Scan Magazine | Special Theme | Enterprise Spotlight - Finland
Revolutionising work culture A game-like app with cute animated characters that can help boost employee satisfaction and productivity? It is not something you would normally associate with business applications and big corporations – but Finnish start-up Apped has set its sights on creating exactly that. By Ndéla Faye | Photos: Apped
“We’ve set out to break the bureaucracy, complicated processes and rigid ways in which big corporations often work,” says Riikka Jakovuori, chief marketing officer at Apped. Launched in 2015, Apped Pulse is a real-time employee feedback, personnel survey and mood tool, where anyone can anonymously record their opinion or feelings on specific topics. “We wanted to break routines and topdown managing styles, so we created an app where the employees themselves, not only the management, can start surveys when they want to know, for example, what others think about a certain issue,” Jakovuori explains. Filling in traditional staff surveys can be dull and time-consuming, but with Apped Pulse, anyone can use it to rate their day, share their feelings on a particular topic or ask their colleagues to share their thoughts. 88 | Issue 89 | June 2016
“We believe that technology can be used to promote wellbeing and motivation. With Apped, we’ve made it quick and easy to see what new ideas employees might have, and what topics are being discussed within the organisation,” Jakovuori states. Where business apps typically require heavy technical integration with existing IT systems, anyone can download Apped’s apps from an app store. “All that’s needed is a work email, and the app directly and securely connects with corporate systems,” says Jakovuori. Apped has resonated with many organisations – from large corporations to medium-sized companies and public sector organisations – and is currently being piloted by 150 clients. “We’re always listening to client needs. We’ve got a few more apps launching this year that will focus on personal time management
and productivity. Apped’s philosophy is to make business more efficient and bring out the best in people,” Jakovuori says. “We believe that two-way real-time communication between management and staff is key to the smooth running of any organisation. With fun and exciting solutions, people can be engaged, motivated, creative and efficient individuals who enjoy coming to work – even on Mondays. We want to enable individuals to use their abilities to their maximum capacity, focus on what matters the most and bring their knowledge to the use of the organisation,” she concludes.
For more information, please visit: www.apped.com