Hi all, I am looking to switch from the Innovator Founder visa to the Global Talent visa (exceptional promise).
Most of my application will centre around the UK-based software company I have co-founded, SeedCulture (https://seedculture.com). Do you think this will suffice?
Mandatory Criteria: Recognition as a leading talent in the digital technology field within the last 5 years.
Led the growth of SeedCulture, a product-led digital technology company, as the CEO and co-founder.
Evidence:
o Letter from Dr. Eric Risser, a technology leader who sold his AI startup for over USD 60m and is one of our advisors.
o Articles of association, showing my shareholding in SeedCulture
o Bank statement showing our 120k investment from Carbon13 (tech investor)
Optional Criteria: 1. Innovation as a founder of a product-led digital technology company.
o Demo video of SeedCultureās platform, showcasing our innovative learning-action loop.
o Visual explanation of how our platform enables user-driven action and measurable impact.
o Audited accounts (last financial year) demonstrating the platformās traction (although we donāt have high sales)
2. Significant technical, commercial, or entrepreneurial contributions to the field.
o Led business development at SeedCulture, resulting in recurring software subscriptions.
Evidence:
ļ§ Letter from a key customer.
ļ§ Pipeline of global organisations (HubSpot deal pipeline).
ļ§ Impact metrics, e.g., number of users and community growth.
Alternative OC (if needed):
Led marketing at SWAN Systems (SaaS scaleup) in 2020, where I contributed to them winning a global pitch competition and beginning their international expansion.
Evidence:
o Letter of recommendation from the CEO of SWAN Systems.
Other: Competitive remuneration from my current role at a non-profit. We have a tech-based Academy that we run as our main product, although the technology we use to do so is an off-the-shelf education tool.
Recommendation Letters:
SWAN Systems CEO ā Evidence of my marketing and growth contributions in 2020.
Carbon13 Investor ā Evidence of commercial and entrepreneurial leadership at SeedCulture
CTO & Co-Founder, SeedCulture ā Insight into my leadership role in building SeedCulture.
Questions:
What is an āearly stage in their careerā? I have been working for a decade now but only in the last five years in the digital tech space.
Is it a good idea to use my startupās audited accounts as evidence, if our sales are low?
Thoughts on attaching my current salary (not at my startup) - I have taken a role on the side and it has a good salary, not sure itās tech focused enough though.
Is this application too reliant on SeedCulture? Should I use the SWAN Systems example in OC2?
Your primary evidence centered around SeedCulture provides a solid foundation, alongwith the investment from Carbon13. The recognition of your company through investment and advisory relationships helps establish your position in the digital technology field.
Regarding your specific questions: Being āearly in careerā typically refers to the time in the specific field (digital technology) rather than overall work experience, so your five years in tech should qualify. While including the audited accounts could demonstrate transparency, low sales figures might not strengthen your case unless they show significant growth trajectory or market potential.
The application does lean heavily on SeedCulture, but this isnāt necessarily a problem if the evidence is strong. However, incorporating the SWAN Systems experience could provide valuable diversity to your application.
For the mandatory criteria, your strongest evidence appears to be the combination of Dr. Risserās letter and the Carbon13 investment. These third-party validations of your work carry more weight than self-reported achievements. Consider emphasizing the innovative aspects of SeedCultureās platform and any measurable impact youāve created in the digital technology space.
While your current role at the non-profit might demonstrate earning potential, focusing on your tech-related achievements and potential would likely make for a stronger application.
Thank you so much, Akash! Do you have any examples of evidence that would help to showcase product innovation?
And if I donāt use the SWAN Systems example in my Optional Criteria but do use the letter from their CEO in the recommendation letter, do you think that would make sense?
And do you know if a screenshot of a CRM (Hubspot) deal pipeline is suffice evidence to show commercial impact? Or would it be better to showcase more tangible marketing statistics, such as number of email subscribers, LinkedIn followers etc?
You need atleast 2 strong evidences per criteria. Letters and salary evidence are insufficient for any criteria. A good split is 4-3-3.
MC: Try adding one more evidence esp. if it is a public evidence.
OC
1: How does this show your specific contribution to the innovation? Need to have stronger linkage of your contribution to innovation and impact. Company videos and explainers arenāt enough.
2: This seems like 1 evidence. Need to have one more.
Thanks so much for the comments, @pahuja! A few questions:
What do you mean by āpublic evidenceā?
What is a good piece of evidence that āprovesā your contribution to the product innovation? This may be hard for me as Iām not the technical co-founder, but did contribute to the product a lot in the way of corporate sustainability and behaviour change domain expertise
Iām not sure I understand your point on OC2: are the letter, the deal pipeline, and impact metrics not three pieces of evidence?
Public evidence = anything under MC which adds to advancement of sector eg. speaking/panels/articles/media mentions etc. More and more TN looks for these evidences for MC and not just internal work evidences.
You will need to have a backing reference letter validating your self-claims, details of what exactly is the product innovation and how its attributed to you, product diagrams/architectures, any proof of product in the market along with your name etc. Refer to the TN guidelines for details.
OC2: is about demonstrating contribution to the field outside of your immediate occupation. I think you are confusing OC3 with OC2. Even if its OC3, just the deal pipeline in one document would seem incomplete. Impact metrics need to be in addition to what your contribution is and to what does the impact actually align with? You should show two specific examples of impact along with quantified metrics and demonstrate how its attributed to you specifically.
Thank you @pahuja , this is super helpful! I have some follow up questions below, would love your thoughts if youāre open to sharing:
I was interviewed for a couple of sustainability/ESG podcasts. Not specifically tech related interviews but mentioned some of our platform and the way we use tech to solve sustainability problems. Do you think this is a good example of public evidence?
I could also provide a link to our pitch in the tech incubator that we were funded by, do you think this is worth including in the MC?
Regarding the product innovation OC, would it be suitable to use:
Platform screenshots to show the core innovation (AI-driven personalisation, gamification, and behavioural science to upskill employees in sustainability)
A letter from our CTO & Co-Founder, validating my key contributions to the product innovations.
And sorry, I numbered it OC2 because it was the second piece of optional criteria evidence I was providing, not because it was the second one in the list provided by Technation. Sorry for the confusion! Itās the commercial contribution one. I was thinking of providing a letter from our key re-sell partner (who themselves have 25k+ accounts), and a letter of success about an innovation grant that I successfully applied for when I started the company.
you can add the podcasts but highlight the tech angle to it. If itās not tech related TN wonāt consider it valid
the pitch doesnāt count as valid, they may not even check external links. Proof of funding is more relevant, you can use relevant screenshots from the pitch like forecasted revenue but itās not really a valid evidence to prove anything
highlight whatās innovative in OC1 and your contribution to it
OC3 needs to demonstrate impact on quantified company metrics. As long as you can show this itās fine