As the Digital Age continues to reshape the world around us, we have recently seen a surge in the number of HR-Tech (Human Resource Technology) and Ed-Tech (Education Technology) startups. Many events, such as the Thailand HR Tech event and Education Disruption Conference 2018, underline the growing importance of these two emerging sectors. If you are talking about startups that are currently at the top of their game in the industry, SkillLane will most certainly be at the top of that list.
SkillLane is an online course platform in the form of both a website and a mobile application with a focus on developing skills and empowering those in the workplace to express themselves and reach their full potential. SkillLane brings together experts in each individual field to teach classes in video format, allowing convenient, easy access to knowledge for all – anytime and anywhere. The content of SkillLane courses focuses mainly on practical skills. More specifically, the course content promotes skills which students can then apply to their lives and their work in the context of their individual situation. For example, there is content aimed at helping the students to develop a savings plan or even to conceptualize and build a startup business.
SkillLane was founded in 2015 by two friends from Kellogg University, in the United States: Big (Thitipong Pisistwuthinan) and Nat (Ehkchat Asavarusikul). Having both worked with startup companies and organizations supporting entrepreneurs in the US, they brought the experience and skills they had gained abroad back to Thailand to found SkillLane. And in doing so, they catapulted their originally small business into a genuine Thai startup company with real income and exponential growth in a variety of dimensions. The company has undergone massive growth from its humble beginnings of filming in their dorm with just one teacher—Nat himself—teaching Microsoft Excel usage, to becoming a trusted platform for more than 400 teachers delivering courses to over 150,000 students—all in less than 3 years. SkillLane has catapulted itself forward and grown from serving one student to hundreds of thousands of learners in just a short period of time thanks to these factors:
Creating Value for both Learners and Instructors
What has made SkillLane the largest online learning platform in Thailand is its focus on producing content in conjunction with instructors in order to create the best, most appropriate content for the learners. Added to that is the importance placed on ensuring the platform is one that creates value for instructors and learners, resulting in consistent, congruent growth for both groups. For learners, there are dedicated teams and experts assigned to screening content quality. The teachers must have genuine experience and expertise in each specific field in order to control the quality of the courses. For course filming, SkillLane has invested in the creation of its own studio space so that filming quality can be controlled in order to meet and maintain the highest of standards. The value that SkillLane provides to its instructors is far more than just an online platform or tool. Rather, SkillLane partners with instructors, providing them with advice and guidance on how to create the best possible service for the students and platform users. Many teachers have a great deal of expertise in their chosen field, but perhaps lack the experience in reaching their target audience online. SkillLane helps to bridge this gap by providing recommendations and advice. In addition to working with a number of very well-known instructors and professors, SkillLane has also partnered with various institutions, such as the 2morrow Group. In this example, SkillLane took the quality lessons and instruction of the 2morrow Group’s offline learning world and developed them for the online world, and in doing so, provided a greater benefit and added value for the institution.
Exploring New Distribution Channels for an Existing Customer Base
SkillLane’s initial customer base was primarily made up of the general consumer, and its business model was the B2C (Business-to-Consumer) model. In addition to reaching customers through the distribution channels of SkillLane itself, the company has also expanded to reach the users of two other partners: the Sanook Learning website and the Ookbee mobile application.
Transforming Existing Market Limitations into Opportunities for New Market Expansion
From experience, SkillLane has discovered that people today have a desire to be continually learning and developing themselves, whether in terms of mindset, work skills, or their personal lives. Companies and organizations must, inevitably, develop the potential of their human resources, by providing their people with training and the knowledge necessary for their company to be a driving force in their specific industries. This is especially pertinent considering the intense competition and rapidly changing technology of today’s Digital Age. From their small beginnings as a B2C business just three years ago, SkillLane has now grown to the point where the company is providing its business services as an online course platform to many leading organizations throughout the country.
Among SkillLane’s current corporate clients are a number of leading companies listed on the stock exchange from a wide variety of industries, including telecommunications, online media, finance, and retail, among others. SkillLane has gained the confidence of corporate giants in these fields thanks to the ability of its platform to solve employee development issues in ways that traditional classroom learning has been unable to deliver. This includes:
- On-demand learning without the need to wait for a scheduled course with a fixed time period. For example, certain company courses may be held only once a year. This means that when new employees arrive, they may have to wait another year for the course and, therefore, the skill development opportunities that come with it. This is a lost opportunity cost for the company. With on-line courses, however, new employees have the opportunity to study at any time, allowing them to bring these work skills to the job immediately, creating greater value for the company.
- Employees can repeat courses or specific classes in SkillLane at any time, providing opportunities to review content and, therefore, consistently increasing work proficiency.
- In today’s constantly changing world, new trends emerging endlessly. For every new piece of knowledge or skill required, SkillLane swiftly brings new content to its platform, allowing employees to access new skills as needed.
Promoting a Company Culture of Business Growth and Expansion
SkillLane’s company culture is one that combines “startup” with “professionalism”, encouraging people to learn and develop; providing opportunities for people to think outside the box, express their ideas, make decisions, and take action on a professional level. Many of the services SkillLane now provides have been the result of team decisions rather than of a single person or overseer. This combined company culture model has resulted in massive strides forward in its business and services.
In the past, we have mostly seen a pattern of startup companies as technology developers, but SkillLane has instead built upon the use of technology to develop people. In 2016, AIS welcomed SkillLane into the AIS The StartUp family, and has partnered with them in developing a tactical communications strategy tool known as the Persuasive Communication Strategy Canvas. It is open to the public and available to study for free at www.skilllane.com/courses/communication-canvas from today onwards.
