See People risk in your portfolio
before it hits the numbers
ppl.intelligence gives VCs and accelerators AI-powered diagnostics on the People layer: one 20-minute founder diagnostic per company, a maturity heat map across your portfolio, and a tailored action plan for every team.
The layer VCs don’t measure. Yet.
By the time People risk shows up in a portfolio company’s attrition numbers, the company has already lost 6 to 12 months of execution.
The People layer is where scaling tech companies break first. It lives in how decisions actually get made, how feedback happens, how pay conversations land, and what culture does (or doesn’t) shape on a Tuesday. None of that is on the board deck.
Most VC platform teams focus on recruiting intros and investor access. So how do you spot a portfolio company’s team problems before they show up in the numbers? You measure the People layer directly.
6–12 months
of execution lost before People risk shows up in attrition
How ppl.intelligence works.
Step 1: A 20-minute founder diagnostic
Each founder answers a structured diagnostic across 5 dimensions: Hiring, Employee Experience, Retention, Operations, and Culture & Strategy. 20 minutes, no prep, no extra spreadsheet.
Step 2: A maturity heat map
You see every company side by side: where each one is solid, where it’s at risk, and which ones need support first.
Step 3: A tailored action plan per company
Every founder gets a tailored People & Culture action plan, built on my methodology and sped up by AI. Concrete, prioritised, and doable next week. Not a generic framework.
Step 4: Cross-portfolio pattern reports
Which issues repeat across your companies? Where should your platform support go? Structured, data-backed visibility on the layer that predicts the next 12 months.
Data first. Hands-on where it matters.
The diagnostic shows you where to look.
When a company needs more than a plan, I step in directly through The ppl.Kickstarter: 1:1 founder advisory, culture workshops, comp design, and role clarity work.
Same pattern recognition, delivered hands-on.
And for challenges beyond People & Culture, I connect founders with vetted specialists from my partner network in legal, finance, recruiting, and tech, for example:
Built on real teams, not theory.
20+
Diagnostics
30+ Teams coached
75+
Startups supported
20+
Years
20+ ppl.intelligence diagnostics, each with a custom action plan per company
30+ teams coached hands-on, 75+ startups supported across mentoring, coaching, speaking, 1:1 and group formats
First coach accredited by Innosuisse (2024) for HR in the scaleup context, a category I helped define
LP and angel investor in early-stage tech, so I know portfolio reporting from the investor side too
20+ years across HR, org development, compensation, M&A, and culture
As of 2026
This works best if…
You manage a portfolio of early-stage or growth-stage startups and you’ve been asking yourself some version of these questions.
If that sounds familiar, ppl.intelligence is built for you. It works for funds from seed to Series B and for accelerators running cohorts.
▶︎ How do VCs measure People and team health across a portfolio?
▶︎ How do I prioritise which companies need People support right now?
▶︎ What should our platform offer beyond recruiting?
▶︎ How do I support founders on leadership and culture at scale?
▶︎ And how do I do any of this without a dedicated platform team?
Founders get something back. That’s why they engage.
Portfolio support only works if founders actually use it. The diagnostic takes 20 minutes, and every founder gets their own action plan straight back: specific to their team, prioritised, and in plain language.
Typical things the plans cover: building salary bands for a 20-person team, setting up a first performance process, what to say when someone asks what their colleagues earn, and keeping the culture real after 17 new hires.
See how founders work with me directly →
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"The compensation framework Carolin helped us build gave our leadership team a clear and consistent way to approach salary decisions. It brought alignment, transparency, and structure exactly when we needed it as the company continued to grow."
Armin Koller, CEO @KEMARO
What People metrics should founders report to their board?
Most boards track headcount and attrition, and then get surprised. Attrition is a lagging signal. By the time it moves, the damage is done.
The cross-portfolio reports translate the diagnostic into People signals that predict problems: role clarity, decision-making bottlenecks, manager effectiveness, onboarding quality, and early culture risk. In a format that works for board conversations, not just HR.
See it in action.
The ppl.Kickstarter x KEMARO built a clearly articulated and operationalized culture system.
What leadership initially considered a "side project" alongside the compensation model turned out to be one of the most impactful outcomes of the entire collaboration.
As the CFO noted, the culture work was a major added value, important at the time and highly relevant today.
(KEMARO is a Series B robotics scale-up, currently expanding globally.)
Start with a pilot.
I'm running two pilots with VCs and accelerators, starting in Q4 2026 or January 2027.
Here’s what’s included:
5 selected companies, or your full portfolio
About 3 months
A 20-minute diagnostic for every founder
A portfolio maturity heat map
A tailored People & Culture action plan per company, built on my methodology and sped up by AI
A portfolio pattern report + a final debrief with your team
Risk-free: If the pilot doesn’t surface at least 3 actionable People risks across your portfolio, you don’t pay.
Pricing depends on portfolio size. Let’s talk about yours:
Questions I get from platform leads and partners
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With the same diagnostic across every company, so you’re comparing like with like. Each founder spends 20 minutes on it, and you get a heat map across the portfolio plus pattern reports that show where risk is building.
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20 minutes for the diagnostic. Everything after that is optional support, based on what their action plan shows.
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The heat map does most of the work. Typically 2–3 companies stand out as immediate priorities; the rest get their action plan and a lighter touch.
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Founders still making every people decision themselves after 20 employees, comp that was never documented, culture described only as “we’re like a family”, and hiring that outpaces onboarding. All of these show up in the diagnostic long before someone hands in notice.
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That’s exactly the gap ppl.intelligence fills: portfolio-wide People visibility and founder support, without hiring for it.
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It depends on portfolio size. We start with a pilot, and I’ll send you a proposal after a short call.
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Yes. I’m based in Zurich and work with European and international funds. The diagnostic is fully remote.
Two pilot spots, starting Q4 2026 or January 2027
A 20-minute call is the fastest way to see if a pilot makes sense for your fund or accelerator. No prep needed.