Rypple Launches Disruptive New Social Performance Management Application

Rypple Loops brings the performance review into the 21st century

Rypple © today launched Loops , a disruptive new social performance summary application. Loops makes it quick and easy for managers to pull together all the relevant information about employee performance already captured in Rypple’s existing applications—continuous feedback, social goals, one-on-one coaching, and meaningful recognition—into helpful, actionable performance summaries. Everything is already in one place and easy to find so there’s no need to dig through old emails, notes, or spreadsheets. Managers can run Loops whenever they choose—at the end of a goal, a project, or a quarter. They can invite anyone to contribute feedback, whether inside or outside their teams. And they can draft a series of customized questions to get the answers they need to accelerate performance. Greater visibility means no surprises when it comes to discussing promotions or compensation.

Rypple worked closely with a select group of customers to build and refine Loops, including Facebook, Gilt Groupe, RichRelevance, PhotoBucket, Bazaarvoice, EventBright, Kobo, Nexj Systems, Pivotal Labs, and Insomniac Games.

“The workplace has changed,” said Daniel Debow, co-CEO of Rypple. “But performance management hasn’t changed with it. Traditional reviews have become disconnected from real performance, and they’re slowing us down. With the help of our customers—creative, innovative companies devoted to nurturing and developing their people—we’ve built a social performance management platform for the way we work today: in real-time.”

Hundreds of innovative companies already use Rypple to set key priorities, recognize meaningful accomplishments, and get ongoing feedback and coaching. Now, with Rypple Loops, managers and their teams can collect everything in one place—in real time—finally making performance management both effective and painless.

“Rypple built a performance platform that supports Facebook’s social, collaborative, and fast-moving culture,” said Bob Trahan, the company’s Director of Engineering and Head of Culture & Engagement. “Working with Rypple means our performance summaries are more real-time and our people get the feedback they want and need.”

Rypple’s easy to use privacy controls allow managers and their teams choose how much to share—and how much to keep private: employees can recognize one another publicly for their accomplishments on a company-wide feed everyone can see; hold private one-on-ones with their manager in a private, shared space; or request anonymous feedback from anyone at the company.

Loops is available as part of Rypple’s Phenomenal Plan for just $9-per-user-per month. It includes hundreds of feature enhancements of Rypple’s social performance platform, and plugs securely and seamlessly into existing work systems.

A Management and Product Team with a Track Record of Success

Rypple’s management team brings proven expertise and accomplishment in human capital management. Co-CEOs David Stein and Daniel Debow were on the founding team and played an integral role in the growth of Workbrain, a company that developed and implemented enterprise-wide HCM Solutions for some of the world’s largest corporations, including Wal-Mart, Target, and Disney. Following a successful public offering on Toronto’s TSX Exchange, Workbrain was acquired for US$227 million in 2007.

Rypple’s senior product development and design team has held executive roles at some of the world’s leading technology companies and start-ups, including IBM, Mozilla, IMVU, Zendesk, Aardvark, Saba, Ariba, and ADP: Rypple’s VP, Product Management Maksim Ovsyannikov served in the same role at Zendesk and played a key role building the company from a start-up to a major player in the help desk space with more than 10, 000 customers; Rypple’s VP, Customer Success Dan Portillo headed the HR department at Mozilla; and Rypple’s Director of Design Marcus Gosling co-founded IMVU, a 3D avatar online community with over 50 million registered users, and worked as a design consultant with IDEO.

Working with customers who collectively employed millions of employees, Rypple’s senior management team noticed that performance management software no longer had any impact on real performance. Instead, it merely automated pre-existing processes that have become disconnected from the collaborative, real-time way people work today.

They built Rypple to combine the best qualities of social software with a new approach to performance management—one that empowers managers and their teams to learn faster and perform better. Managers who adopt Rypple ensure that their teams get the continuous feedback, one-on-one coaching, and meaningful recognition they need to stay on track and consistently achieve their goals. Employees who use Rypple build a real-time portfolio of accomplishments and skills, so they no longer have to rely on painful performance reviews for feedback, recognition, and reputation at work.

Strong Support from Leading Investors, Thought Leaders, and Customers

True to its philosophy, Rypple built its social performance platform based on ongoing feedback from hundreds of forward thinking customers. “Rypple is a true partner,” said John Quinn, VP of Engineering at Gilt Groupe. “They worked with me to build a platform that makes it easy for my team to get the continuous feedback and coaching they need to be great.”

Rypple has raised $13.5 million in venture capital from a cadre of acclaimed venture and angel investors . They include Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and an early investor in Facebook and Linkedin; Silicon Valley venture capital firm Bridgescale; Joe Sigelman, founder of Office Tiger; renowned investor and philanthropist Seymour Schulich; Roger Martin, the Dean of the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Business; and Maynard Webb, CEO and Chairman of LiveOps, former COO of eBay, and founder of WIN(Webb Investment Network).

“When I was first introduced to Rypple, I was intrigued by the platform’s potential to disrupt the talent management market,” said Webb. “After seeing how their technology empowers people to advance their own careers, I knew immediately I wanted to be a part of what they were doing.”

Some of the world’s leading thinkers on management practice, employee engagement, and performance management have also provided strong support and valuable insights. They include renowned CEO coach Marshall Goldsmith, Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University, Jeffrey Pfeffer, and Linkedin VP of Strategic Initiatives Ellen Levy.

“Enterprise can benefit enormously from social software and other consumer applications,” said Levy. “But they need to be mindful of how these tools affect productivity and return on investment. Rypple has taken the best qualities of the consumer and social web and applied them to improving business performance through employee engagement.”

Pricing and Availability

Rypple is a web-based SaaS platform that can be accessed directly online. It requires no installation. Managers can get started immediately at www.rypple.com . The platform is available in three versions: a freemium version that provides basic capabilities; Rypple Premium , which costs just $5-per-user-per-month and includes access to Rypple’s goals, real-time peer feedback, one-on-one coaching, and recognition applications; and Rypple Phenomenal, which costs just $9 per-user-per-month and includes Rypple’s rapid performance summary application, Loops extensive support, rollout, and integration into existing company work systems.

About Rypple

Rypple is a social performance platform built for the way we work today—in real time. With Rypple, teams can share key priorities and get the continuous feedback, coaching, and recognition they need to consistently achieve their goals, finally making performance management painless and effective.

Contact:

Rypple Press Contact:
Nick Stein, 416-930-0856
nick.stein@rypple.com