HR & People Engagement Archives • Page 6 of 8 • SAP.iO

SAP.iO In New York, COVID-19, HR & People Engagement

Threats To Employee Wellbeing Intensify As Pandemic Wears On, MeQuilibrium Study Finds

Threats to employee wellbeing continue to intensify well over a year into the pandemic, as evidenced by a 21% rise in burnout and a 17% increase in somatic stress symptoms, a new meQuilibrium study found. The study examined changes in overall wellbeing among 5,474 meQuilibrium members from a broad range of industries representing managers and individual contributors.

“Employee wellbeing continues to be under threat 18 months into the pandemic,” says Brad Smith, Ph.D., Chief Science Officer, meQuilibrium. “Our data shows that workers continue to feel the cumulative mental health impacts of the crisis in the form of increased stress symptoms, burnout, and diminished motivation. We need to take action now to protect employee wellbeing before the clock runs out.”

The study also revealed a particularly large burnout risk increase among younger workers of 64%, which was nearly three times the increase for employees over 30 (22%). The increase in burnout symptoms is especially high among managers (+54%), hospitality (+48%), health care (+32%) and finance (30%) industry workers.

When it comes to gender differences, meQuilibrium found that although men and women are experiencing about the same rate of increase in burnout (+24% in women and +25% in men), men’s somatic stress levels are rising at a faster rate than women’s (+9% for men vs +3% for women).

No matter what job title, gender or industry, a key factor in wellbeing risk is employer support. Employees who felt strongly supported by their employers reported the highest levels of wellbeing and were less likely to report turnover intent.

Battling the great resignation? Startup Crosschq wants to arm businesses with AI to find and retain workers

Whether you’re looking for a new job or trying to hire new talent, everyone is a bit frustrated these days. Workers are burnt out and companies need to fill roles that are critical for their operations. Finding the right candidates is a perennial issue that has become even more pressing as businesses try to recover from the pandemic.

Exacerbating the problem is the so-called Great Resignation. According to polling from Gallup, around half of all workers are at least contemplating looking for a new job, a trend that speaks to an underlying dissatisfaction with the status quo as people reevaluate their priorities and personal goals.

Amid these dynamics, San Francisco HR platform Crosschq is trying to help businesses find and retain their best workers with a suite of cloud-based tools that leverage machine learning and AI systems for everything from reference checks to recruitment. The 3-year-old startup also offers analytics to predict retention rates to get an overview of patterns and how to change them.

Its mission has been aided by a recent expanded $30 million Series A round led by Tiger Global that brought its total funding to more the $40 million. Other investors include GGV Capital, Bessemer, SAP.iO, Rocketship.vc, NBA star Klay Thompson and Lattice CEO Jack Altman.

Most freelancers don’t make 6 figures, Wethos raised $8m to change that

In Q2 of this year, 11.5 million people answered this question by quitting their jobs. Next to retail, business services saw the biggest exodus of talent to freelancing, which is projected to be over half of the workforce by 2030. Today, leaving a corporate job means leaving your corporate paycheck and benefits, a risky move when only 5% of freelancers make over $100k a year. Freelance as a viable and lucrative career has been out of reach for most, but in the words of Vice President Harris: “I often say that the ability we should all have is to see what can be, unburdened by what has been.”

Today, we’re thrilled to announce Wethos’ new $8M round of funding led by Third Prime with participation from new investors Javelin, Full Circle, F7 Ventures, Clocktower, and Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, as well as continued support from Laconia, Valuestream, and many others. We’re also excited to add Wes Barton from Third Prime and Vivian Cheng from Javelin to our board alongside existing board member Dion Ridley, Engineering Leader at Netflix Studios. This fresh injection of capital follows 100x growth since we launched with just 100 studios less than a year ago. We proudly power nearly 10,000 virtual studios, which have won over $54M in projects by leveraging Wethos’ tools.

Employee development platform GrowthSpace raises $15 million Series A led by M12

Israeli startup GrowthSpace, which has developed a platform for employee development programs, announced on Wednesday that it has secured a $15 million Series A investment round. The financing was co-led by M12, Microsoft’s venture fund, and Vertex Ventures. This latest round of funding, which also included previous investor M-Fund Club, brings GrowthSpace’s total amount raised to $19 million.

GrowthSpace has developed a technology that provides a personalized development program for employees. The system matches employees and experts after understanding their business goals and professional challenges. The company said it has over 1,000 coaches, mentors, and professionals speaking a variety of languages with expertise in 300 different skills. The company’s business model is based on an annual subscription that includes a certain amount of credits, with each credit being equal to one personalized development program for an employee which includes 5-7 meetings with an expert. The cost per credit drops as the subscription program grows.

Now Streaming: Binge-Worthy Digital Corporate Learning Programs

Imagine getting immersed in your next corporate training program the same way you’ve binged watched your favorite Netflix series. That’s the kind of engaging employee training experience that startup Hardskills has created.

Unlike traditional formats that rely on talking head lectures, Hardskills training programs are more akin to cinematic productions, featuring professional directors and actors who replicate real-world situations culturally aligned to global audiences. The objective is to serve up personalized content that builds someone’s human skills. As digital natives increasingly dominate the workforce, it turns out that skills such as being open to new ideas, critical thinking, and influencing people are prized just as much as technical know-how in the enterprise arena.

“Our digital learning platform delivers the content, technology, administration, and metrics that provide personalized, interactive training for people to gain the behavioral and cognitive skills they need,” said Shoba Purushothaman, co-founder and COO at Hardskills. “With data-driven assessments, we deliver personalized coaching based on the skills graph of each employee.”

Immerse “Upskill Ultimatum” Research Reveals Need for Businesses to Transform Training or Risk Losing Talent

Major research conducted by global software company, Immerse, reveals that nearly 50% of US and UK employees are prepared to move companies if they don’t receive the training they need, yet HR departments are not prepared to revamp old methods for another seven years. The lack of modern training leaves the door wide open for continued departures at a time when recruiting is in emergency mode.

Immerse’s brand new research, The Upskill Ultimatum, reveals that a majority of companies plan to wait until 2028 – when tech-savvy Gen Z workers will form a large proportion of the workforce – to deploy immersive training technologies^[1] across their organization. This is despite studies which have shown the effectiveness of these technologies in boosting knowledge acquisition and retention, and despite the fact that two-thirds of HR professionals believe that companies that fail to employ cutting-edge training technologies will struggle to attract and retain top talent.

he survey of 1,000 knowledge workers and 1,000 HR professionals across a range of sectors, conducted by Immerse, show massive fractures in the current training landscape. Nearly half of HR professionals (49%) believe that today’s training deployment is inadequate for a hybrid working world. Also, businesses are feeling the effects of this “learning drought”, with half of HR professionals reporting an emerging skills gap in their organization, resulting in operational company risk.

Immerse is a virtual reality technology company that has developed the Immerse Platform which enables companies to create, scale and measure virtual reality training. Having grown license revenues by 300% last year and with a global customer base and customers such as DHL, Nestlé and bp, Immerse are leaders in using VR to maximize human performance and the employee experience.

Crosschq Secures $30M in Tiger Global Led Series A Financing To Expand and Scale AI-Powered Talent Intelligence Cloud™

Crosschq, pioneers of the Talent Intelligence Cloud™ powering a revolution in data-driven hiring and people analytics, announced today an extension to its Series A financing bringing the total round to $30 million. Led by Tiger Global, this $16.5 million expansion included returning investors GGV Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, SAP.iO, rocketship.vc, and new investors including Jack Altman, current CEO of Lattice.

“Our talent landscape is changing with unprecedented velocity and the need for advancements to drive better hiring decisions has never been greater,” said Mike Fitzsimmons, Co-Founder and CEO of Crosschq. “Our Talent Acquisition and DEI leaders are hungry for reliable data and analytics to source and retain the best talent. We are proud to be emerging as the Talent Intelligence vendor of choice for this increasingly complex environment.”

Over the past year, Crosschq’s Talent Intelligence Cloud™ has rapidly been adopted by talent leaders across all core sectors. In the last month alone, users of Crosschq’s platform have nearly doubled, up by 86%. In addition to attracting major players in the Enterprise Tech, Fin-Tech, and Media industries including Snowflake, Blend, Hubspot, and Dish Networks, the company has recently expanded solutions in the Life Sciences and Health Care sectors. Adoption by new customers including Carbon Health, CityBlock Health, and Hengrui, China’s largest pharmaceutical company, reflects this growing market segment for the company.

Recruiting technology company Humanly.io raises $4.2 million in seed funding round

A technology company that uses artificial intelligence in recruiting job candidates has raised $4.2 million, including funding from two local venture capital firms.

Humanly.io is headquartered in Seattle and Sacramento, and it raised the recent seed fund from investors including Moneta Ventures of Folsom and Growth Factory Capital in Rocklin.

“We will use the money to scale up the team and the product,” co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Andrew Gardner told the Business Journal.

The company currently has 10 employees, most of whom work remotely, though the company has small offices in Seattle and Sacramento.

The funding this week was led by Zeal Capital Partners in Washington, D.C., and also included Spark Growth Ventures, Basecamp Fund and Y Combinator.

According to venture capital tracking website Crunchbase, Humanly.io has raised a total of $5.3 million since its launch in 2019.

Humanly.io uses artificial intelligence software to automate screening and scheduling of hiring for companies and recruiters. It also has a suite of software that helps recruiters and hiring managers be more efficient during job candidate interviews and virtual interviews over teleconferencing.

Paradox’s New Experience Assistant Named HR Executive Top Product of 2021

Paradox, the conversational recruiting software company helping global brands like Unilever and McDonald’s streamline the hiring process through automation with a human touch, announced its newest product, Experience Assistant, earned the top honor in HR Executive annual best HR technology solutions awards.

Experience Assistant was selected because it fundamentally transforms how candidates interact with a company — instantly turning any existing career site into a dynamic content-driven and hyper-personalized interaction on both mobile and desktop devices. While Paradox’s flagship recruiting assistant, Olivia, has built a reputation for helping global recruiting teams get work done, Experience Assistant focuses on the candidate.

“For years, the holy grail of candidate experience has been true 1:1 personalization at scale, but it’s been elusive at best,” said Aaron Matos, Paradox Founder and CEO. “We have a vision for the next-generation of consumer-grade recruiting software — and Experience Assistant builds on that vision. We don’t believe employers should be forced to overhaul their career site to create unique, dynamic experiences. Now, they don’t have to.”

Each year, HR Executive top product award recognizes the most innovative new technology solutions that are helping business leaders meet the critical HR needs of their organizations. The staff of HR Executive selects the Top HR Products each year after performing an extensive evaluation of the submissions with help from a panel of industry experts.

SAP.iO Foundry Singapore Kicks-Off “Future of Work” Startup Program

September 14, 2021 — SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) launched a virtual startup program focusing on human resources (HR) technology and the future of work solutions at SAP.iO Foundry Singapore in collaboration with SAP SuccessFactors. The six international startups have been selected by a jury of SAP experts and partners to join the program.

Over the next 13 weeks, SAP will accelerate these early-stage startups that are focused on recruiting, talent and team management, and wellbeing solutions. The startups will have access to curated mentorship from SAP executives, exposure to SAP® technology and application programming interfaces (APIs), and opportunities to collaborate with SAP customers around the world. The program will conclude with the SAP.iO Cohort Demo Day in December 2021.

“We are operating at a time where every industry has been disrupted, and almost every organization is undergoing some kind of transformation. People are at the core of this transformation and the heartbeat of business. We see a continuing trend of leaders looking for innovative ways to empower people with the information and capabilities they need to succeed in a digitized world,” said Aaron Green, Head of SuccessFactors, SAP Asia Pacific & Japan. “By partnering with SAP, these startups are joining an innovative ecosystem, and we look forward to working together to accelerate digital transformation for our customers in the world of Human Experience Management.”

The following startups are participating in the SAP.iO Foundry Singapore program:

Accredify empowers organizations to create, issue, and verify digital credentials like educational certificates and employee records. Employers and third-party verifiers can check if credentials are certified true copies without time consuming manual cross-referencing.
Boldly’s platform enables both coaching and mentoring in one place. With the largest global database of professional coaches, Boldly ensures both coaching and mentoring culture can scale with exceptional operations, coaching and mentoring resources.
Tagvance’s personnel and asset tracking solution provides real time and high precision location tracking of people and assets in industrial spaces for improved safety and productivity.
Talent Games helps companies find and assess top millennial talent using recruitment games. Talent Games’ gamified candidate assessments are scientifically proven to accurately evaluate each candidate’s personality, cognitive ability, aptitude and behavior, all while they play the game.
Wagely empowers companies to provide employees with affordable and sustainable financial services, including access to earned wage access (EWA). This allows employees to access already earned but unpaid wages to reduce financial stress and boost their productivity, motivation and retention.
Springday is a B2B software-as-a-service platform with wellness programs, assessment tools and content to enable employees to be happier and healthier.

About SAP.iO
SAP.iO delivers new partnerships and products for SAP by accelerating and scaling startup innovation as well as incubating employee ventures. SAP.iO brings together innovators from every region, industry, and line of business to transform how businesses run. Since 2017, SAP.iO has helped 300+ external startups and internal ventures accelerate their growth while enabling thousands of SAP customers to access innovation. For more information, visit https://sap.io/.

SAP.iO In San Francisco, HR & People Engagement

SAP Startup Spotlight: The Mom Project

SAP invests in a lot of promising startups, and it’s sometimes hard to keep track of all of them. E-3 Magazine has selected the most interesting companies to showcase in our SAP Startup Spotlight Series. In this article, we will take a look at The Mom Project.

The Mom Project is the leader in helping businesses attract and retain female talent. With a community of more than 500,000 talented professionals connecting to over 2,000 companies, the company is committed to building a better workplace by harnessing the oft-overlooked intellectual workplace power of moms. In this interview with founder and CEO Allison Robinson, we will explore what makes The Mom Project unique and what’s next for the startup.

E-3 Magazine: How does The Mom Project work?

Allison Robinson: On top of offering $500,000 in grants as part of the Stronger Together Fund, The Mom Project created programs to support community members during their time of need as we all continue to navigate the coronavirus pandemic that sent ripple effects through every aspect of life beginning in March 2020. RALLY, for example, is a peer-to-peer mentorship program giving community members the space to solicit and offer advice. Resume Rev, a no-cost program that helps moms put their best foot forward, saw more than 15,000 resumes created and downloaded within the first 90 days. RISE, the inaugural initiative from our not-for-profit MomProject.org, launched in September 2020 to elevate 10,000 women of color over the next three years through a new upskilling model that puts moms first with scholarships to highly sought-after technology certificate programs including Google and Salesforce.

As of July 2021, there are more than 500 women enrolled in RISE via one of six certification tracks including Salesforce Administration, Google IT Support, and Google IT Automation with Python, which can be completed in as little as six weeks. In Q2 of 2021, RISE also introduced additional certification tracks such as Project Management, Data Analysis, and UX Design to further accelerate the supply of qualified leaders of color to meet demand for diverse talent by committed employers and partners of The Mom Project.

SAP Startup Spotlight: Anthill

Muriel Clauson is the CEO and co-founder of Anthill. She is an active speaker, advisor, and thought leader on the future of work and artificial intelligence, and has authored scientific publications, was a scientific advisor for several governments and organizations around the world, and is an advisory board member for Humans for AI. Muriel is completing her doctorate in industrial-organizational psychology at the University of Georgia and conducted research at Emory University’s Goizueta School of Business and the Carl Vinson Institute of Government. In this interview, she explains how Anthill achieved its goals, how the company is connected to SAP, and what’s next for the startup.

E-3 Magazine: What exactly is Anthill?

Muriel Clauson: Anthill is the first talent management software for the deskless workforce, the 80 percent of the global workforce that does not work at a desk or computer. Anthill has broken the barriers to connecting with and understanding deskless employees in manufacturing, supply chain, and retail sectors, which exist in almost every large enterprise.

How does your solution work?

Clauson: Anthill is built upon a predictive relational model linking hundreds of assessments. Our backend technology allows us to ask employees a few questions on our mobile experience and learn a lot about them, because each answer helps us predict responses for the rest of the questions in our model. This is made possible by Anthill’s machine learning technology based on years of historical data, which is able to predict a wide range of people insights, like skills and turnover drivers, from limited responses and deliver a comprehensive map of the talent in an organization in an ongoing, rewarding way for employees. Anthill’s predictive model is complex but results in a seamless and fun user experience for workers. Anthill is available via app or SMS texting for employee users. Anthill’s dashboard capabilities focus on engagement and retention, internal mobility, and reskilling and development tools.

On-Demand Coaching Platform Bravely Announces $15M Series A Funding Round

Bravely, the technology platform connecting people to on-demand professional coaching and development, announced a $15 million funding round led by Telescope Partners. This funding round will further Bravely’s rapid growth and advance its mission to transform the way companies support inclusive, high-performing teams by providing universal access to coaching.

“The world of work is undergoing the biggest change we’ve seen in our lifetimes,” says Sarah Sheehan, Co-Founder and President of Bravely. “The competition for talent right now is unprecedented, and there’s more attention than ever on the tools companies offer to support their employees’ growth and development. The choice is: rise to meet the new standards, or lose your most valuable asset, which is your people.”

Bravely is the first coaching platform designed to scale whole-population support for companies of all sizes, and boasts the most highly-vetted coaching network in the industry. With this funding round, Bravely will both expand its global reach and develop powerful new data capabilities, allowing for an even deeper understanding of, and capacity to serve, diverse individual employee needs. In addition to new automation and personalization, this capital will also power research informing Bravely’s ethical, inclusion-focused use of data, as well as developing a People Science function at the company.

Paradox acquires Baltimore-based Traitify to simplify recruiting process

Paradox, a recruiting software designed to make the process more conversational and personalized, has announced its acquisition of Traitify, a mobile-first digital assessment platform based in Baltimore, to simplify the recruiting process.

The terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Paradox founder and CEO Aaron Matos expects the Traitify platform to further enable Paradox’s mission to “simplify hiring through automation with a human touch.”

“They share our passion for recruiting and our philosophy that software should make things simpler, faster and easier — not add more work,” Matos said in a statement.

Scottsdale-based Paradox was founded in 2016 after Matos observed recruiters spending way too much time managing their application tracking system (ATS), following up on emails and scheduling interviews.

Matos saw an opportunity to automate much of these tasks. This idea plagued him like a “pebble in his shoe,” which is what drove him to start Paradox. He believed software should be doing the work for us, not the other way around. He wanted to build software to help recruiters spend less time with software and more time with people. Olivia, the company’s conversational AI assistant, has been developed to make that happen.

Since then, Paradox has experienced rapid growth and has been recently ranked in the top 5% of the Inc. 5000 list of America’s fastest-growing private companies. Some of Paradox’s major clients include Unilever and McDonald’s.

The company’s acquisition of Traitify is the next step in its growth strategy.

The Use Case Podcast: Storytelling about Censia with Joanna Riley

In the Use Case Podcast, episode 114, we have storytelling about Censia with Joanna Riley. During this episode, Joanna talks about how practitioners make the business case or the use case for purchasing Censia.

Joanna is an expert in all things teams and tech. Her passion for democratizing talent information in order to help organizations hire much better talent more efficiently and lucratively really comes through during the podcast.

Listen Here…