After 16 years in development, as a tech lead, architect and CTO, I am opening an education center and a closed club for developers and tech leads. Not a course with stars and a certificate that later sits on LinkedIn. A live circle of practitioners with a cap on headcount.
Right now I am recruiting the core: the first 15–20 people who will set the tone. For them the first year is free. Later the club will be paid. The core still gets that year at zero.
What is inside
Two group calls a month. We review someone else’s case and your own: architecture, code, a career knot. A private chat between calls. Short reviews from members and from me.
Once a month a meetup in Moscow. Bring a work problem or just talk. Referrals and openings live in the same circle. The center’s materials open to members.
Seats are few on purpose. A large chat impersonates a community. Conversation there usually dies under gifs and “urgent middle for a week” jobs.
This is an experiment. I do not know how it will land. I am putting in the time. If the circle does not form, better to learn it on twenty people than on a landing page that promises a “community”.
A call lasts while there is a case, not until a slide deck ends. You bring a slice of a system, a painful refactor, a stuck hire. We look together. If you have no case, you can listen, but I am building the core from people who will put their own task on the table at least once.
Who this is for
A mid-level engineer who already writes code and wants to decide, not only close tickets. Reviews from their practice, architecture, talk about leading. A person hunting a ready “middle to senior in eight weeks” track will be angry here: there is no checklist track.
A senior or tech lead who needs a room, not another course. Solution design, hiring, bottlenecks, other leads in the frame. If you only want to listen, the slot is better given to someone who brings a case.
A founder or CTO building a product and tired of looking alone at the stack, quality, contractors and interviews. Not “I will assemble a team turnkey”. A review and a second look.
Two or three years of development. I am not taking below that yet: otherwise the club becomes a junior course, and that is a different product. The center’s courses live separately, at /en/education. The club is not a wrapper over lessons. Lessons you can take in silence. Silence in the club is useless.
1:1 mentoring
A separate shelf. Sixty minutes a week plus chat. Review of tasks and code, from a bug to a system sketch. A plan with checkpoints. Few slots, otherwise it is not 1:1.
First month 1500 ₽, to see the actual work. Then 7000 ₽ a month. You can stop any time. Paid monthly. If the first week is wrong, I refund.
Mentoring includes club access.
Money after the core
When the free year for the first people ends, the club is 1800 ₽ a month.
Mentoring is priced as above, independent of the core intake.
How to get in
Willingness to show up on calls and bring something, not only read the feed.
Write to constantin@potapov.me or Telegram @potapov_me. Short: role, what you do now, what you want in a year, why this circle.
I look at each person myself. This is not a funnel that welcomes everyone. A letter without a role and without “why this circle” I will probably set aside. Not pride. I do not want a chat where everyone waits for someone else to start.
Center page: /en/education. If the format is not yours, write anyway, I will say so.
