Latest from the blog

Using Rypple to get ongoing, actionable feedback is something that thousands of leaders do everyday to learn fast and reveal their blind spots. But many people who are new to Rypple want to know; what types of questions should I ask to get the most helpful feedback?

Here for your viewing pleasure are 17 role-based questions you can ask right now to help you on your way!

(Note: many of these questions are based on the “Make one thing your super power” principle)
If you’re part of the corporate leadership

• What’s one thing the senior management team can do to provide you with more visibility into how our business is being run?

• What’s one thing the senior management team can

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The new model of selling software as a service is uniquely well suited to Canadians.

That’s a pretty bold statement coming from a country better known for meek apologies than declarations. Screw that. We’re throwing down the gauntlet: if you’re picturing Dudley Doright then you’re picturing the old Canada. Get with the times: Canadian startups are kicking ass at the new web.

Some might say we’re biased, but we’re pretty damn proud to be Canadians. That’s not a position you’ll hear a lot of our compatriots express — we’re a nation often defined but what we aren’t rather than what we are — but it’s the truth. We’ve …

The Diverse Workplace
The data shows that employers need to move quickly to redefine an employment relationship that makes sense for the realities of today’s environment – before it is defined for them in ways that compromise their competitiveness and sustainability over time.

This new relationship must be grounded in three organizational dimensions:

• Fostering self reliance on the part of employees
• Creating greater personalization in how the employment deal is defined and delivered for various segments of the workforce.
• Building more flexibility and agility into the organization’s structure and processes, talent and reward programs, and the HR function itself.

Think of this new deal or employment value proposition (EVP) as the art of the possible. Creating a synthesis of both traditional and novel approaches to workforce …

I’ve talked about why organizations should care about employee engagement and 3 tips to get yours back on the engagement train. Thing is, employee engagement is a tricky animal and most organizations see the early operational symptoms of an engagement issue before they see the greater problem.

Here at Rypple I’m fortunate enough to work with some pretty amazing organizations, all of whom come to us with the same end goal; to engage, motivate, and align their teams. However, the operational symptoms they come are sometimes different. To help you determine if you might have an engagement problem, here are 3 warning signs I see most often.
1. Your people say they want more feedback
I’d be a rich …

Hi everyone! I’m Steven Chung, a Computer Science/Business Option and Three-Year Geography student at the University of Waterloo. I just started a co-op term at Rypple. Yeah, my designation is mouthful, but I enjoy learning a variety of things. I’ve transferred a few times and know what it’s like to be unsure of what career path to take. After jumping around, I found an interest in design. I read about it almost every day — you can follow along on my Google Reader feed if you’re interested.

I learned a ton of stuff during my last co-op term at Xtreme Labs and I wanted to see what other start-ups are up to. Rypple …

Staying Competitive
We are at the earliest stages of a significant workplace transformation that will profoundly affect how businesses approach people management and how individuals approach the workplace.
The big question employers are thinking about is: Will companies face greater challenges as they compete for talent on a global basis?

In mature economies there are few signs this will be a widespread issue in the short term. In fact, Towers Watson tells us that the next “war for talent” is likely to be waged inside organizational walls. The picture is quite different in the emerging economies – competition for talent in the external market is already heating up.
More Key Findings

• People need security in good times as well as tough times.
• The challenge for employers

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We’ve had a great run of our Rypple Leadership Series webinars, featuring the likes of Marshall Goldsmith and David Allen. September will continue that trend with an appearance by Brian Halligan, our much-anticipated host and the CEO of HubSpot.

Brian’s going to address Creating a Post-Modern Business Culture:
Mad Men has provoked many vibrant discussions among marketing thought leaders. What’s changed since the 1960s? What’s the same? Join HubSpot Founder and CEO Brian Halligan for a talk about how he has built a unique, post-modern business culture at HubSpot, inspired by a Mad Men-style …

This week’s Funny Friday comes from Ted Goff, accomplished editorial cartoonist. Ted was also the pen behind last week’s Too Busy for Performance.

Anxiety About the Future
Many employees are currently sacrificing advancement for job security.
The need for security and stability trumps everything else right now.  We can see this in the workplace today – young job seekers applying everywhere to find any job. The study shows that 76% of the respondents want a secure and stable position above anything else – and only about half think it’s achievable.

Most expressed doubts about their own ability to take responsibility for ensuring their futures and their long-term financial and physical health. Roughly half agreed that they were up to the task. The focus of people in the workforce is on practical aspects of the deal – the pay and flexibility in work arrangements. These effects are …

Luckily, most people aren’t. The problem is that most of the systems we use everyday — everything from vacation tracking to traffic signals — assume that all of us are. There’s a pretty simple way to de-scumify, as you’ll see below. The missing ingredient? Trust.

Our first instinct when faced with the threat of losing control is to immediately tighten the control we have. Consider employer vacation policies. Most Western employers allocate their staff a fixed number of paid vacation weeks and a handful of sick days. The meter’s running, so you better save them up for something really special. As Dan Pink’s …