| (1) Describe your startup. Pluto is a comprehensive workforce analytics and communications platform to equip companies with the tools they need to build a diverse & inclusive culture. (2) What inspired the creation of the startup? I pulled a thread and never stopped. When I was a kid I was a big data and finance nerd. That led me to study economics in undergrad and to learn that capitalism had a few fundamental flaws including, among other things, negative externalities and information asymmetries that artificially magnify societal inequities while ironically lowering company profits. So I went to law school to see if the law could help internalize them, only to learn that the law is slow and retrospective (for some good and some not so good reasons). So I turned to tech to build a solution that would help companies use data to internalize some of these externalities in order to capitalize on those lost profits while reducing societal inequities. Long story short, VCs at the time thought I was too idealistic and inexperienced — not entirely wrong. Luckily, I was also equally stubborn, so I taught myself to code then slowly but surely built a team, a SaaS platform and a company — the jury is still out, but I’m willing to bet we make a dent in the problem. (3) What differentiates your startup from the competition? Most workforce analytics or communication platforms don’t seriously consider D&I, data privacy or the respect and trust of individual employees to be an important part of their business. We do. So much so that our entire business is built around it, from its very core. Pluto is unique in its holistic and respectful approach to addressing D&I and workplace issues as an inherent part of running a business: from earning your employees’ respect and understanding their needs to building great and innovative products that work well for everyone. Our unique, proprietary mix of story-based surveys with advanced D&I analytics, privacy controls and inclusive options as well as our ongoing two-way messaging and escrow incident reporting, provide companies with the set of tools they’ve always needed to actually measure and improve their culture over time. (4) Who is the target market? Companies of all sizes who are prioritizing D&I or their culture, no matter where they are in their journey. At this point in time, we’re particularly interested in mid-sized companies and enterprise — especially given the advanced analytics and routing features that we’re releasing to support companies with complex business units and global rollouts. (5) How did you grow your presence in your target market? We met passionate professionals who wanted to move the needle at their organizations, demoed Pluto to them and showed them how it would help. They tried it out, liked what they saw and then told their friends. (6) What stage are you at? Post-revenue, pre-venture. We’re an early stage startup with a growing number of customers. Given the nature of our product, we have had to be extremely thoughtful in its development — this has taken a while, but we believe our product is much better for it. We expect to be ready for scale later this year. (7) What are some of the biggest challenges that your startup has had to overcome? D&I being underfunded in most companies means that there isn’t often a budget for a solution like ours. So we’re basically building a people analytics and communications platform that’s so good, companies will buy it even though it also gives them the thing they really need: D&I. Ironically, our D&I focus is actually why Pluto is so good to begin with, but unfortunately companies aren’t always rational — which is one of the things we’re trying to solve. (8) What is next for the startup? This is a ripe time to push conversations around race and build more accountability for D&I efforts in the workplace. We just developed an antiracism story to guide employees and leaders in exploring their relationship with systemic racism and gain insights into employee thoughts and experiences on issues of race. We are excited to be rolling this out – you can learn more in our blog post. (9) Where would you like to be in the next 5 years? The Google of workforce analytics and communications, but with advancing D&I as our guiding mission instead of the much lower (but unfortunately still better than most) initial bar of don’t be evil. (10) How do you build resilience into your startup during this COVID-19 pandemic? Supporting leaders in understanding how COVID-19 was and is impacting their employees and to have more information as they strategize was a natural step for us. Our approachable storytelling format and extensive privacy measures are well-suited (necessary even) to properly collect this kind of sensitive and personal information. You can read more in this blog post. (11) If you had to give one piece of advice to an up and coming startup what would it be? Prioritize D&I and be ready to adapt as your team grows. Most startups think they need to focus on rapid growth and that D&I can wait until the team is larger, but failing to build these foundations early only makes it harder later on. Be thoughtful about the team you’re building, the voices that are being heard and the processes you’re implementing (including by not implementing any). |
Featured Startup: Pluto
by
Tags:
Leave a Reply