TINYpulse, a Seattle startup that offers technology to assess employee morale, has cut about 10 percent of its staff, the company confirmed.
The company cut 12 jobs, nine from sales and marketing and three from product, leaving TINYpulse with a headcount of 108.
“We needed to better align our resources particularly on the sales and marketing front,” TINYPulse founder and CEO David Niu told GeekWire. “This alignment better positions the company for continued and long-term success especially as we further expand our core TINYpulse offering.”
Founded in 2012, TINYpulse gives leaders a pulse on how happy, burnt out or frustrated their employees are. More than 1,000 companies big and small — including Facebook, IBM and Airbnb — use the service to ask their employees one anonymous question a week, like, “How happy are you at work?” or, “On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate our on-boarding process?”
TINYpulse analyzes the responses and then provides information that helps executives gauge the happiness levels of people at work. In addition to the continuous feedback loops, employees can also give peer-to-peer recognition to colleagues that deserve appreciation. Bosses have the ability to send back all this information to employees so they know their opinion matters.
TINYpulse also offers an employee portal that allows workers to make their own suggestions, anonymously, on how to improve morale. Others can then vote on these suggestions. The company has an anonymous messaging service that lets executives follow up with employees on their survey answers and suggestions.
Prior to this round of layoffs, the company had been in growth mode. In December 2015, it raised $6 million and planned to up its headcount from close to 100 at the time. At the time, the company said it still had its $3.5 million seed round in the bank as well.
Niu is a well known Seattle area entrepreneur, previously co-founding BuddyTV and NetConversions.
