Harvard Business Review, MIT EdX, among others, leveraging existing knowledge and targeting the right content at the right time for each person.

We are deeply committed to making self-knowledge accessible for everyone. For instance, we partnered with Gerando Falcões, a prominent Brazilian NGO that aims to reduce poverty by educating young people from the favelas, making our platform available to over 20.000 young people. We are also deeply committed to reskilling and upskilling people in the workplace, so I believe we have a strong alignment with the MIT Solve Learning for Civic Action Challenge, in particular with building core social-emotional learning skills, including self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.

We have clients in many regions around the world, and our portfolio includes global organizations such as Oracle, AB Inbev, and Raízen. More than 60,000 people have already used our tool and the feedback has been excellent (93% experience rating). We were awarded in the Top 10 in the EdTech category of the 100 Open Startups Ranking in 2020 and 2022. We were one of the 15 startups from around the world (and the only one from Brazil) selected for the Berkeley SkyDeck acceleration program in the 1st semester of 2021. In 2023 we closed a Seed round, led by ACE, with emphasis on major communication vehicles (https://pipelinevalor.globo.co...).

Although our solution currently targets enterprises, we can rollout it to any organization around the world, both in the private and public sectors. Our platform is currently available in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Japanese.

Our platform has 4 main features:

1) Purpose Assessment: online assessment inspired by Ikigai that maps the profile, talents, motivations, desired impact and potential of the entire team
2) Radar: pulse check tool inspired by the Coaching Wheel of Life for continuous reflection of people's experience and context
3) Map/Journey: socio-emotional skills assessment and personalized development journey curated with content from the best open source sources in the world
4) Beacon: 180/360 performance and skills assessment tool, with SWOT and PDI analysis for each person to be the protagonist of their development journey

All these tools are integrated and continuously accompany people's development journey, generating data and insights for the organization, leaders and faculty.

Our Purpose Assessment tool was inspired by the Japanese concept of Ikigai, which is the combination of 4 areas of life that we all need to have a life with purpose and self-realization: what you do very well (Talent), what you love do (Motivation), how you can contribute to the world (Impact) and how you can create value (Power). The tool, which takes about 20 minutes to complete, is based on theories from analytical psychology and behavioral science, and helps people reflect on their professional and life purpose. In addition to individual analysis, with development tips for the person and their manager, the platform generates consolidated data for the entire company, allowing it to understand the profile of its team, its motivational factors, strengths and points of development.

Once individuals complete our purpose and skills mapping tools, the platform generates a completely personalized development journey for each one. We have trails for the development of 15 socio-emotional skills linked to the future of work and inspired by Theory U (e.g. Protagonism, Leadership, Empathy, Resilience), all based on the Science of Learning, with content curated from the best open source sources in the world (eg TED Talk, university articles, podcasts, etc). The platform follows the evolution of people over time and generates tips and insights for employees, managers and faculty.

Last year we launched the Beacon Tool to the world, a performance and competence assessment that looks at people in a holistic way, considering not only the results, but also the process, the adherence to the organizational culture and the context/external factors that can interfere positively or negatively with the performance of each one. The tool generates a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) for each person, in addition to an Individual Development Plan and a performance and skills Dashboard for managers and faculty.

Finally, our platform generates unique people analytics that integrate the entire employee journey, empowering people to be protagonists of their professional journey, in addition to supporting leaders with data and people analytics of the main variables that impact engagement, performance and turnover.

Our solution currently targets all employees within organizations, usually enterprises with several thousand people. Our largest client is Raizen, a global company that was born from the merger of Brazilian biofuel producer COSAN and Royal Dutch Shell. They currently use our platform for their entire team, comprising over 40,000 people across the globe.

What is most remarkable about this client is that we achieved over 86% engagement with our tools, which is remarkable for an HRTech solution like ours. We are particularly proud that most people within Raizen are blue-collar and low-skilled workers in factories and farming operations, who never had access to a tool like ours.

This is our purpose: to make self-development tools available to everyone within an organization. We are changing the way organizations leverage their people by empowering literally everyone to be a protagonist of their development journey.

Another high-profile case in which we generated a meaningful impact was CALOI, Brazil´s largest bike manufacturer. There, we mapped the entire team with our Purpose Assessment tool, including team from the Manaus factory, identifying, among many other data, people´s desired impact, a tool inspired on UN´s Sustainable Development Goals. With this information, CALOI created voluntary committees in which people could propose and implement ideas aligned with their purpose. These committees were so successful that they even launched new products, such as the Pride Bike, which reverts profits to the LGBTQI+ movement in Brazil. This was widely divulged in the main media outlets of Brazil. https://exame.com/marketing/ca...

We were born within an HR consultancy that has been operating in the People Assessment and Development market (http://mbaempresarial.com.br/) for 30 years, and we made our spin-off in 2018, when we moved to Cubo, Brazil´s largest startup hub. A brief summary of the founders' experience follows:

Mauricio Betti (Co-founder & CEO): graduated in Business Administration from FGV-SP. I worked more than 5 years in strategic consultancies like BCG and Bain, and in global companies like Google and Telefonica. Led organizational transformation projects for companies of all sizes (eg TAM, Telefonica, Petrobras). After my MBA at MIT Sloan, I entered the world of HR, first in the family group (Business MBA), and since 2018 as an entrepreneur, founding Talent Academy.

Renata Betti (Co-founder & CMO): Graduated in journalism and advertising, her first job was in the communication area at Endeavor, where she discovered and fell in love with the world of entrepreneurship. For 10 years, Renata worked in some of the main communication vehicles in Brazil, such as Globonews, Veja and Época, focusing on the areas of education, business and entrepreneurship. Renata was a Globonews correspondent in Silicon Valley for 2 years, covering the world's leading technology ecosystem and learning from giants like Google, Facebook and Airbnb. She is co-founder of Talent Academy and leads the areas of Marketing, Sales and Communication.

Jaqueline Padilha (partner & COO): Psychologist by training, at the beginning of her career Jaque worked in hospitals and had direct contact with people in challenging stages of their lives, often resulting from the pressures and stress of everyday life in organizations. She also worked for 5 years in the Human Resources area at BCG, where she met Maurício. She is a partner at Talent Academy and leads the startup's product and operations area.

We currently have 40 employees, divided into 3 areas: Operations (Product/Technology/CS), MKT&Sales, and Finance & Business Development. In addition, we have a network of experts, who are HR consultants who support our clients in specific demands, using the tools on our platform.

We believe in the power of networks, and our solution can really make a difference in several organizations and initiatives across the globe. We are applying to SOLVE because we want to connect and contribute with people and organizations who, like us, want to change the world.

We aim to make access to self-knowledge and self-development universal, helping everyone within an organization, from the leadership team to the factory floor, to achieve their potential. Assessment tools have been done for decades now, but they are usually restricted to the leadership team of companies, because of their high cost and extensive, lengthy application. We have condensed 4 different assessment tools in a 15-minute, fun and innovative experience that can be applied to a whole organization in a very short period, generating not only individual data but also consolidated data that generates great insight into an organization's team, helping drive change and increase engagement. Furthermore, our platform creates a Development Journey, for each and every individual within an organization, which is a complete change of paradigm from traditional one-size-fits-all learning and development programs. Finally, we generate game-changing people analytics that help organizations truly understand the main factors that drive engagement, performance, and turnover.

With our platform, organizations from all sectors will be able to completely overhaul the way they develop and engage their employees, students, and members, helping people achieve their full-potential, and connect their unique purpose to their work. This is how we will change the world.

We have 5 impact goals for next year:

1. Double the number of users, achieving over 100k users

2. Triple our client portfolio to over 100 organizations

3. Achieve over 80% engagement rate of users with our platform

4. Achieve an NPS over 80 for our platform

5. Scale Talent Academy to at least 5 more countries in LatAm/Europe

Within 5 years, we expect to achieve the following goals:

1. Over 1M users

2. Over 1,000 client organizations

3. Achieve over 80% engagement rate of users with our platform

4. Achieve an NPS over 80 for our platform

5. Scale Talent Academy to multiple countries/regions across the globe

We expect to achieve these goals by continuing building our solution and serving clients with excellence, driving change and empowering people to be their best selves.

Our main indicators related to the UN´s SDGs are:

# of Talent Academy users, in particular of blue-collar and low skilled workers within client-organizations

Engagement rate of users with our platform

eNPS of users within client-organizations

% of turnover of employees within client-organizations

# of company-led initiatives that are connected with our platform 

We believe the greatest resource humankind has lies within ourselves. If people lived up to their potential, anything would be possible. But most people don't tap into their potential, mostly because 1) they don't know their potential; 2) they don't know how to turn it into reality; 3) organizations don't help them along the way. We firmly believe that the way that organizations manage and develop their employees is deeply flawed, and needs a complete overhaul. Studies show that up to 87% of people are disengaged at work (source: Gallup).

We believe that the future of work will be centered on promoting a purpose-driven, employee focused culture, in which people are empowered to be their best selves at work.

Our solution addresses these problems by empowering people throughout their professional journey, transforming potential into high-performance, generating fulfillment and changing the world with action-driven insights.

Our solution leverages decades of experience in behavior assessment and skills development from our parent company, an HR Consulting firm in Brazil (http://www.mbaempresarial.com....).

We aim to revolutionize people management worldwide and change the way people relate with work, through a new and scalable approach centered on purpose (we are firm believers of Simon Sinek's "the Golden Circle" framework). We offer an employee success platform that helps people identify their professional purpose, through a proprietary online assessment tool inspired on the concept of ikigai, and on the theories of Carl Jung, Edgar Schein, Ned Herrmann, among others. This assessment generates a wide array of people analytics, that help companies diagnose and act upon their entire team's profile, strenghts, gaps, motivational drivers, and potential. The platform then generates personal development journeys and insights for everyone, using proprietary algorithms and artificial intelligence, matching the ideal content for every user based on their unique development needs.

We are very committed to diversity and inclusion. Over 50% of our team is female, including 2 of 3 founders. One of our tools actively monitors diversity and inclusion within our clients, which is key to drive change.

We sell an annual license to our platform that grants access to our assessment and development tools, in a SaaS model. Currently we price the license according to the number of employees of client organizations. The unit price per license varies according to the size of the organization or scope of the project, but on average each license costs around USD 5 per month. 

In Brazil, there are over 800 companies with 500+ employees, with nearly US$800B in revenues, and over 4M employees. If we reach 10% of these companies, charging ~USD 60 / employee / year, we are talking over USD 24M / year in Brazil alone. Since we are already doing projects in other countries in Latin America, we estimate this potential to be at least twice this figure (~USD 50M / year).

Today, we have 35 active client organizations, including global companies such as Raizen, Ambev and Oracle. More than 60,000 people have used our tool and the feedback has been excellent (93% experience rating). We have been doubling our revenue every year for the past 3 years, achieving USD400k in revenue last year. We expect achieve breakeven by the end of this year. 

In 2023 we closed a Seed round, led by ACE, with emphasis on major communication vehicles in Brazil (https://pipelinevalor.globo.co...).