This startup aims to empower 1 million parents in guiding their children’s career choices

Lifology has certainly been creating a buzz in career guidance space since its inception in 2018. The Uttar Pradesh government has partnered with the startup in providing digital career guidance at schools across the state. Lifology has also partnered with the Adani Foundation to support children in the coastal region of Kerala in career selection and even GEMS PartnerEducation, the world’s largest K-12 education provider, has secured Lifology as a permanent partner in providing career assessment and coaching for their students across more than 40 countries.

Lifology’s work speaks for itself. Two research reports on parenting that were written by this fast-growing organisation got featured in leading media houses in the country. They recently raised $1 million in funding from a team of investors in the UAE to further develop their Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms.

On June 1, the Global Day of Parents as declared by the United Nations, Lifology has launched its novel platform, the Super Parent Eco-system.

To know more about the genesis, the vision, and the functioning of the Super Parent Eco-system, YourStory spoke Praveen Parameswar, CEO of Lifology. Praveen is an alumnus of the London School of Economics and the University of Cardiff, UK. He has 10 years of experience in working as an organisation development consultant, trainer and leadership coach in the UK, India and across the Middle East. He is the author of ‘Thinking Beyond the Paradigms’ and a well acclaimed TEDx speaker.

YourStory Media(YS): What inspired Lifology to launch ‘Super Parent Eco-system’?

Praveen Parameswar (PP): We want to make this world a better place where people enjoy more happiness, fulfilment, financial security and purpose.

The 21^st century has been unfolding with incredible developments. AI, Robotics, Genome Research, Stem Cell research, Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, developments in longevity studies and other innovations will phenomenally change the way we live. And in recent months, Covid-19 has is in fact been acting as a catalyst to the development of these innovations. Under the influence of these massive developments, our systems of education, our expectations around employment, and even the career landscape, will undergo rapid transformations.

In this chaotic scenario, our children require strong support to make the right choices around their higher education and career. More than 76 percent of children consider their parents to be the most important influencer in choosing higher education and career, but majority of their parents do not feel capable to do this effectively.

The Super Parent Eco-system is on a mission to empower every parent in India to lead their child to the most appropriate career where they enjoy happiness, fulfilment, financial security and purpose.

YS: How does Lifology plan to achieve this ambitious mission?

PP: Lifology’s Super Parents Eco-system is a combination of five elements: Lifology Magazine, Lifology TV, Lifology Hub, Lifology Connect and most importantly — the Lifology Super Parent Community.

The complete system, powered by Artificial Intelligence and Augmented Reality, will give parents access to carefully curated information on new age career options, provide a tool kit to map children to the most appropriate career pathways and connect them to a network of career coaches that rank among world’s top 80^th percentile. Regular, exclusive live sessions on career selection and education, and cutting-edge programs for life skills development, among a myriad of other features, will empower the decision-making skills of our Super Parents even further.

YS: Why are you focusing only on parents? What about schools, governments, educational institutions and other stakeholders involved in the process of a child’s career decision?

PP: As I mentioned earlier, the Super Parent Eco-system is the newest venture by Lifology. We are giving ultra-focus on this vertical because parents play a major role in the education and career decision making of their children. Thus, we believe that paying more attention in this area will help us to move faster towards our vision.

However, along with this, we closely work with various state governments and school chains across India, UK, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Singapore.

YS: What are the major challenges you see on your way forward?

PP: The tendency of many to base decisions on limited information they have at any point in time would be the major challenge we expect to face on our path. The stubbornness that comes naturally comes from an ego-centric perspective, which says ‘it’s my child’s decision, who are you to counsel me on this?’, is another roadblock we face. In addition, the time, energy and patience that parents can spare for this initiative towards constructive development is also quite critical.

Q: What is Lifology’s key strength?

We are motivated by our Mission.

We see meaning, purpose and a compelling ‘Why’ in what we do. The success of our mission would make our community, and subsequently the entire world, a great place to live in. This makes us put our heart and soul into what we do.

We have an extraordinary team comprising of alumni of the Harvard University, IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Kozhikode, Oxford University and the various IITs. Our Chief Assessment Officer, Dr Marilyn Maze, carries an experience of four decades in the arena of career guidance. My Co-founder, Rahul Nair, is the only representative of India in the Asia Pacific Career Development Association’s Executive Council. This team pushes our vision further.

YS: Does Covid-19 affect your business?

PP: Actually, we see the scenario created by the current pandemic in a positive light. Lifology is a 100 percent digital platform. Traditionally, there has been a lot of reluctance from parents to follow digital solutions for education and career decisions. But over the last three months, we have witnessed many drastic changes in Indian parents’ mindset towards e-learning and guidance, which otherwise would have taken over a decade.

YS: What are your future plans?

PP: We are on a mission to support at least 1 million parents in next 24 months. Our vision is to expand Lifology’s services to every state, district and village in India and launch in local languages also. We strive to bring global knowledge to every part of India and empower Indian parents to be the world’s best Super Parent community.