We Are Peers

We Are Peers (often abbreviated WAP) is a French education-technology company that designs and delivers peer-to-peer learning programmes. Its method is built on scientific research into how adults and students actually acquire knowledge — through exchange, project work and the sharing of lived experience rather than through one-way content delivery. The company describes itself as a pioneer of peer-to-peer learning and has been recognised in the EdTech200 ranking. The pedagogy was first developed by founder Diane Lenne while she was at Emlyon Business School. Observing that the most valuable learning happened outside formal courses, she created a peer-driven course in which students reveal and share the knowledge embedded in their own experience. Within six months the course had been extended to all 1,300 students at the school, and the decision was taken to build a company around the method. We Are Peers now sells its method to two main customer groups: grandes écoles and universities, and the academies or learning functions of large corporations. Its workshops are designed to be short and intensive — the company claims that two hours of WAP workshops are more effective than two days of conventional training — and to be participative, breaking silos and developing social skills. Typical engagements include creating self-sustaining learning communities, diffusing and embedding corporate culture, harmonising practices across a heterogeneous network, transferring knowledge at scale without loss of information, and increasing the appropriation and impact of training or transformation programmes. The company publishes outcome figures from named clients. With Thales, 80 managers from different disciplines shared their practices; all of them adopted the role of facilitators, and 22,560 hours of one-to-one knowledge-transfer interviews were saved. With Société Générale, 50 advisers improved their results, with one business unit moving from 58th to 1st in regional sales rankings, and more than 70% of participants experimenting with new practices the day after the workshops. With TotalEnergies Solutions, a community of 50 learning managers was animated using the method. We Are Peers reports that its solution has been deployed in more than 50 grandes écoles and companies, and that its method has been tested and approved by 19,529 participants across 1,162 WAP workshops. The company is privately held and based in France.

We Are Peers grew out of a pedagogical experiment at Emlyon Business School. Its founder, Diane Lenne, observed during her own education that the most valuable learning did not happen inside formal courses; it happened when people were most engaged in their projects and in exchanges with others. Convinced by this, she created a course at her school built around peer learning. Instead of delivering content, the course aimed to reveal the knowledge anchored in each student's experience so that students could learn from one another and find their own path. For Emlyon, the course represented an evolution of the school's teaching models by involving students, a way of valuing and uniting the cohort. Within less than six months the course was extended to all 1,300 students of the school on the day of the rentrée (start of the academic year). This success led to the creation of a company to allow everyone to take up this knowledge-sharing pedagogy. The company describes three years of research and development behind the WAP pedagogy. It developed first around a research project in pedagogical innovation, then as a new course at Emlyon, becoming a pedagogical reference within the school in less than a year, and finally in the academies of large companies. Since then, the WAP solution has been deployed in more than 50 grandes écoles and companies. The company reports that its method has been tested and approved by 19,529 participants over 1,162 WAP workshops, and it has been recognised as a Top EdTech200 company and a pioneer in peer-to-peer learning. We Are Peers markets its method to organisations that want to create self-sustaining learning communities, diffuse and embody their corporate culture, harmonise practices across a heterogeneous network, transfer knowledge collectively at scale without loss of information, increase the appropriation and impact of training or transformation programmes, and build a culture of knowledge sharing that avoids duplicated effort. The company publishes client results: at Thales, 80 managers from different disciplines shared their practices, 100% of managers adopted the role of facilitators, and 22,560 hours of one-to-one knowledge-transfer interviews were saved; at Société Générale, 50 advisers increased their results, one business unit moved from 58th to 1st in regional sales rankings, and more than 70% of participants experimented with new practices the day after the workshops; at TotalEnergies Solutions, a community of 50 learning managers was animated. The company is privately held and based in France. Its method is positioned as efficient (two hours of WAP workshops claimed to be more effective than two days of training), participative (developing social skills and breaking silos) and embodied (developing a positive work culture by sharing examples of success).

• Diane Lenne creates a peer-learning course at Emlyon Business School.

• Within less than six months the course is extended to all 1,300 students of Emlyon on the day of the rentrée.

• A company is created to bring the WAP knowledge-sharing pedagogy to a wider audience.

• WAP solution is deployed in more than 50 grandes écoles and companies.

• We Are Peers is recognised as a Top EdTech200 company and a pioneer in peer-to-peer learning.

Pioneer of peer-to-peer learning; short, participative, research-based workshops positioned as more efficient than conventional training.

• WAP peer-to-peer learning method

  A research-based method of sharing and capitalising knowledge, delivered through short participative workshops.

• WAP workshops

  Two-hour sessions claimed to be more effective than two days of conventional training.

1. 1We are Peers, apprendre des autreswearepeers.com
2. 2À propos — WAP | Peer learning sessionswearepeers.com
3. 3We Are Peers — Wikidatawikidata.org