Yonge & Eglinton : Innovation + Job News

In 2006, Poly Placements was founded in the kitchen of Virginia Poly. She based her recruiting firm's philosophy on the novel prospect that when it comes to recruiting, "people should actually like the process. Our clients, the candidates, they should enjoy it."

Poly's observation that too many companies viewed a looming job opening as a dreaded task to be done rather than an exciting opportunity to make the business better led to the development of the firm's "ROI of Happiness" philosophy, which, she says, "is not some airy-fairy hippy thing about eating organic vegetables together. It's about really improving your bottom line."

The work seems to be paying off. The company reports 2,600 per cent revenue growth in just a few years, and made it onto PROFIT magazine's list of the fastest growing startup companies in Canada in 2009. The company has grown, Poly says, from a single employee in 2006 to 55 staff this year -- including about 10 hires in recent months. "At the rate we're growing, by the end of 2011 it will probably be closer to 100 employees," she says.

In addition to the company's difference in approach, Poly attributes the growth to a difference in the business arrangement. Since about the recession of 2008, she says, companies have been giving big contracts for multiple hires over a period of time -- sometimes for the staffing of an entire department -- to the company rather than hiring the recruiters for a single opening at a time. "These are big contract with big clients. That's been huge."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Virginia Poly, Poly Placements

Rypple, who as we reported last week is aiming to "change the world of work" through its social-media-style human workplace application, could change the world of a few people more directly: according to company head of marketing Jay Goldman, Rypple is hiring for three positions immediately and "will probably just continue to have positions open," for the next year and beyond. "As amazing people apply," Goldman says, "we'll just constantly see how they fit and how the timing is."

The company plans to ramp up rapidly, as noted in last week's feature, after the launch of the 2.0 version of its application and the recent opening of a San Francisco office. Goldman notes that in addition to having the energy and passion associated with start-up enterprises, the company has won awards as the most democratic workplace in the world and offers attractive benefits and perqs.

Goldman suggests interested parties apply using the "Apply Now" button on the website, "but if people have any questions, they can feel free to talk to us on Twitter or by email."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Jay Goldman, Head of Marketing, Rypple

A banking phenomenon sweeping North America over the past few years, known as "relational banking," "boutique banking" or, simply, "new concept" banking, relies on a seemingly simple innovation to the bank-branch experience: the human touch. Featuring open concept designs, more direct and informal contact with employees and better amenities (from coffee to toys to community spaces), the branches are intend to make people's relationships with their large multinational financial institutions a little more homely -- a model of warmth borrowed from retailers such as Starbucks and Chapters/Indigo.

TD Canada Trust introduced the first of its take on the concept with a branch in Brampton last fall, and opened a second in Windsor thereafter. Now what one TD manager calls "the future of retail banking" has arrived in downtown Toronto, with a branch opened June 4 at Yonge and Imperial Streets that features a community boardroom, a "community wall," a children's play area and a customer coffee lounge, among other comforts.

"We've received very positive feedback about the new concept branches we recently opened in Brampton and Windsor and we think they'll love it in Toronto too," branch manager John-David Di Rezze said in a release about the new 5,600-square-foot-location. "Our new open concept space ... tells customers as soon as they enter that this place is all about them."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Tashlin Hirani, TD Canada Trust

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Children's birthday parties are meant to be fun, but they can often also have a huge environmental footprint, as Debbie Zinman says. Every guest drives to a store, picks out an individually packaged gift (each of which has been separately manufactured and shipped by truck), wraps it in paper that will soon be discarded... that's not even to get started on paper invitations and thank you cards.

Zinman and her business partner Alison Smith were looking to do something about that environmental drain when they launched ECHOage in January 2008. And they came up with a concept that Zinman says makes a child's party "an opportunity to learn something," by helping others in a way that is "moving, inspiring and exciting."

The social enterprise's innovation was to create a website that would allow children to send invitations to guests, asking them to contribute to one large gift for the birthday child and to a good cause at the same time. Children choose charities to benefit from their guests' giving, and money received is split equally between the charity and the child's dream present. ECHOage gets revenue from a 15 per cent administration fee charged on each party.

Based in the Yonge and Eglinton area of Toronto, the company has ECHOage parties happening across North America, and Zinman says they have been growing at an ever-greater rate. She says clients have so far raised over $250,000 for children's charities and points to a scrolling list on the ECHOage homepage of the donations' impact. In addition to the two founders who work "day and night" on the enterprise, the company employs three part-time staff.

Zinman says that the company is based on a community of parents -- overwhelmingly mothers -- who advise on every aspect of operations. To capitalize on that community asset, ECHOage launched an Ambassador program last week to help spread the world through social networks.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Debbie Zinman, co-founder, ECHOage