Startup Story #33: Engazify – Using a bot to appreciate employees instantly!

March 27, 2017

Every employee eagerly waits for his or her performance reviews from their manager. But this doesn’t happen as often as it should because reviews happen just once in a year in most organisations. Enter Engazify, an artificial intelligence-powered solution that comes with its bot to help you give instant feedback to your employees in real time. This simple yet innovative concept was formed by Siddharth Shekhawat and Purva Surse and Engazify was launched in April 2016.

Through this solution, managers and HR teams can use the Engazify bot to check performance trends and track feedback associated appreciation happening within the team. “In my previous work experience, I used to interact with many managers and HR teams. I found that they weren’t happy with the existing way of working. The information was too bulky for them to look at. We conducted several surveys to find out exactly what employees and employers want. We found out that employees weren’t happy as they didn’t get feedback often. Sharing feedback was a very heavy task for the managers. Now with the bot, Engazify provides an end-to-end solution for this,” explains Shekhawat.

Providing instant feedback is at the core of Engazify but it has other features too. Firstly, it captures positive feedback using related emoticons. There are specific emoticons attributed to values like being driven, hardworking, motivated, etc. Secondly, it allows managers to give constructive feedback to their employees right after the completion of a project. This feature helps managers conduct anonymous surveys within the team. The third feature assists managers to check the pulse of the team. In this aspect, the bot goes to each team member and asks them a few questions that have been curated by the manager. Through Engazify, every employee has a performance scorecard that allows managers to see which member is more interactive.

Shekhawat also mentions that Engazify also comes from the need to understand how millennials function when it comes to jobs, “These days people stick to one organisation for a maximum of three to four years and in that time, they would’ve got feedback from their employers just twice or thrice. Everyone is moving at a fast pace, looking for better opportunity. This function will allow managers to keep a check on whether employees are enjoying their work or not. They can even assess why this is happening.”

Though based in Pune and currently working with a team of four, this startup now has clients internationally but faced a few challenges while setting up in the city, “Purva and I are not from Pune so when we came here we had no network. But we met a lot of people within the startup community who noticed our work. There’s a very close knit community here in Pune and that’s one big advantage!” adds Shekhawat. He also says that back when they started, using bots was something new and not many were ready to take it up, “Initially, we had a really hard time because our product was different. Bots were at a very nascent stage. But the point is to keep on going. We have learnt so much from marketing, interacting with customers till the fundraising part as well. We listened to what our customers wanted and that is the key. We have fit the product to suit the needs of our clients.”