Progress through partnerships: Digital Skills Academy partner Eleni Lialiamou from Kimolian Academy 

We find out more about one of CCC’s Digital Skills Academy partners Eleni Lialiamou, Founder and Principal Product Coach at Kimolian Academy.

Capital City College’s (CCC) Digital Skills Academy recently teamed up with Kimolian Academy to launch a Tech Innovation and Entrepreneurship Programme for Women.

Kimolian Academy is an education provider offering Product Management Training to empower women to create tech-enabled products with a positive impact.

We sat down with Eleni Lialiamou, Founder and Principal Product Coach at Kimolian Academy to learn more about how she came to set up Kimolian Academy and how her programmes can benefit women in London.

Can you tell us a little about your career journey?

After studying computer science and telecommunications at the National Technical University of Athens, I had a career in STEM sciences working in computer science and programming. I worked in various places such as Finland, Greece and in Silicon Valley in the US. I’ve always been a very curious person who likes solving problems so moving into tech-enabled product development was a natural move. For me, a strong product is really about that intersection between technology, design and having a good business model as well as a great team.

The other thing that has shaped my career is seeing the potential in other people and, not just my direct reports or peers within my team, but across different functions. While leading the development of different products, I’ve always enjoyed finding ways to get people excited about the problems they’re facing. It’s an incredible creative process that has allowed me to connect with people, not only people that I’m serving as product users, but also people within my team. 

How did you come to set up Kimolian Academy?

As my career developed, I moved into management and leadership roles and became Executive Vice President of Product Management at Informa Market. In 2023, I decided that I wanted to implement a passion project that I’d had in mind for a while.

When I was a manager, I found myself acting as a coach to my team members. I bought training packages for myself and my team. We did all sorts of development workshops and activities and really embedded them into the way we worked because I really wanted to see what types of training would help people really master certain skills and build confidence.

When I started building my own teams and working in leadership roles, I began nurturing female talent by promoting women or bringing women into my teams. I created the Product Coaching Circle, a weekly meetup that I ran with friends. We’d guide women through different techniques and show them how to develop products. I was writing the curriculum and it gave me great joy to see women stepping into the space and taking on product-related roles. It really highlighted for me the qualities that you can tap into when you find this talent and nurture it – so that’s what really gave the inspiration to create Kimolian Academy.

What can students expect to do on your courses?

The course begins with participants talking about themselves and presenting their team, which really lays the foundation of working as a team. From then, we look at the product ideas, the problems and think about how to solve them. Then we think about how we’re going to take the product to market, how it looks as a prototype, explore monetization approaches – and that’s basically the curriculum. 

Kimolian Academy is really a compilation of the things that I wish somebody had told me. It’s a 12 week program which guides participants through different product development challenges following some of the best practices and, more importantly, leading their team. It’s not just about the tools, the frameworks and the mechanics of developing products, it’s also about how you nurture your team so that they see you as the product leader. I believe that you don’t lead with authority, you lead through influence. In fact, a leading indicator of success of a product or a start-up is how its team behaves and performs.

The course also looks at all the qualities that you need to embody in order to be successful. Some of those qualities are often already there, such as curiosity and empathy, and we work on strengthening them. Other qualities may need to be more consciously instilled, such as learning how to be a strong collaborator. It’s not a passive training programme – there are a lot of questions and there’s a lot of participation.

What does Kimolian Academy offer students?

Our courses have really enabled a lot of women to access a programme that is flexible and works alongside their other commitments. Kimolian Academy has quickly become an international community of women, not just in the UK but across the globe. Earlier this year we presented at a conference in Lagos in Nigeria and we have participants from Europe, Canada, the USA, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. Kimolian Academy is a community of women who share the qualities of curiosity, empathy and a collaborative mindset. They are driven and ambitious, with the desire to make an impact through what they’re doing.

In addition to running Kimolian Academy, I work as a consultant supporting startups and larger businesses. After the very first course I started placing women on consulting projects that I’m involved with. It’s a big commitment  but I’ve kept nurturing the community and running courses so there’s a constant stream of consulting projects where I’m able to position women that have graduated from Kimolian Academy.

Who delivers the courses?

Primarily it’s me who runs the courses, but I also get some of the graduates who specialise in specific technical areas such as UX design to come back and share their knowledge, practice and tools. It’s great when former graduates can become facilitators and have the opportunity to grow in that capacity.

As part of our collaboration with the Digital Skills Academy, students do the courses online but we have the opportunity to meet once a week in person. This provides opportunities to collaborate, space for reflection and allows participants to talk about their own business ideas and practice presentation skills. 

How did the partnership with the Digital Skills Academy come about?

It’s one of those serendipitous connections that are so valuable. I’d always wanted to help underrepresented women so I started working with LIFT (Leading Inclusive Future through Technology), offering free placements on my programme for women in London to participate. LIFT is a partnership between the boroughs of Islington, Camden, Hackney and Tower Hamlets, working together to create opportunities for local people and support businesses in tech, creative and sciences. As a result, I started attending various LIFT events along with Kimolian Academy graduates. Some of the women had also completed training with the Digital Skills Academy and so my contacts at LIFT suggested that I talk to them to share what I was doing.

I got talking to Carlo Liu, Head of the Digital Skills Academy, and she was very forward thinking in working out how we might take what I had already built and expand its reach. As a result, there have been a lot of good adjustments and improvements to the programme, and I really do believe it has great potential.

What are your hopes for the course and the partnership in the future?

Just looking at the applications we received for the Tech Innovation and Entrepreneurship Programme for Women, I could see that they are driven by values, have intellect and the capacity to execute their plans. I’d like to see this narrative through with the Digital Skills Academy and give more and more women solid foundations to achieve what they want. Some might choose to go into startups and others might go and work for other organisations or become partners. I’m looking forward to seeing more of the value we create in the economics of London and our business activity.

What have you gained from starting Kimolian Academy?

It’s incredible to see what I’ve already received back from this community of women since I started Kimolian Academy. There are women volunteering, helping with social media, managing the community, working on business development and supporting me with grant applications.

This whole experience has opened my eyes to what is hidden. When you’re working in companies and looking at CVs and hiring people you see just one part of the world. When I started Kimolian Academy I stepped out of that world and started going to diversity and inclusion conferences, seeking out communities and spaces that I hadn’t explored before. It was incredible to see the potential that was there along with a strong desire for hard work. It makes sense that we should have a programme like this where people can have a sense of community, a sense of belonging, and be supported to do what they deserve to be doing. 

For me, running Kimolian Academy is a way of giving back. I’m not part of another person’s training company so my aspirations for growth are my own. For me, growth is all about what we are collectively going to create – How many startups will come out of this? How many women will go and find impactful work? What are the good outcomes that we’re producing? 

There is such a great deal of hidden potential in women but we need to believe that we can do it.  Along with practical and technical skills, the Tech Innovation and Entrepreneurship Programme for Women programme provides women with a sense of community and self-belief. We aim to enable women to unlock their potential and use their existing values and intellect to execute truly impactful work and access the financial strength that goes with it.

CCC’s Digital Skills Academy provides valuable insight into the careers available in the digital sector. We have supported more than 2,000 Londoners to secure education and employment in digital careers and offer a wide range of Digital Skills courses.

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