Stories23.09.2019
masterplan.com – When lessons learned become the next product
The Netflix for lifelong learning in the company.
What do you do if you want to found a company, but despite having spent several days in the Sauerland away from the buzz of the city, you find all your ideas rather half-baked? You think about the valuable lessons you have learned from your last successful startup, and build a business model around this knowledge! This is what happened at masterplan.com.
With their previous startup Employour, the company’s founders Dr. Daniel Schütt and Stefan Peukert successfully managed the exit to Bertelsmann in 2015. Today, the two founders see the key to their success in the ability to build up their entire digital marketing expertise internally, after initial attempts with external consultants did not live up to their expectations. For the mechanical engineer and the business economist, this is proof that anyone can acquire the necessary skills for digitisation if the motivation is right. A ‘Netflix for in-company training’ would be ideal.
This was the idea that kickstarted the masterplan.com story in 2017. Daniel and Stefan took the starting capital from the proceeds of the sale of Employour. With DvH Ventures, Tengelmann Ventures and a business angel, seed financing soon followed. In mid-2019, forty people were working for the Bochum-based company.
What is your USP? We perfectly combine content and platform. The result is that learning can, for the first time, be integrated seamlessly into everyday working life - our customers and data confirm this. We see that the users spend a huge amount of time on the platform and in the individual lessons. As a result, they really stay on the ball - some users have been learning continuously for a year and a half.
Why do you do what you do? What drives you? The world is changing faster and faster - in all areas. This means that every human being has to learn with increasing speed so that they don’t get left behind. Nowadays, learning doesn’t just take place in school, but continues throughout our whole lives. Building a platform which makes this is possible is a huge motivation for us. In addition, you have the dynamic of entrepreneurship: One day you have the feeling that everything is over, but then the next day you know that you are actually changing the world - we thrive extremely well in these tense situations.
What are you particularly proud of? If you look at the challenges around the planet today, almost all of them can be solved by education. Working on an educational company, building an educational product, and then seeing our product change people's behaviour is cool. For example, we get feedback from mid-sized companies who say that their teams are starting to think and work agile thanks to the product we offer.
What is your goal for the next three to five years? We want to build the operating system for in-company training. We want to provide everyone in a company with the best learning environment for professional development.
Why should people apply for a job at masterplan.com? If you look at the economy, many areas are monopolistic. Amazon, for example, occupies shopping, and Google occupies internet searches. If you share the opinion that education can solve the big problems on this planet and you want to work for a company that aims at occupying the field of education, then you will fit in perfectly. Our vision and the matching product are highly attractive for applicants.
