Business
Hello everybody! Today, we have Freddy Vega from Platzi. This is a very special episode for me because Freddy and I are both from Colombia and I am a big fan of Platzi. Freddy is the creator of Cristalab, he was also a university teacher; and the Founder and CEO of Platzi. In today’s episode, we’re going to explore Freddy’s journey at Platzi. We wanted to create a totally different online learning experience that could change the world. Platzi was created because of the collaborative efforts of Freddy Vega and Christian Van Der Henst, which interestingly was Freddy’s number one competitor. The goal was to change the 10% completion rate of online education. Though the first launch in Argentina was a failure, they moved forward and faced the challenges. Freddy shares the make-it-or-break-it moments of Platzi, how he and Christian resolved some communication issues, and how they both leveraged the idea and empowered their team. He emphasizes on the importance of transparency in a startup, and how the pursuit of truth can define its success. Right now, Platzi is positively impacting 700,000 people in 20 different cities, 12 different countries, with over 200 online courses. Episode Quotes "What actually drove us was that our biggest passion was education." "I just never thought the possibility of failing. I just thought that it's going to succeed slower instead of just not going to happen." "If we wanted to do something it's not going to be for Mexico, Colombia, Argentina or Spain. It had to be something for everyone in the world." "You should always reward your first users, the people that believed in you." "A good leader will give you a straight order and explaining why." "When you're not transparent, the cost of communication along the company grows." "It's always education with an effort on a scalable impact in the digital economy that creates the biggest results." "The pursuit of truth defines the people that will be successful in the future." Listen to Learn 00:22 Getting to know Freddy Vega and his journey creating Platzi 05:33 What drove you to do Platzi? 08:38 What led you to move forward after the failure in Argentina? 11:22 The challenges and make-it-or-break-it moments in building Platzi 20:22 The Leader's Camp at Platzi: How Freddy and Christian leverage their brain trust to empower their team 23:22 What experiences have driven you to have a very open introspective mindset? 29:56 If you could go back in time, what advice would you tell yourself? 31:30 Rapid Fire Questions 38:10 If you could teach the world one skill, what would it be? 41:39 Parting thoughts? Where can people find you and learn more about your projects?