Coffee Jam: 30 minutes on community-led growth. On me.

A pro-bono working session for mission-driven founders who know community could be their growth engine, but need clarity.

When designed well, community becomes your growth engine: the more your it helps users fulfill your brand promise, the more you grow. That's the thesis behind my strategy consulting at Hacking Communities. And once or twice a month, I open my calendar to test it against your reality.

  • "Appreciate you being so generous with your advice -- it was truly the most helpful I've received."

    — Saba Ahmed, Founder at Tiny Dinner

Still have questions?

A few things people usually want to know before booking. If you're already sold, skip ahead and grab a spot above.

  • Bring one real question: a launch, a stalled community, a GTM decision. We'll pressure-test it against frameworks I've built over 15+ years and 4 continents: customer success journey design, lifecycle archetypes, hyper-local movement building. You leave with one clear next move.

  • The best strategy work starts with real conversations. Some jams turn into engagements. Most don't, and that's fine. Either way, I learn what founders are actually up against, and you get unstuck.

  • Clarity and confidence on a real decision. A recent example: a founder came in unsure whether community belonged in their customer journey at all, and worried about what could go wrong running one. Thirty minutes later, they'd determined it added genuine value, and that they could set it up and run it well without their biggest fears coming true. That's the shape of a good jam: you arrive with a question, you leave with a decision.

  • Enough to make a decision, yes. The format works because of its constraint: you bring one real question, not your whole strategy. If the question deserves more than 30 minutes, you'll know exactly what to explore next, and you'll have the framing to do it.

  • Author of Hacking Communities (endorsed by Erik Torenberg, Derek Andersen, and Roy H. Williams). Built and exited my first venture. Currently Fractional Head of GTM at GigU. Full story here → /about

Laís is a community-led growth strategist and fractional executive. She builds go-to-market systems where belonging is the engine.

For 15+ years, across four continents, she has turned ideas into businesses, led teams through ambiguity, and designed growth systems where customer success becomes advocacy, which becomes movement.

What I do

  • Designing growth systems where users become advocates: from research and customer success journey development to hyper-local activation and movement building.

  • Embedding as a fractional Head of GTM or growth strategistL leading cross-functional teams across product, ops, and marketing through ambiguity, across time zones, and into new markets. Senior leadership, without the full-time overhead.

  • Human-Centered Systems. Building community systems from the ground up leveraging my signature engagement frameworks: customer onboarding and success journeys, the 5 P's of Community, Closeness Circles, and Engineering Serendipity.

  • Clarifying voice, sharpening positioning, and turning complex missions into stories that move people to act: from pitch decks to keynotes to content strategy.

  • Scaling operations across markets and cultures from startup ecosystem strategy and government advisory to multi-city launches and distributed team building.

Trusted by Teams, Leaders & Partners

  • "Most people who talk about community building want to romanticize it, or worse, they want to make it into a series of actionable 'steps' without heart. Lais de Oliveira explains the required actions in amazing detail, but she does it with a sensitivity and a wisdom that can only come from experience. Every page gets better and better."

    Roy H. Williams
    Author, Wizard of Ads

  • "Laís is one of those rare people who lead their life by how they think the world should be, and in ways that can help the most people possible around them. This is what makes her the best type of community builder."

    Derek Andersen
    Co-founder and CEO at Startup Grind and Bevy

  • "While Laís has proven herself as an impactful community builder [with ODCB and Hacking Communities], what makes her unique is she is both a skilled practitioner and a teacher. As a result, she understands the theory and the practice of community building, and her insights are rooted in what works."

    Erik Torenberg
    Founder at Turpentine, On Deck, and Village Global:

  • "Laís has been crucial in helping us develop our programs at Startup Genome. Her proactive, solution-oriented approach to building community is invaluable. She excels at leading by example, which is crucial for fast-moving teams. She has a special blend of strategic and operational focus that any community-focused organisation would be lucky to have"

    Liam Ward
    Programs Director at Hypergrowth (by Startup Genome)

  • "Laís can do it all! She is a skilled strategist and leader, who is also adept at designing and implementing key systems and processes. At Startup Genome, Laís established and managed a global expertise network from scratch, meeting complex requests with 'ideal' matches within weeks. She is diligent and focused, an engaging and credible contributor in group settings, generous with her knowledge, and collaborative in her approach. The impact of what she can achieve in a short space of time cannot be understated."

    Ama Williams
    Startup Ecosystems & Innovation Expert and Peer at Startup Genome

  • "Laís has been absolutely instrumental in helping us define a hybrid community strategy, combining local chapters as well as a global membership community. Her passion, deep expertise and hands-on approach has been invaluable and key to the success of our community"

    Maiko Schaffrath
    Founder & CEO, Impact Hustlers

  • "I wanted to give my utmost thank you for our time together in our coaching relationship. Your wisdom and experience provided the foundations needed to really hack a community from scratch. Since our times together I've been able to refine that there are many different communities of donor organizers, and each of these communities needs different kinds of support."

    Haley Bash
    Founder & Executive Director at Donor Organizer Hub and Lais’ Client at Hacking Communities

  • "[Laís'] leadership showed us what strength with empathy looks like, what it means to hold space for others while still pushing the mission forward with boldness. She balanced drive and warmth in a way that made this fast-paced, ever-changing journey feel a little more grounded.”

    Lara AlBarazi
    Experience Manager and Canada Lead at Timeleft (reported directly to Laís)

In a Nutshell: Community Success, Tailored to Your Needs.

Seasoned Community Executive on a Flexible Basis. If community is key to your business success, I can help: from building a community team to devising a solid strategy to enhance their capacity and achieve your goals. Let’s work together.