While the pandemic initially was rooted in isolation, the rapid adoption of technology to support remote workforces led to the increasing availability of an unprecedented global talent pool. While accessing this new pool has brought benefits to employers, managing payroll and other HR functions has now become more complex. Symmetrical.ai has built a global payroll platform that handles the end-to-end payroll process for employers and employees with automation and sophistication. The company is focused on seamless integration through its modular-based system that uses APIs to connect with existing technology stacks. Designed to meet the needs of a modern workforce, Symmetrical handles onboarding, employee management, on-demand payments as employees earn, gig workers, temporary workers, as well as standard employees. The company has navigated the compliance landscape across the countries it operates in to ensure clients are protected against ever-changing laws and Symmetrical can serve as the employer of record on behalf of clients. London TechWatch caught up with Symmetrical.ai Cofounder and CEO Piotr Smolen to learn more about the business, the company’s strategic plans, his vision to bring payroll into a function that requires only two API calls, latest round of funding, which brings the total funding raised to $26.4M, and much, much more
HR
Konfir Raises £1.6M for its Instant Employment and Income Verification Platform
Institutions are increasingly using automated models to accelerate credit and hiring decisions leveraging AI/ML. In order to build the next-generation models to handle these tasks, organizations must design systems that are reflective of the dynamics of a modern economy (prevalence of gig/flexible workers) and have the appropriate supporting data to assess. Konfir is an instant employment and income verification data platform that provides companies with real-time access to employment and income data for any UK-based worker that can be used in decisioning. All the data on the platform is user-permissioned, protecting the personal information of the applicant, and therefore compliant with GDPR. In terms of employment, decisioning models have far too long stringently relied only on traditional income for assessing worthiness, limiting access to the financial system for otherwise qualified potential borrowers. With Konfir, banking, lending, loan servicing, leasing companies, and potential hiring companies can get verified, real-time income data straight from the source. London TechWatch caught up with Konfir CEO and Founder Chris Milligan to learn more about the inspiration for the business, the company’s strategic plans, recent round of funding, and much, much more…
The Top 4 Things to Study When Hiring New Employees
t is clearly a job seekers market right now, which affords them the opportunity to take the best of competing offers, even if they have already accepted a previous offer, and “ghost” their new employer by never showing up on their first day, which is happening in record numbers and is not a cool move, at all So, to save you all the tedious effort of having to go back and restart your recruiting efforts after making bad offers or hires, it is important you get it right in the first place.
SquadPal Raises £400K for its Social Community App to Connect Distributed Teams
While the flexibility and benefits of remote work arrangements have been touted, the reality is that working from home can be isolating and depressing for many, leading to lost productivity. The small interactions with colleagues in an office setting or team-building events just can’t be replicated in a remote workforce. SquadPal is a community app for distributed teams to connect and interact at a social level. The app offers games, quizzes, live experiences, competitions, and challenges to improve employee morale, build engagement, and foster comradery among coworkers. The app formalizes and improves much of the makeshift team engagement activities that were being done on company Slack channels and on Zoom. The app is being used by teams at companies like Amazon, Uber, and Paypal. London TechWatch caught up with SquadPal Cofounder and CEO Robinson Nouveau to learn more about how the founding teams’ experience managing remote workforces at the onset of the pandemic inspired the business, strategic plans, recent round of funding from investors that include CapitalT, Jair Paula Jr, Charlie Songhurst, Raphael Theron, Riccardo Bruni, Nick Lally, Christer Holloman, Martin Gould, and Dan Murray-Serter.
Sona Raises £1.6M for its Workforce App That Empowers Frontline Workers
There are countless workforce management applications and tools for workers that spend most of their time in front of a computer. But for members of the workforce that don’t sit at a desk, there’s a dearth of options to do simple administrative tasks, creating a bottleneck in communication between employers and employees. Sona is a workforce platform designed specifically for the needs of frontline workers (often deskless) like those working in retail, healthcare, logistics, and even manufacturing. The platform, founded earlier this year, focuses on shift scheduling, company communications, holiday leave scheduling, and feedback to ensure that both employees and employers are on the same page. London TechWatch caught up with Cofounder Steffen Wulff Petersen to learn more about building a timely solution for an economy where the concept of work is evolving, the company’s strategic plans, and recent round of funding from Speedinvest, Andy Leaver of Notion Capital, Lorenzo Franzi of Flash Ventures, and several partners from Novator.
Oliva Raises $2.2M for its Online Mental Health Platform Designed for the Needs of Businesses and Employees
The mental health crisis has a hidden toll on employers; depressed employees miss an increased number of workdays every year, employees with depressions lose 8% of work productivity on average, employees experiencing depression are two times more likely to leave a company than their non-depressed counterparts. With performance, engagement, and absenteeism all affected, companies are addressing the importance of providing mental health services to employees. Oliva is an online mental health platform that is designed for the needs of employers so that they can adequately address the mental well-being of their employees. The company uses a research-backed care model to provide service to employees rather than just connecting them with a therapy provider. Sessions can seamlessly be booked, with a slack integration, in just a few clicks where the employee is connected to a vetted specialist that is a part of the Oliva network and the employee is further supported by an in-house care team. Oliva also provides management training so that potential mental health issues can be detected early before they have a significant impact on operations. London TechWatch caught up with CEO, serial entrepreneur, and Cofounder Javier Suarez to learn how his personal experience running a startup led to founding this company, the importance of investing in employee mental health, the company’s strategic plans, recent round of funding, and much, much more.
Sirenum Raises £2M for Employers to Effectively Manage Shift Workers
The process of managing and organizing shift schedules for workers can be a daunting and time-consuming task for employers. For employees, disorganized shift scheduling creates uncertainty and affects their personal lives in a number of ways including daily activities and sleep. Sirenum is a technology-enabled management solution that allows employees to manage their shift-based workforce from a single centralized platform. The startup handles a variety of tasks including scheduling, payroll, compliance, and reporting. London TechWatch caught up with Cofounder Joshua Pines to learn more about how the company emerged from a solution built for the 2012 London Olympics, the company’s future plans, and latest round of funding from investors that include William Currie Group and former Tesco CEO Sir Terry Leahy.
Omnipresent Raises £11M to Help Companies Manage Their Remote and International Workforces
While the pandemic may have shuttered travel, in many ways, the workplace has become more global. The shift to remote working and work from home has now allowed employees to work without consideration for borders and the location of their traditional offices. However, managing a remote workforce has its own complexities from a human resources standpoint. Omnipresent is the SaaS platform that enables companies to tap into a truly global workforce without having to worry about managing the local requirements. The platform focuses on making sure that all employee issues are appropriately handled, compliant with local requirements, whether legal, payroll, tax, or benefits-related. London TechWatch caught up with Co-CEO and Cofounder Matthew Wilson to learn more about how the pandemic impacted the trajectory of the platform, the future of work, and the company’s most recent round of funding from investors that include Episode 1, Playfair Capital, and Truesight Ventures.
myGwork Raises £750K for its Professional Community for the LBTQ+ Community and Their Advocates
Although impressive strides have been made to make the workforce more inclusive recently, still 56% of workers think that companies should be doing more to recruit and hire from the LGBTQ+ community and almost 20% believe employers have negative attitudes towards LGBTQ+ hiring. myGwork is a professional community and network focused exclusively on the needs of this community and its supporters. The free network, which currently has over 300,000 members, offers resources for employers and prospective employees to connect, features events and news, and offers a mentorship program; the company charges corporate members on a tiered schedule.
London TechWatch caught up with brothers and Cofounders Adrien Gaubert and Pierre Gaubert to learn more about the inspiration for the business, the company’s traction, expansion plans, and first institutional round of funding from 24Haymarket.
How to Navigate the Changing Role of People Operations in 2020
In the midst of the pandemic, the election, and the resurgence of significant social justice movements, people operations professionals are needing to navigate a far more complex environment lately.