Campground Systems

Last week we convened a forum of Accelerator Program Leaders to discuss…what happens AFTER the accelerator program is over? Our event hosts?(me from?Campground Systems, Anand Deshpande at Mercury, and Keyaira Lock Adewunmi at the The Garage at Northwestern University in SF) wanted to create a forum of practitioners and peers to discuss this question. These takeaways should be relevant to any type of program or even VC platform trying to figure out how to keep program alumni engaged.? My takeaways:? ?? Community is a mandate for accelerator programs. (That’s probably why everyone who attended was so fun). Community events were the most common strategy to keep alumni activated and supported. Our panelists had a lot to share -- Sylvia Flores at Manos Accelerator highlighted how they host a conference in Mexico for their entire Latin American community.? Claire Rosenfeld mentioned that Alchemist Accelerator alumni will show up to hikes and talks without any special incentive – they just have a ton of loyalty and love for the program. Neal Sales-Griffin shared from the Techstars side that hosting high-quality retreats in Tahoe never fails to bring founders back. ?? Content varies by audience but it’s often more important to provide strong mentorship / connection than the answers. Whether it’s financial modeling or sales training, sometimes the most effective learning comes from founders who are just one stage ahead of you (an insight we came to when I was at All Raise as well). ?? Collecting data from alumni involves picking up the phone and calling them. ?? CRM's and platforms are critical to keep everyone engaged (and track data), but a solution didn't emerge as winner. I swear I didn’t plant this theme, but accelerators are either swimming in spreadsheets and Airtables and/or investing a ton of money (even up to 60 engineers internally) to build a homegrown platform. One panelist mentioned that systematizing accelerator ops in a tool can cut down the time to launch ("I can launch an accelerator in a day by replicating the system I built!") -- so it's pretty important to get this right. This is why I'm building Campground -- to integrate the CRM part with the participant-facing engagement without needing to invest hundreds of thousands of $$. I just love hosting learning conversations like this to support the growth and professional development of program leaders. You can join our community too, link in the chat! And great to meet y'all - Kathleen Quinn Steeves, Sylvia Flores, Sohela Shah, Ph.D., Madeleine Vecchione, Kate Drane, Marion Araque, M.Ed, Grace Anne Belangia, Marcus Thompson, Caroline W., Troy Daley

?? ThinkChicago by World Business Chicago = connecting local students with career opportunities by innovative companies and startups. We want #Chicagoland companies to thrive and scale with #Chicagoland talent. ?? Thank you Mayor Brandon Johnson for joining us to kickoff #ThinkChicago NEXT 2024 by World Business Chicago, with ComEd, Microsoft, 1871, Salesforce, City Colleges of Chicago, and University of Illinois System! ?? The Mayor has a powerful call-to-action for the City of Chicago: to transform our city by investing in the success of our young people, via meaningful career pathways. ?? World Business Chicago’s #ThinkChicago program strives to build a more inclusive and diverse workforce for our #Chicago’s #business, #innovation, and #startup ecosystem: our student cohort is majority women, majority students of color, and represent more than 30 unique #Chicagoland universities and colleges. ThinkChicago by World Business Chicago leads a series of events, initiatives, and workshops focused on career exploration, immersion, development, and preparation. As our annual summer flagship event, our multi-day #ThinkChicagoNEXT event connects students with business and innovation ecosystem leaders, opportunities to explore jobs by local companies and startups, and career preparation workshops. In recent years, ThinkChicago by World Business Chicago distributed resumes books to 160+ local companies for their hiring and talent needs. World Business Chicago is so proud of our coalition of incredible partners committed to building a world-class and diverse workforce right here in #Chicagoland and #Illinois: ? Microsoft: Nisaini R., Paige Michals, Jasmine Macklin ? ComEd: Gil C. Quiniones, Laticia Dezell Holbert, Max Leichtman ? 1871: Lydia Walters ? Salesforce: Cheryl Munroe, Christina Meitus ? City Colleges of Chicago: Juan Salgado, Eric B. Lugo ? University of Illinois System: Brenna Conway, Jed Taylor, Rashid Bashir ?? As always, phenomenal work by our World Business Chicago rockstars Trenton Dunn and Manleen Rajput! ?? Learn more here: https://lnkd.in/g-uE59Mt ??Salesforce Tower, #Chicago

I’m excited to share more about Campground Systems, the company I’ve been building in stealth mode for the past year. It’s the product I wish I had as a program leader. It's just perfect timing to announce Campground in the context of a program that recently launched out of pilot mode: The newly announced Corps to Career Initiative run by the California Volunteers Fund, an innovative way to help California Service Corps Alumni launch fulfilling careers while meeting the state’s workforce needs. The Corps to Career Initiative is powered by Campground, and here's how. Much like other workforce programs, they produce workshops, career fairs, and manage employer partners. Corps to Career needed: ?? A login-protected hub for Fellows to access resources and events ?? A directory for Fellows and Employers to browse, filter, and connect ?? A way for students to update their own data ?? A true CRM, not Google Sheets, to track engagement and metrics ?? Multiple partners and campuses to manage on the back-end, in one place Campground is the first purpose-built CRM and hub designed for program leaders to do ALL those things in one place quickly. More than 82% of the 640+ stakeholders on the platform are actively engaged. As Tina Kim, deputy director, shared, the alternative would likely have been building a homegrown platform that did all of the above. “Campground created a centralized version of our systems to start with.” It allowed their small team to focus on program delivery, not customizing a complex product…saving hundreds of thousands of dollars in staff and consulting time. (This was a huge motivation for me to start Campground, after seeing so many dollars and hours spent on Salesforce/HubSpot/Airtable implementations that just didn't scale!) As we head into year 2 of the initiative, the team has huge ambitions to serve the 10K+ Californians who enter the Service Corps every year. Campground is excited to empower that ambition from behind the scenes. Can’t wait to share more. Thanks David Silver, Jordan Mickens, Chantell Padilla, and Zena Amran, M.Ed for being great Campground users! Learn more about Corps to Career here: https://lapost.us/?p=63942 Learn more about Campground here: www.campground.fyi

Meet our 2024 PitcHER? Finalists (part two)! ?? The 10 finalists will now hone their pitches with coaching from Philly Startup Leaders and showcase their startups for our panel of judges. Be there to hear their innovative startup ideas and see who wins $100,000 in funding and mentorship from one of the judges! Learn more about our PitcHER finalists here: https://lnkd.in/gpAXVAHc

As part of our #GETTransition to community, we're spending the next couple months celebrating some of our amazing partners in the ecosystem! Campground has collaborated with us for #GETExploration and #GETChampions and we can't wait to see what they do next! Celebrating CAMPGROUND and their commitment to equity in tech by providing innovative CRM tools for programs, companies, and cohorts! Learn more about their impactful work to help impact and shape an inclusive future in technology. Learn More about CAMPGROUND by visiting them at https://lnkd.in/ef7ttexA #GETCitiesSpotlight #EquityChampions #GETTransition #GETCommunity #Campground

After receiving more than 75 submissions from alumni-founded startups across the country, we're excited to announce the 5 Finalists chosen to compete at Alumni VentureCat on July 19, 2024! They're slated to pitch to a world-class panel of judges, as well as a curated audience of Bay Area investors, entrepreneurs, and Northwestern University alumni for the chance to win $100,000. Congratulations and best of luck to Sophia Wennstedt & Chance Cobb of Blip Energy; Sruti Bharat of Campground Systems; Summer Delaney, MBA of CollabWORK; Prarthana Gupta of OrdrSmart (Techstars Farm to Fork'23); and Jake Gutstein & Graham Kirstein of Zest. Read more about Alumni VentureCat, the Finalists, and more! ?? https://lnkd.in/dGv-MHUf