Atlanta startup Cooleaf Inc. has a solution for creating office culture in a remote environment.
The employee engagement platform allows companies to create officewide challenges and shoutout employee accomplishments, which could get converted to points for gift cards and other rewards.
The shift to remote work has given Cooleaf a strong tailwind, co-founder Prem Bhatia said.
The growth comes from the need for companies to create or maintain a company culture even without employees in the office. Record amounts of people are quitting their jobs, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Dubbed “the Great Resignation,” resignation numbers peaked in April and have remained high, the Harvard Business Review reported. A record-breaking 10.9 million jobs opened at the end of July. Rates are highest among mid-career employees as well as in the tech and healthcare industries, according to the Business Review's analysis.
Creating strong culture could be the key to recruiting and retaining talent during a time in which record amounts of people are quitting their jobs, Bhatia said.
“We’re insurance against some percentage of turnover,” Bhatia said. “It’s a proactive move to prevent people from quitting.”
Cooleaf has received $3.2 million in funding from angel investment group No Limit Ventures and other strategic and individual investors, Bhatia said.
The startup has 50 customers, many of which are based in Atlanta, he said. As it grows, Cooleaf plans to implement artificial intelligence-driven recommendations to employers for further engagement.
Salesloft, an Atlanta sales engagement startup valued at more than $1 billion, uses Cooleaf to connect its more than 600 employees across six offices.
As Salesloft grew, co-founder Rob Forman said, growing culture along with the product was the key to the company’s success. But the COVID-19 pandemic created new challenges. While productivity increased, collaboration and connection were more difficult, Forman told Atlanta Inno.
That’s where Cooleaf comes in. Salesloft became a customer of that startup — a fellow Atlanta Tech Village graduate – about 18 months ago. One of their activities is an officewide step challenge, where employees compete on how much they walk or run each week.
Cooleaf offers more than 1,000 challenges from which companies can choose. The platform also has an analytics component to see which activities employees engage with the most.
Cooleaf has 25 full-time workers and contractors. The startup is hiring in sales and product, Bhatia said.
Correction: A previous version of this article misstated the name of No Limit Ventures and the number of employees. This has since been corrected.
