In this four week course we will cover the core concepts of tech to give you the knowledge and confidence to ask the right questions, evaluate opportunities and become smart money.

Who this course is for:

• Angel investors who have signed their first or second checks
• Aspiring investors
• Venture Capitalists without software backgrounds

A good use of a smart investor's time is not to learn to code, but to understand the technology production process and make sure it aligns with business goals. To do this successfully, investors need to understand technology workflows, learn how to ask the right questions and estimate costs effectively.

You will learn:

• Core differences between tech & traditional businesses
• Which metrics are important at which stage
• Who does what on a product team
• How much different stages of development cost

This is not a course on investing or coding. This course focusses on the core concepts of software product development and how they relate to business strategy. 

COURSE DATES: 11 JULY - 5 AUGUST 2022

About your instructor

Sophia Matveeva is the CEO & founder of Tech For Non-Techies, an education company and consultancy. Sophia has contributed to the Financial Times, The Guardian and Forbes on entrepreneurship and technology, and hosts the top rated Tech for Non-Techies podcast.

Tech for Non-Techies teaches non-technical professionals how to Speak Tech and succeed in the Digital Age through corporate & individual training programs. As a non-technical founder, Sophia has co-created apps and algorithms that have been used by thousands, won App of the Day by Mashable, and were featured by Inc, the BBC and more.
 
She has also guest lectured at the University of Chicago, London Business School, and Oxford University, and led the Blackstone x Techstars accelerator at the University of Texas.
 
Sophia is a start-up mentor at the Chicago Booth Polsky Center of Entrepreneurship, and has advised leading accelerators including Chicago Booth’s New Venture Challenge and the Microsoft x London College of Fashion incubator.
 
She holds an MBA from Chicago Booth, and a BSc (Hons) in Politics from Bristol. She speaks English, Russian and French. Sophia also sits on the Board of University of Chicago’s Alumni in the UK.

Sophia's Story

When I got the admissions letter from Chicago Booth, I thought life was going to be sorted. Or at least my career! 

The University of Chicago Booth School of Business was consistently ranked as the global #1 business school by Business Week and The Economist, so I was feeling pretty smug.

My plan, as I wrote in my admissions essay, was to get to business school, come up with a brilliant startup idea, get a team together, get funding and leave with an MBA and a startup. Naturally, world domination would follow.

By this point, I had worked in a top financial PR company, had a stint in a private equity firm in London and worked in India. I had very little knowledge of the tech sector, but it seemed to be where all the opportunity was coming from. 

I desperately wanted to join the tech boom, and spent most of business school testing various ideas for tech startups. Eventually, the beginnings of an idea for a retail tech business began to take place.

I managed to convince some of my classmates to join me and, through sheer bloodymindedness, we got into the Chicago Booth New Venture Challenge, the top academic accelerator in the United States.

The problem was, none of my classmates actually new how to build the thing we were pitching. Naturally, we didn't get very far in the accelerator, but again, through more persistence and bloodymindedness, I managed to raise some angel funding and marched bravely towards global tech domination. 

This is when disasters began to strike. I worked with a part time CTO, who was planning to raise his Big Tech job when we had raised more money. He said words to me I did not understand.

I looked them up on Google and watched endless YouTube explanations, but that left me more confused. I signed up and paid for coding courses, which I either hated and completed or failed to finish and wallowed in guilt. 

There are plenty of courses helping you to retrain to become a developer or a data scientists, but that's not what I needed. I needed to know how to work with technical professionals to deliver a product into users' hands. 

I ended up learning how to hire and work with developers, designers and data analysts on the job. It was a hard, painful and expensive journey, but when I was going through it, there was no other way.

I began writing about what I was learning in Forbes, and when my article What Non-Technical Founders Really Need To Know About Tech reached thousands in less than a day, I realised that I was not alone.

I began giving talks to help non-technical entrepreneurs get the skills and confidence to build their tech ventures. I taught University of Chicago alumni, spoke at the Mayor of London's international trade promotion agency London and Partners and at entrepreneurial hubs like WeWork. 

One day, an MBA student from London Business School came to my talk and found it so useful, he convinced London Business School to host the course. 

Since then, MBA students, investors and corporate leaders have used my courses to create their first products, make smarter investment decisions and lead digital transformation projects. 

Every company is now a tech company. Even your coffee shop has an app!

This is why I believe that knowing the core concepts of tech is simply a core leadership skill in the Digital Age. 

Taught at

In this online course you will learn

1) Tech vs traditional businesses

• Digital workflow: from idea to product. The steps to take and the professionals involved
• Core differences with traditional business

2) The metrics that matter

• Product metrics vs business metrics
• Why product metrics change over time
• Spot vanity metrics

3) Who does what on a product team

• Product management
• Design for technology
• Back end vs front end
• Analysis vs Data science

4) Myth busting

• Build it & they will come
• Don't overvalue the tech
• & more

The details

Every week, you will get new course content to watch and read on demand. Each week you will also have a 30 - 45 minute 1:1 session with Sophia Matveeva to apply what you are learning in the course to your unique goals. 

We will also cover two start-up pitch presentations, to help you practice what questions to ask.