Every human-resources manager not trapped in some Mad Men time warp will tell bosses and employees alike to ask for, and offer, feedback on a frequent basis. Of course outside of infrequent performance reviews, it rarely happens. With inspiration from Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard, San Francisco-based startup 15Five was founded to make sure it does, and not just once a year, but once a week.
The 15Five online service creates five-question weekly reports that “take 15 minutes to write and five minutes to read,” hence the name. “We’re taking this very complicated challenge of gathering feedback from employees and generating it in a way that they enjoy doing, and doesn’t take much effort or time,” says 15Five founder David Hassell. “And we make sure the most critical information flows to the right people in the organization.”
The idea for 15Five, Hassell says, came from a solution legendary outdoorsman Chouinard devised to reconcile two seemingly conflicting parts of his work life: the need to spend a good chunk of his time hitting the California surf or hiking Yosemite to test products and come up with new ones, and keeping close tabs on the needs of Patagonia as a growing company.
Chouinard began asking his employees to spend 15 minutes writing a short report with negative and positive feedback on their work that he could read in five minutes. The quick summaries were perfect reading during a lull on a Rocky Mountain hiking trail, and allowed Chouinard to do triage on pressing problems, as well as promote the latest successes.
Hassell took Chouinard’s basic concept and built software to automate the process of writing a 15-five report. Every week, employees fill out a form with five questions chosen by the CEO. Questions can range from “How is morale?” to “What’s the biggest challenge you faced this week?” Answers can be as long or as short as employees want, and they are encouraged to leave both positive and negative feedback.
Department managers then review their employees’ reports, and can ask questions or leave comments. As they read each report, managers flag specific employee responses to build a larger report for the CEO. The idea is that feedback trickles up from the lowest-level employee to the CEO, which helps employees feel that their voice is heard.
Non-profit Startup Weekend‘s CEO Marc Nager says the reports help him keep attuned to the daily pulse of his company. “Before our weekly hands-on meeting, I spend an hour reading our 15Five reports so I know what we need to address and fix,” he says. One of Startup Weekend’s 15Five questions is “What do you wish had more time for this week?”, which Nager says helps the company find new ideas and projects that fall within its mission of promoting entrepreneurialism.
15Five is currently working on version 2.0 of its software, and Hassell says there will be easier ways to digest employees’ feedback to get an even better sense of what’s going on in the company, though he wouldn’t give specific details. To get there, 15FIve has raised $1 million from Yammer CEO David Sacks along with angel investors Ben Parr, Jason Calacanis, John Hamm, Matt Brezina, and Ben Ling.
The goal of it all, Hassell says, is to help businesses run more efficiently by spending less time fussing over office disputes, and more time on the activities that make their employees productive and happy. It’s something Chouinard would no doubt get behind, especially if it means more time to surf.
Software That Gives a Voice to What You Love (and Hate) About Work
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Software That Gives a Voice to What You Love (and Hate) About Work
