Alan Johnson is co-founder of Treehouse, the online learning platform that lets anyone bypass traditional education and learn the skills they need to become a world class developer. If you are looking to get started building your MVP or you just want to brush up on your coding skills then it’s an invaluable resource.

Originally a coder, Alan now leads the Marketing team at Treehouse but still regularly release his own projects like Hopefully Sunny, a weather app that sends forecasts directly to your inbox. You can check them all out over on his Github.

Not content to sit still and rest on their laurel’s, Treehouse recently implemented a ‘no-managers’ policy causing quite a lot of debate online. We catch up with Alan to discuss the future of education, building a company, and to pick his brains about the Treehouse approach to working.

What was your motivation in setting up Treehouse and what’s the biggest thing you’ve learned along the way?

Our mission is to bring affordable and accessible technology education to people everywhere, in order to help them achieve their dreams and change the world.

The biggest thing I’ve learned along the way is a really hard question. I think one of the big things I’ve learned is the value of having a mission that’s bigger than yourself or even the sum of the people on your team. I’ve worked on quite a few teams, but I’ve never believed in the core of what we do so strongly as I have with Treehouse, and that makes it so much easier to get out of bed in the morning and go after problems.

You currently lead the marketing team at Treehouse but originally you were a coder. Do you think your background gives you an advantage over other marketing people?

I’m actually not leading the marketing team anymore. I tend to move around within Treehouse a lot. But, I do think my background as a programmer helps me in almost everything I work on. Being able to automate solutions and analyze data is a skill that I’m grateful that I have, and working on a web app means that you’re almost never that far from code.

Do you think the Treehouse and online learning in general will replace traditional education?

I don’t think we’ll replace traditional education, but I certainly think we have an opportunity to reach a larger audience than traditional higher education has, especially as it relates to technology education. Allowing students to work at their own pace and to tune what they’re learning to match the jobs they’re seeking are major advantages to what we do, in my opinion.

Are there any success stories from members which stand out?

There are too many to list! Be sure to check out http://teamtreehouse.com/stories. A few weeks ago we received an email from a student who’s transitioning from working as an electrician to writing software. It’s not an easy jump, even with Treehouse, but hearing his story of how he’s gained confidence for the future and confidence in being able to provide for his family was something that really stood out to me.

Ruby is well known for being adopted by the startup community. Would you recommend it to budding entrepreneurs who are hoping to build an MVP?

Absolutely. Ruby and Rails have been my tools of choice since around 2006, and while sure, there are other languages and frameworks out there, and I use them from time to time, I love working with Ruby.

Treehouse has grown very quickly since 2010. What are some of the things you have done to encourage this and where do you see the company in 12 months?

I think the biggest thing I’ve learned in working on marketing with Treehouse especially is to see the value in small improvements and the benefit of them adding up over time. There’s no one big thing that helped us grow quickly, but the sum of small tweaks and experiments has led us to where we are today. I guess what we’ve done is stay patient and persistent.

My hope is that in 12 months we’ll see a really great increase in students learning with Treehouse and especially a great increase in the number of lives changed through learning and changing careers (or starting careers) through Treehouse.

You do a 4 day work week at Treehouse. Do you feel this makes you and your team more productive?

I’m not sure, actually, but it’s what we do. I think that having a longer weekend certainly makes us more productive in those four days. I actually don’t think the 4 day work week is so much about being productive as it is about us all building the company we want. One of the things we all really want is lives outside of work that are full and meet our ideals, and that extra day helps us achieve that.

You recently got rid of your managers at Treehouse. What would you say are the benefits and challenges of working like this are?

I think the primary benefit of us ending the idea of managers at Treehouse was that it cuts out a lot of artificial barriers. If someone thinks someone else should do something, they should talk to them about it, not go to a manager or stay silent. If someone wants to lead, they should lead. Having no managers has helped us avoid some of those barriers most companies have in terms of ensuring that everyone on the team has the power to make and execute on ideas.

The primary challenge is that at times things are chaotic. Decision making can be a little more organic without managers, especially when it comes to big decisions for the whole company. Ryan and I certainly still have to step up and lead day to day, but we try not to act like there’s necessarily some endowed right for us to do so. We’re still new to having a company structured this way, and we’re learning a lot about what works best, but it’s been a great experiment and I certainly think we’ve seen more positives than negatives from the change.