Howamigoing raises £1.1m in seed funding to transform employee performance

UNDER EMBARGO UNTIL 09:01 AEST TUESDAY 16TH APRIL

Howamigoing raises £1.1m in seed funding to transform employee performance
 

Julian Cook, CEO and founder of Howamigoing
 

Sydney, 2019: London-based HRTech startup Howamigoing announces that in April 2019 they have raised an additional £890k in seed funding, bringing their total financing to date to £1.1m.

Howamigoing launched an innovative platform in 2018 that allows employees to transparently and confidently manage their year-round feedback and performance plans. They’re now working with companies in the UK, US, Hong Kong and Australia.

The fundraise was led by angel investors Chris Hadley (founder, Quadrant Capital) and Richard Elmslie (CEO, Rare Infrastructure).  Existing investors Andrew McGill (professional director, co-founder Crescent Capital), Alister Jordan (CEO of Coles Express, Chief of Staff to former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd) and Jason Weeks (CEO of Vendorable.com) also participated in the round.

Howamigoing was founded by ex-J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs investment banker Julian Cook. The company will use the investment to build out their Sales, Marketing and Customer Success functions in light of their international pipeline.

Julian Cook, founder and CEO, said: “In 2019 it’s just not good enough to run a one-size-fits-all, ‘tick-the-box’ performance review process.  Employees are the heart of any business - they deserve more and if they don’t get more they will leave. There have been so many advancements in technology and social psychology over the past 15 years that aren’t being utilised by companies.  We know that employee appraisals don’t drive individual performance, we know that stack-ranking employees destroys teamwork, we know that combining pay with feedback skews feedback, and we know that most people don’t give honest feedback to their superiors when they can’t do so anonymously. This fundraise is a great show of support for the global rollout opportunity ahead of us, the quality of our offering and the strength of our team.”

Andrew McGill, company director, said: “Howamigoing offers an elegant solution to a global problem.  Having personally witnessed or been part of the transformation of many developing companies, in my experience the most successful had cultures built on feedback and employee development.  It’s exciting to see Julian and the team build a scalable platform incorporating leading research that can be used by companies of all sizes across the world.”

Alister Jordan, Chief Executive of Coles Express, said: “I’ve seen how important genuine peer to peer feedback is in both the private and public sector in developing a strong, aligned and honest culture. Sometimes telling the truth to a colleague about their strengths and opportunities for development is the hardest thing of all. The fact that Howamigoing is gaining traction across four continents demonstrates a realisation that ongoing, honest, performance-based conversations in the workplace are critical to unlocking performance and improving culture.”

Howamigoing believes that the best teams are built on constructive year-round feedback, which is why they’re using technology + design + psychology to break down the communication barriers preventing colleagues from gathering ongoing guidance from each other. Their offering utilises slick UX and UI alongside a novel way for conducting 360-degree feedback, check-ins, goal setting and pulse surveys.

ENDS

For more information, please visit: https://howamigoing.com/

For imagery, please click here.