The first-ever Mentor Bridge session in Estonia officially launched at the Civitta office in Tallinn on June 19th. Marking a significant milestone, this is the first real mentoring program Civitta has introduced in Estonia under the Mentor Bridge initiative, expanding our mission to support the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem.
The premiere in-person event brought together an ambitious group of founders and a lineup of six expert mentors for intensive, personalized 1:1 consultations. Offering a flexible hybrid experience, the session facilitated 8 comprehensive mentoring consultations across both offline and online formats.
The 50-minute deep dives paired mentees with industry professionals including Karin Kunnapas, Kerli Luks, Tatiana Chavarriaga, Katrin Kiviselg, Eerik Hannus, and Kaur Kasemaa. The conversations moved past abstract theory to focus on practical challenges, covering areas like AI, B2B sales strategy, founder-led marketing, and community building.
The immediate usefulness of the program was reflected in feedback provided, where mentees praised the program for applicability of the advice and the clarification of their next business steps.
Participants left the session with highly actionable solutions. One mentee highlighted a major "aha moment" from their consultation: "The idea of creating a small-scale test without real money operations to stress test and check for retention data."
The mentoring team was equally impressed by the founders' dedication and openness to feedback. Reflecting on the sessions, one mentor shared: "The [mentees] were chosen very well. While some thought they primarily needed pricing advice, in reality, they needed market validation and sales strategies – which is totally understandable. Both got great ideas from the exchange, and I believe they will successfully test these out."
As the first Estonian occasion wraps up, the insights gained are already shaping the future of the program. Based on feedback, future iterations will look into offering more niche-specific expertise and extended mentoring across multiple sessions to help founders carry out their actionable steps. We are incredibly proud of this successful launch in Tallinn and look forward to continuing our work with early-stage founders across the region!
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