Operation North Star

The role of Aaltoes is to empower entrepreneurship, make exploring it accessible and change the culture around it to be more positive.

Entrepreneurship is often seen as something fairytale-like, complicated, and “not for me, because I don’t know how these things work.” As a result, we lose great talent and ideas every day to assumptions and the fear of the unknown. They end up elsewhere, never realizing their full potential. By removing both mental and practical barriers to entrepreneurship, we can help young talents bring their visions to life instead of just daydreaming.

Aaltoes creates a space where opportunities and talent can meet to create something meaningful.

What is Operation North Star?

The goal isn’t to be perfect from the start. The goal is to start doing. Because the beginning is always the hardest.

Operation North Star is a concept which holds our three pillars under it. The North Star encompasses the path of every member in the ecosystem within Aaltoes. No matter whether you’re a team member or a builder, it makes sure you find your way and keep coming back here.

Your North Star is the dream you reach toward, your big and ambitious goal set high above you. As mentioned in Startup Käsikirja, the probability of success stays the same no matter how bold your dream is, because high ambitions attract the best people to join you. So you might as well aim high. It might seem scary or even impossible at first, but if you keep pushing forward, you’ll get there.

Operation North Star isn’t just for soon-to-be founders. Every Aaltoes team member and volunteer has their own goal to strive for within the ecosystem. It can be anything from starting a business to gaining experience in Aaltoes or finding like minded people (or even better, people who challenge your ideas).

Because at the end of the day, it’s not only about reaching the North Star. It’s about daring to dream bigger, move forward with courage, and inspire others to do the same.

To support this, we’ve defined three focus areas for 2026, which you can read in detail below.

Scroll down to uncover our vision for the next year.

  1. Era of Action

  • The word “pöhinä” is familiar to many; it describes the sense of buzz and hustle in the startup world. It often gets a negative vibe because some think it’s used by young students who talk a lot and promise “big things,” but never actually deliver on anything concrete.

    But that’s only half the story. These students have found a group to spar ideas with and a place to explore opportunities. They just haven’t taken the next step yet.

    That’s where we come in. We want the Aaltoes ecosystem to be full of ambitious people ready to take action. To make the Era of Action a reality, with a constant stream of talent through Startup Sauna’s doors, we have work to do, explained more in sections 2. United together and 3. 360° Visibility.

    We define Action as taking a next step towards one’s North Star. Through Action, there will inevitably be results. We will measure results through multiple KPIs such as

    • the amount of people visiting our events

    • active ecosystem members

    • new companies registered because of our bootcamp and summer accelerator events

    The formula to results is simple. More founders = more companies = more success stories. Aaltoes needs diverse talent to form winning teams.

  • An idea is easy. Acting on it is the real challenge. Mental and concrete barriers hold people back, resulting to not even consider entrepreneurship. Although the quality of Finnish startups has been improving, the rate of founding them hasn’t increased.

    Growth startups might be the solution to Finland’s poor economic growth. Right now they contribute about 1,5% of GDP but already 10% of exports. But these companies never get built if there isn’t a clear place where to build, experiment, fail and ship.

    We don’t care if it’s a trendy B2B AI SaaS GPT wrapper or a way to disrupt Wolt by building underground burger-blasting tunnels; if you have a vision, a team and the courage to take the next step towards your North Star, DO IT!

    Aaltoes needs to create an environment where finding these things is possible. Moreover, curious students must find themselves here and start developing their skills.

    For us Aaltoes is a huge people accelerator. It’s the place where one should go if they want to learn more by doing. 

    We’ll remove all negative connotations from ‘pöhinä’ and turn it to clear next steps to take.

  • By making it a no-brainer not to push entrepreneurship in Aaltoes especially for those in the early and middle stages of their journeys by launching Operation North Star. 

    → Expanding the summer accelerator program with spring and autumn bootcamps in order to build more high-quality startups increasing the amount of potential future unicorns and enabling support for more promising founders. This is a huge opportunity for people to put their learnings into practice. It can also act as a fast track for Summer of Startups.

    → Utilizing Aaltoes’ huge (but currently underused) alumni network. We want to channel knowledge back into the ecosystem through inspiring speaker events and targeted programs such as bootcamps, workshops, and mentoring sessions.

    → Increasing the amount of events that bring people organically together and help them to find others to build and innovate with.

    → Iterating and constantly juggling around ideas that might have a place in Aaltoes. Couple examples which we and our community members have expressed the need towards:

    • CO-RNER: A series of “Find Your Co-Founder” events where idea owners and talented individuals collide, connect, and form teams

    • Immersive Founder Dinner experiences: connecting a handful of ambitious community members to successful founders in a dinner-chat setting to discuss personal questions and advice

    • A diverse set of workshops and bootcamps to build founder mindset and knowledge

    • Reviving some past events, such as Startup Fair and open summer barbeques

    In the end it’s all about enabling our ecosystem builders to eventually ship their products and get first customers.

End goal: As many entrepreneurial seeds as possible planted for a longer term impact

2. United Together

  • This community works best when we act as one. Instead of building barriers, we create systems that make communication clear, decisions transparent, and coordination easy.

    United Together means:

    • Everyone knows what’s happening and why.

    • We make sure the community is heard. Everyone should know who to talk to when facing questions. 

    • Volunteers and attendees feel welcome, safe, and part of something meaningful. The concept of psychological safety is present. This is the place to build, experiment and do things. We won’t blame you for being brave.

    Anyone who walks into Startup Sauna or hears about Aaltoes gets immediately a picture of how they can get involved.

    Unity is not just a value — it’s the way we make Aaltoes run smoothly, grow faster, and keep people engaged.

    We’re also entering an era of greater transparency in decision-making, financial flows, and strategic planning:

    • An effective communication and ongoing discussion internally in the board and externally in the ecosystem.

    • Community participation in planning processes fostering ideation and responsibility-sharing.

  • Without an active community and clear communication Aaltoes can’t function. Duh. Yes, the importance of these things is obvious.

    However, we have witnessed how difficulties in these areas affect all parties involved. We can’t waste energy on struggling with the fundamentals.

    We often mention that it's Europe's most active entrepreneurial community. For us, it doesn’t always feel like it. There needs to be more people involved and we want to see innovative initiatives pushing from the ecosystem rather than forcing safe concepts.

    Aaltoes is also a place to develop your event and people management, coordination and operational skills through various events, which we should highlight more towards eager volunteers. If they know these opportunities exist and see the upside from leading them, we will have a very active and healthy community.

    The concept of psychological safety is often seen at the top of charts when measuring which factors boost innovation, performance and productivity. Aaltoes is a place to test, build and fail. If we are not failing it means we are not moving fast enough. We’ll learn from past mistakes and won't do them again. 

    For operation North Star to work we need helping hands. Therefore, it’s extremely important how we manage our volunteers. They’re a crucial part of an equation that makes everything happen.

    The feeling of belongingness and purpose needs to be present. True value in Aaltoes is the people in it.

  • One key thing we want to accomplish next year is for those members of the community who have ambitions to strive for larger responsibility, we give them a path to do it.

    Introducing Paths

    Making Aaltoes more accessible and open for newcomers and current ecosystem players:

    Founder Path: Designed for those eager to build, connect, and develop their entrepreneurial skills. Delivered through an expanded accelerator program, curated events, and meaningful community connections.

    Member Path: Designed for those seeking guidance and clarity to take more responsibility and possibly lead your own project. Progress toward your goals within the community through shared accountability and ownership, ecosystem-driven projects and a volunteer log.

    We’re forging the strongest community by marketing volunteering opportunities to people who want to explore Aaltoes from the inside out, so volunteering opportunities are not limited to just those people who already are in the ecosystem.

    Movie nights and karaoke nights are good, but we can make it better by having even bigger celebrations and community-only events. Bringing back BBQ parties and hosting company excursions available for the community members to state a few ideas.

    Whoever steps their feet to Startup Sauna should feel welcome and have a clear way to get immersed in the community. Once there, they most definitely don’t want to leave. This is why we want to launch an ‘Aaltoes Buddy’ system where e.g. eager Aaltoes team members can act as a buddy for the newcomers, helping them get used to the space and to determine next steps to take <3

End goal: A thriving multidisciplinary community with active team members and key volunteers

3. 360° Visibility

  • Comprehensive awareness from all angles. We personally have many friends in the business field that are curious about entrepreneurship but they don’t hear about Aaltoes too much. This is true for many engineering and arts fields as well. We can do so much more, especially in the campus area, to be a more prominent place where students find their way.

    Nothing is usually perfect, but we can try to optimize the experience for everyone. That’s why we want to hold regular feedback sessions with all of Aaltoes stakeholders to know what can be improved. The worst thing is to assume. It’s better to listen.

  • While spending countless hours organizing events, doing lecture visits or just hanging around the co-working space we noticed something very alarming. Many students saw entrepreneurship as a way to push their dreams forward (great!), but they had no idea what Aaltoes was, how it could serve them and why they should even spend time there. 

    Aaltoes is a well-known organization, or at least it should be. Still, people often a) don’t have a clear picture of what goes on in Aaltoes and sometimes think it has something to do with literal toes, b) assume you already have to be an entrepreneur to join, and c) have no idea how to join even if they want to. Is there a paywall? Can everyone attend the events? We’re tired of hearing this.

    As we stated in the Era of Action we need more people kickstarting their journey. This won’t happen if Aaltoes is considered as a complex entity for only a specific group of people. 

  • Taking over the campus

    Simple. Every student in Aalto should know about Aaltoes and its possibilities, and they should know how to join.

    → Organizing tactical lecture visits.

    → Being present during orientation week and other bigger events at the campus.

    → Having clear ways to join following Founder and Member paths.

    → Collaborating with guilds.

    Increasing regional cooperation

    A lot is happening outside of Otaniemi. Cooperating with other organizations in Finland creates win-win situations, where ideas, information, and innovation flows more freely.

    → Collaborating with other Finnish entities, such as other entrepreneurship societies and hubs like Maria01

    → Attracting talent from other universities.

    → Evoking curiosity towards smaller events outside of ring III.

    Nourishing global presence

    Maintaining well-established international relations is mandatory, but the key to success is often closer than you think.

    → Focusing on maintaining and strengthening already established international relations.

    → Exploring possibilities in the countries close by, like Estonia and Sweden. Super easy and efficient to access while having enormous learning potential. Sounds like a great opportunity.

End goal: make 2026 the most collaborative and visible year yet

Are you ready to determine your North Star?

LEARN MORE ABOUT ANNIKA & NUUTTI