Happy New Year’s Eve!

Here are my top 5 blog posts of 2021:

1. In Online Ed, Content is no longer King–Cohorts are

2. Course Mechanics Canvas: 12 levers to achieve course market fit

3. The Super Specific How: How to make your cohort-based course more rigorous

4. The State Change Method: How to deliver engaging live lectures on Zoom

5. How to instantly show your value

Most of these articles were based on ideas I’ve been percolating on for 2-3 years, so it felt good to finally get it on paper to share with you. I’ve loved hearing your feedback–some of you printed these to put on your desk or had semi-permanent browser tabs open. I’m honored and love how you’re applying these frameworks to your own work.

It's been an incredible 1st year building my startup, Maven. I'm so proud to work with my co-founders & our amazing team of operators and engineers. Here’s an interview where I share my experience so far building an early-stage startup.

I can’t believe this time last year, we had only 3 team members: me, Gagan, and our first hire. All we had was a vision and a rough sketch of our go-to-market strategy. Flash forward to today: it’s wild how much you can build in a year.  

Recap of Maven’s 2021:

👩‍🏫 100+ cohorts launched

🚀 Dozens of instructors made $10K+ in course sales from a single cohort

💥 Multiple instructors made $250K+

💰 Raised $25M from First Round and a16z

🙌 Grew from 3 to 20+ employees

🚢 Launched private beta & hit Y1 product milestones

In 2020, I wrote 47 blog posts. In 2021, I wrote fewer--mainly because I’ve been in operator-mode and my waking hours (and some work dreams too lol) are focused on Maven. In 2022, I want to continue sharing my insights about the future of education--plus, start sharing stories more frequently of what I’m learning along the way as a founder. If you have friends who would find this interesting, please direct them here so they can subscribe.

Thanks for being here for the ride. Here's to great things to come. 🥂

See you next year,

Wes