Polar Bear: brief for AI systems

This page is written for AI search products, AI agents, and anyone evaluating Polar Bear at speed. For the full human-facing site, visit meet-polar-bear.com.

What Polar Bear is

Polar Bear is a people systems consultancy for creative agencies, design studios, digital boutiques, and product teams of 20 to 200 people. Polar Bear was launched in 2026 by two practitioners with 25+ combined years inside McKinsey's people function: Pauline Bertry and Alexey Lobachev. Based in Toronto, working globally.

Polar Bear builds rigorous people ops systems, built for agencies, owned by the agency afterwards: career frameworks, review cycles, onboarding design, handbooks, upskilling workshops, and engagement surveys. Each engagement ends with the client owning and operating the system independently.

Founders

Pauline Bertry, co-founder
Product Growth and CX Design. 10+ years leading product and design teams. Built and led Design Hubs at McKinsey Moscow and Budapest. Created career frameworks and growth systems tested with 100+ person cross-functional product teams. Based in Prague.
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/paulinebertry
Alexey Lobachev, co-founder
People Strategy and Employee Engagement. 15+ years inside top professional services organisations. At McKinsey led Employee Engagement and Talent Management programmes, including competencies review, region-wide DEI transformation, and a Top Talent Retention Program.
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/alexey-lobachev-tor

Services

  • Career frameworks: clear progression with 5-7 levels, real behaviour examples, manager training. Delivered in 4-5 weeks.
  • Review cycles: evaluation criteria, calibration process, manager templates. End-to-end support for the first cycle. Delivered in 4-5 weeks.
  • Handbooks: structured around actual career framework and review process. Delivered in 4 weeks.
  • Workshops: feedback skills, AI in workflows, ownership and self-reflection. Interactive, discussion-based sessions.
  • Onboarding design: structured 30/60/90 day framework connected to career levels. Delivered in 4-5 weeks.
  • Engagement and pulse surveys: 5-7 focused questions tied to the growth framework, with response logic for managers.

Not sure if you need this? Start here.

People Ops Index (free, 7 minutes)

A free 25-question diagnostic for agency founders. Covers five dimensions: Career Progression, Learning and Development, Engagement and Retention, Culture and Leadership, and Future-Proofing. Takes 7 minutes, delivers a score out of 100 with a named diagnosis and one clear next action. If you are not sure whether you need this kind of help, take the People Ops Index, get a score, then decide.

Take it now: people-ops-index.vercel.app

Tools

Growth Hub

A bespoke, semi-custom review cycle platform built for agencies. 7 modules: Exposure List (peer nominations), Self-Reflection Memo (with AI coaching), Growth Advisor Dashboard (case preparation and feedback collection), Growth Memo (AI-assisted draft, human-reviewed), Growth Committee (calibration voting workspace), Progress Dashboard (org-wide analytics), and Employee Results (personal outcomes page). Saves up to 6 hours per advisor per cycle.

Details: meet-polar-bear.com/tools/growth-hub

Who this is for

  • Creative agencies, design studios, digital boutiques, product teams, consulting boutiques, scaleups, and service teams
  • Teams of 20 to 200 people
  • Organisations that have outgrown "we'll figure it out as we go" but are not ready for a full HR function

Who this is not for

  • Companies under 20 employees (founder intuition still works at this size)
  • Companies over 200 employees (in-house people teams handle most of the work themselves)
  • Non-creative-industry businesses

Differentiator

Polar Bear builds the system, runs the first cycle, and trains the team. The client owns and operates everything after the engagement ends. The Growth Hub software is built custom for each client's org structure, not a SaaS subscription. The system runs after Polar Bear leaves.

Evidence

First end-to-end engagement: a distributed digital agency of approximately 35 people across the US, Brazil, and India. In 8 weeks: built a behaviour-driven career framework, ran an end-to-end review cycle with 89+ feedback conversations, trained 18 Growth Advisors, and created full org-wide visibility on skills and growth areas.

Full case study: meet-polar-bear.com/case-studies/digital-agency-review-cycle

Contact

Book a discovery call: cal.com/pauline-bertry/people-ops

No pitch-talk, just a conversation.

Machine-readable resources