Climb Hire

While Climb Hire does teach hard skills to prepare Climbers for the Salesforce Administrator certification, the program dedicates at least as much attention to helping Climbers intentionally and strategically cultivate relationships with fellow Climbers and prospective employers. The program consists of 150 hours of online classes that take place on evenings, split evenly between hard and soft skills training. It also includes a real-world Capstone Project and opportunities to engage with the community outside of class time, including volunteer events in which Climbers connect with industry professionals. 

Climb Hire developed a peer-to-peer cohort model in which Climbers provide each other with support and care even as they practice networking skills. The fellowship fosters an environment in which Climbers and near-peer alumni Fellows share their stories of breaking into the “new collar” economy. By treating these lived experiences as assets, Climb Hire aims to motivate and foster solidarity among Climbers. 

The program reinforces this sense of community through its financial model as well, hiring alumni Fellows to work as facilitators and mentors. Once alumni find a job and earn an annual salary of at least $45,000 in the Bay Area, or $39,000 in Colorado, they help pay for the training of future Climbers through monthly contributions of $150. This alignment of personal, professional, and financial incentives around community-building and relationships puts social capital-building at the heart of Climb Hire’s model.

For initial cohorts, Climb Hire has directly brokered connections with employers and industry professionals. As the alumni network grows and establishes itself, Climb Hire aims to shift more of that employer-connecting role to its alumni, helping alumni continue their networking skills development. If alumni Fellows are able to leverage their social capital to help current Climbers succeed, the program can continue to scale efficiently—Climb Hire expects Cohort 3 to have 100-120 Climbers divided into two classes, more than double the previous cohort size.

Peers: Climb Hire fosters an environment in which each cohort also becomes a social network where social support and information-sharing are explicit expectations. The curriculum makes visible the role of social capital in finding employment and encourages Climbers to refer each other to job openings and share back learnings from relevant experiences such as job interviews. The program is also iterating on specific peer support models, introducing peer “success buddies” whom Climbers can turn to for assignment and job support, and exploring “gratitude circles” at the end of each class session to build community and trust.

Alumni Fellows: Climb Hire alumni who secure jobs and/or successfully pass the Salesforce Admin certification exam can apply to return to work as Fellows, which entails mentoring and facilitating class in smaller breakout rooms during the bi-weekly three-hour sessions. They also complete weekly coaching calls with a small group of four to five Climbers. The program is working to increase Fellows’ capacity to teach and broker connections with employers.

Industry Professionals: Climb Hire frequently invites industry professionals from technology companies to help Climbers improve their soft skills and prepare for job interviews. The program makes clear the importance of building social capital with these professionals as a learning opportunity, in addition to a relationship-development one. Climb Hire anticipates holding as many as five events connecting Climbers in the next cohort with industry professionals, ideally meeting eight to ten professionals and establishing strong individual relationships when they make sense, and in which the volunteers will have an opportunity to reflect on the role that networks and relationships played in their own professional lives.

Employers: Climb Hire invites prospective employers to meet Climbers at signature events that it dubs “social capital events”—typically dinners and happy hours, but now only virtual options—encouraging Climbers to use their newly formed relationship skills and to make connections in industry. 

Climb Hire Staff: Climb Hire staff initially delivered much of the program’s instruction. As these responsibilities have shifted to Fellows, the staff’s relationship with Climbers is transitioning largely to one-on-one appointments on an as-needed basis. Climb Hire’s staff now carries out weekly training sessions with Fellows. Further, Fellows individually report to staff once a month on their small group work with Climbers, in addition to regular notes on their four to five Climber mentees’ progress and challenges. Finally, staff vouch for Climbers and alumni among their own networks.

Make the importance of social capital transparent. Climb Hire is not a program in which participants absorb good networking habits implicitly or through osmosis. Rather, the program repeatedly and consistently emphasizes the importance of relationships and connections in each facet of the curriculum and community-building approach. Access to new relationships with both peers and industry professionals is a core value proposition in addition to helping develop hard skills.

Create pathways to community-building. Climb Hire centers its peer-to-peer cohort model around sharing information, mutual support, and intentionality. By encouraging Climbers to share their experiences, and by introducing structured relationships among peers, such as the Success Buddies system, Climb Hire scaffolds community- and relationship-building skills. The Capstone Project also requires teamwork and collaboration.

Collect relationship-specific data. Climb Hire engages participants in middle and end-of-program focus groups, some led by alumni and others by staff members. Questions focus on Climbers’ experiences with alumni mentors, the perceived quality of relationships developed within the cohort relative to outside the program, and other relationship-specific queries. Such data can shed light on the impact of Climb Hire-specific relationships on metrics such as graduation rate, job placement, and earnings outcomes.

Climb Hire conducts mid and post-program survey focus groups to gauge the extent to which Climbers are building out their networks, and the nature of those networks. Examples of questions include:

Based on your experiences thus far, do you think you have created any close friendships at Climb Hire?

Did you keep in touch with any volunteers after the event?

Please comment on how the volunteers have been helpful to you after the events.

If you are to think about your relationships with other Climbers in comparison to other relationships you have developed over your lifetime, is there anything that stands out as particularly unique or special in these relationships?