The modern workforce is highly attracted to the finest work culture. The key to long term success is the culture that is carefully built and nurtured in the organization. There is no right option on which culture should be practiced by the companies. However, the organizational culture should be guided by the core principles and be up to date with the current scenario to create positive results. A strong work culture can nurture happy employees, putting an organization on the path to success.
Appiness Interactive is one of the companies that is fostering a team culture that is open and dynamic. When it comes to startups or any business, brand building and work culture play a big role in attracting talent. Established in 2012, Appiness Interactive is a Bangalore based Product Development, UX and Digital Marketing firm specializing in Digital Services for the whole spectrum, from startups to Fortune-500s. It started as a medium to bridge the gap created with rapid changes in web technology where the incumbents were not able to adapt and master the new developments.
Leaders behind the Curtain
The Founder and CEO of Appiness Interactive, Visakh Viswambharan, is excelling at creating the best company culture. Appiness Interactive is the brainchild of Visakh. He has been a part of many successful ventures throughout his journey. Visakh is a serial entrepreneur who has also been recognized as the Young Entrepreneur of the Year by the Indian Achiever’s Forum. In 2018 he acquired the F&B chain Cuppa Beverages Pvt. Ltd., later he also founded the KNOiT platform which is a chat-based system for the gated communities. His endeavors as a business leader have been successful due to his exceptional skills and strategies.
However, Appiness was supported and built by other key contributors. Rigin Velayudhan – Co-Founder & COO, a colleague of Visakh, while they were employees, joined hands along with Sunil P Thomas – Co-Founder & CMO, an investment banker and graduation mate of Visakh to establish Appiness. Rigin is an expert in bringing business insights into the digital sphere, enabling brands and organizations to transform into new-age digital entities; he handles a few of the key accounts of Appiness. Sunil is a seasoned strategist who has years of experience in Digital, Strategy, Consulting, Transformation, Content, Marketing, Operations and Sales; Sunil and Visakh have Co-Founded a couple of other successful ventures too.
This team of 3 and the organization took the next step by onboarding Visakh’s childhood friend and schoolmate Vijil in 2018. He was handling sales at some well-known brands like Star Network, Whirlpool, Sabmiller, etc. He brought in a whole new perspective from the consumer space to the tech firm.
Happy Team Immune to Excuses
A Happy Team is a reason for the company’s success. Appiness believes that employees are at the center of everything they do. Thus the team works hard to ensure that the startup remains focused on scaling, acquiring customers and getting to market, and not worry about all the issues that arise with initial product development. In order to deliver the best results, Appiness makes sure that the company attracts the best people with the right attitude. “We always told the HR team to hire attitude and train skills,” says Visakh.
A skillful team with the right attitude is immune to excuses. Each team member is well trained by leaders and provided with the best technologies to help them deliver excellence. This approach helps the company to stay at the top of the latest trends. The young, passionate and aggressive teams of individuals are striding the un-trodden path to achieve excellence. Praising the team members, Sunil asserts, “Our team is awesome. And we try really hard to stay that way.”
Open and Communicative Company Culture
Appiness promotes an open and communicative culture that allows individuals to provide undaunted out-of-the-box ideas. Through Practical creativity, the employee is allowed to pitch the ideas without any hesitation. The belief is that an idea is only good as the returns it fetches for the clients. If the idea is bringing positive results, the company is more than happy to implement it. “We are not here to create immortal art; we are here to generate revenue for our clients,” asserts Sunil.
Everyone is responsible for diversity and inclusion, so one must proactively partner through professional and educational programs to make the work environment a better place for everyone. Rigin adds, “We have an amazing balance of male to female ratio and we operate like a family.”
Room for Fun and Opportunities
Due to the open culture, the workspace allows each individual to have room for work and fun altogether. “A happy heart is more productive than an unhappy yet highly skilled resource,” says Visakh. Thus, the company promotes recreational activities that not just help boost the social skills but also enhance teamwork. Appiness Team looks forward to APL (Appiness Premier League) every year, 4-month madness with indoor and outdoor games. “We see the attrition rate to be as low as 0 in this period,” says Vijil, CPO of Appiness.
Some of the other key benefits are constant learning & development and onsite opportunities. Training plays an important part in any employees’ career as it helps them to learn the latest technology and also to boost their career graph. We genuinely believe in enhancing the skills of our people, we try to push their limits and we know someday they will thank us for the constant demand for perfection and productivity beyond their normal limits. “I strongly believe that a manager who makes you comfortable by not pushing your limits are not doing any justice to you in long term,” says Visakh.
Triple 3 is another thing Appiness’ HR team follows to make sure all the new joinees are comfortably settled in. When a new employee joins apart from the regular induction and training 3 times of review is done within the first 3 months. 1st review is on the 3rd day with the HR team, 2nd is a lunch or dinner with the Founders on the 3rd week and the 3rd is with the HR and team lead in the 3rd month. “This gives a clear indication on how much we care about each individual,” says Rashi Ramesh, HR Manager.
Achievements By Far
To date, Appiness Interactive has been successful in bagging 50+ design nominations and has won 35 international design awards. The company has also been nominated as India’s best digital startup of the year 2013. The achievements are sheer hard work of the employees. Appiness has grown the team constantly and now has an employee strength of 150+ people.
Above all Appiness is a self-funded company. Appiness has also launched a Product Partnership Accelerator called Appy Hours in 2016. Appy Hours is amongst the best Product Development Accelerators. The startups can overcome the initial hurdles of getting in the market with a good product at a significantly lower cost with the help of Appy Hours. And has invested in 8 Startups. And the startups have won 9 awards in less than a years’ time; which includes the Most Innovative Startup at the World Startup Expo.
