Colorado remains a top location for tech companies and employees.
The 2020 CompTIA Tech Town Index rated three Colorado cities — Denver, Boulder and Colorado Springs — among the top 20 cities for tech workers. Job seekers across the United States may want to consider checking out the Centennial State when looking to join exciting, talented and value-focused teams.
Built In Colorado sat down with employees from ten Colorado businesses to learn more about their experience with their company’s culture and how they have grown into their roles. All of these companies are hiring — it’s a great opportunity to join one of the US’s biggest and brightest tech communities.
Workiva is a platform that simplifies and automates the management and reporting of business data.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Collaborative.
We have amazing, talented people at Workiva, and it’s constantly inspiring to work together to create things that are way bigger than anything we could achieve alone. Everything about our company, from the way we build products to the ways we support our employees, is 100 percent a team effort. Throughout my time at Workiva, there have been opportunities to collaborate with folks who are passionate about ideas and have influenced both product and company direction.
Our product teams are intentionally a mix of disciplines, such as user experience, engineering, product management, delivery management and quality assurance. We often host ideation workshops with diverse team members who come up with various ideas on how to tackle new opportunities. Great ideas can come from anywhere — and more perspectives help uncover hidden assumptions and align the team on the ultimate goal.
Collaboration isn’t limited to only our product development, but our company development as well. We embrace constant feedback to continuously improve and evolve how we work together.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I have been with Workiva for eight years — I started as an entry level UX designer only a year out of school. Over the years, I’ve gotten to work across most of the product, growing my skills and influence. My managers were incredibly supportive and gave me opportunities to stretch and grow in the areas of strategy and leadership. A few years ago, I was assigned to help bring one of our new incubator solutions, global statutory reporting, to life. Working alongside sales, solution architects and an amazing UX researcher, we crafted how we could adapt our platform to this new international market.
At the same time, my manager nominated me to take part in the first class of the Women of Workiva Leadership Academy — a program that offered training, executive coaching and networking to senior leaders. The training and coaching was hugely influential in helping me distill the core ingredients for becoming an empathetic, impactful leader. The networking helped give me critical allies both for the work I was doing as well as to lean on for advice and different perspectives. I now lead a team of 20 talented designers and strive to ensure they have similar opportunities.
VIZIO produces hardware and software for smart TVs and sound systems.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Budding.
As a new organization within VIZIO, how do we prepare for growth and culture impacts as well as build an environment and product that makes us all excited to come to work? For now, we spend a lot of effort on involving developers in the product roadmap — we want to feel like our code is on target and making an impact. Beyond that, we focus on both in-person and virtual team building that everyone enjoys — and have them often enough that you never have to feel like you missed out if you cannot attend.
Overall, our budding culture is focused on collaboration, work-life balance and forming a bond with our coworkers that supports quality, purposeful work that will make VIZIO proud.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I have been with VIZIO now for three months. We are building a new organization at VIZIO and it’s been a very fast and exciting experience. I have observed that Vizio is dedicated to hiring great people and trusting them to do a good job. In the three months since I have been hired, I have been given full autonomy to do my job and have received amazing support from my peers and executives alike. That support in turn allows me to give a great deal of autonomy to my team, which helps us to produce a very active and supportive engineering culture.
Bonusly is an employee recognition platform designed to cultivate and reward high engagement among teams.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Inclusive.
We talk about and practice diversity, equity and inclusion in all facets of our organization, from how we run meetings to compensation and career development and throughout the hiring process. Our product presents an opportunity to advance inclusion wherever it is used by providing a platform for people to be recognized for their contributions and including all in the recognition process.
As a remote team, we have a unique set of opportunities and challenges when it comes to inclusivity. One such opportunity came up when a candidate applied for a position who is unable to hear or speak. Being a remote team and conducting interviews remotely, we adapted our interview process to be entirely text based, sending out questions and challenges ahead of time and then discussing through chat. Inclusivity isn’t always convenient, but we believe in it as a core value and gladly work to manifest it whenever we have the chance.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I joined Bonusly three months ago to lead the data initiative. This was a new domain, having previously specialized in application development. The first thing I did was learn everything I could about data pipelines, their history and where they are headed. From there, I was able to pick where initial work left off and put together a functional data pipeline in the first month. Having the autonomy and support to learn and move fast has been fun and educational, setting me up to succeed in the next set of challenges as we deliver next level insights for our customers.
CyberGRX is a cyber risk management platform for businesses and their third-party connections.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Energizing.
I come to work every day energized by what the day will bring, because of the people I get to work with and the problems we get to solve together. CyberGRX is at the intersection of a huge and growing problem for every company on the planet — 67 percent of companies had a third-party related cyber incident in the last year.
The application of machine learning provides full visibility into those risks across the entire third-party ecosystem and a unique crowdsourced solution where every one of the nearly 10,000 companies on our exchange is helping every other company reduce their third-party risk. That’s pretty energizing in itself, but we also have a culture that encourages new ideas, is willing to risk failures as well as to celebrate successes, while encouraging teams to win. I look forward to coming to work every day.
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and how did it help you grow professionally?
Having been at the company for less than six months, it feels as if every project is the coolest I’ve worked on. But a key milestone was the recent launch of our predictive cyber intelligence capability: Applying machine to third-party cyber risk management at scale, and with dramatic results. I’m proud of the way our teams partnered across the business to bring the launch to fruition in a truly cross-functional way, with every function playing its part and navigating through plenty of last-minute challenges that might have undone a weaker team. That kind of teamwork relies on trust at every level of the organization, and I’ve been reminded how much it is the responsibility of senior leaders such as myself to set the tone, to lead by example and to be willing to put the greater good before our own interests.
Leadership is never done and we can all learn to be better leaders. In my experience, the best way to do that is to see great leaders in action and try to do what you see them do. I’m lucky to be able to do that at CyberGRX.
Pie Insurance is a commercial insurance provider with a focus on making insurance accessible and affordable for small businesses.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Ambitious.
As part of the product organization at Pie, everything we do is ambitious. A perfect example of this was two years ago when we were tasked with building the partner portal, a solution for Pie’s partner agents to submit their clients for worker’s comp coverage and track their status in real time. This was going to be our first major system, and we needed to build it within a very short timeframe. At the time, it felt very ambitious — and it was going to require all hands on deck. We ultimately finished the work on time and the partner portal has proven to be a foundational project that has helped Pie grow exponentially since it launched. Ambitious projects are tackled by incredibly talented Pie-oneers who continue to surpass what is possible on a daily basis.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I started working at Pie three years ago as an underwriter and was given the opportunity to transition into product after about a year. I’d always been interested in a product career, but I didn’t have a technical background; after my first meetings with engineering, I knew I had a lot to learn. I’d been in the insurance industry my entire career to date and this new role was uncharted territory. On top of that, COVID-19 had just emerged in the U.S. so I started in the role remotely.
These factors actually helped me navigate ambiguity and uncertainty in a way that would end up being critical to my growth as a product manager. It’s been almost two years since I moved from underwriting to product, and with overwhelming support from my team I’ve gone from helping here and there on projects to confidently leading entire products on my own.
Blue Moon Digital is a consulting agency that leverages data analytics to improve clients’ customer interactions.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Collaborative.
This is reiterated throughout the team and company. People lean on coworkers to learn from each other and navigate challenging situations. This is encouraged from the top down to each level within the organization. People really team up together to find the best solutions for clients, internal processes and team growth. In the most chaotic time of year — which is now, with our clients primarily being in the retail space — our team is constantly sharing tips and tricks, tracking documents and best practices across the board to ensure efficiencies and lend a helping hand so that all clients and team members are set up for success.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I’ve been with the company for six and a half years, and I’ve seen a lot of ability to navigate different growth paths — including my own. I’ve helped define an area that I’ve wanted to grow into that matches company and personal needs. I’ve helped shape others’ growth paths as well, and have seen team members expand on their skill set from coordinator to managerial levels within my time at Blue Moon Digital. Growth is a core focus for us and we endeavor to create an environment where employees can capitalize on their strengths and interests.
Zen Planner is a branch of Daxko, who builds technology solutions to help streamline management of health and wellness organizations.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Supportive.
The Daxko team has each other’s backs, especially when things are tough. The last one-and-a-half years of working remotely have revealed the true character of our people: Our engagement surveys show that we feel supported by our team members and our teams feel supported by our leaders. Our work is sometimes difficult and sometimes easier, but one constant throughout is the quality, intelligence and empathetic nature of the folks you work alongside at Daxko. We all work hard on our own work — no one will do your work for you, but we will all be there to help, guide and support you along the way.
On my team, the customer service advocate crew exemplifies this attitude day in and day out. Our team members will go out of their way to jump in and volunteer to cover each other’s shift times or answer each other’s questions throughout the day. Our team cares about one another on a personal level, and it shines each day in our stand-ups and meetings. We’re constantly laughing and checking in with each other beyond just work-related topics because we genuinely care about each other as humans.
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
I’ve seen a huge amount of professional growth and development throughout my five-plus years at Daxko. I am most proud of my part in helping team members reach their career goals. I’ve seen folks move from the support team into product, website development, account management, retention, payments, technical services, software development, marketing and people development.
For me, it is the growth of my team members that brings me the most fulfillment, and I enjoy showing up each day ready to push folks towards the next level that they are interested in or help them explore different paths within Daxko through shadowing, connecting across departments and dedicated time for professional development courses and conferences. I start career pathing discussions with my team members within their first six months at the company. During our weekly one-on-ones, I continuously check in on where my team members are interested in exploring next. All paths are open at Daxko, and starting in support provides a perfect foundation to advance.
Choozle provides a digital advertising platform that manages campaigns across a variety of mediums, including video and mobile ads.
Describe your company culture in one word.
People-centric.
Choozle understands the value of putting people first — it cultivates employees who feel that their ideas are valued, believe in and recognize teamwork and feel a sense of identity in their work. We have a teamwork channel on our company slack, and multiple times a day employees shout out recognition of coworkers either on their team or cross-functionally. I have worked for other organizations and tried to implement employee recognition. At Choozle, it isn’t extra work to give recognition; Choozlers are humble and willing to give credit where it is due.
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and how did it help you grow professionally?
The Choozle people team has a couple of really exciting projects taking place. We are in the process of implementing new infrastructure systems to support our scaling organization — conducting a deep HR system audit, identifying weaknesses in processes or tools and selecting vendor partners that will improve the employee experience has been very rewarding. My perspective is that there is always room for improvement. As a people team, our goal is to make the best employee experience. This develops each employee and grows the people team’s experience and perspective.
Skupos is a data platform dedicated to streamlining workflow and supply chains for convenience stores of all sizes.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Fast-paced.
Why? We’ve got a huge opportunity in front of us.
We’re a startup. Startups move, innovate and evolve quickly — they aren’t a linear progression. This means embracing change and working through ambiguity. They also provide an excellent environment to get involved, learn fast and make an impact early on.
Skupos is its own unique version of a startup — but you’ll see characteristic similarities to others. For example, in our customer experience organization we’ve built six new teams from the ground up in under nine months. In fact, we built two of them twice, in two different locations — and the results have been outstanding. We’ve achieved our highest ever recorded CSAT scores, churn is down 30 percent and we’ve significantly reduced our cost to serve. Each of these are huge wins for our customer, and for Skupos.
We’re swinging for the fences — home runs, not singles!
How long have you been with the company, and what professional growth or development have you seen in that time?
15 months. Professional growth? Patience.
Developing a career I’m proud of — one that fulfills me and allows me to aim high — takes a sustained approach over time and a great deal of energy.
Let me explain. I’ve developed a skillset that I can rely on and I’m known for, but I’ve also got to focus on building new skills that open up opportunities down the road. There are no shortcuts for skill development. Hacks? Maybe. But no shortcuts to put a new skill set into my professional quiver as a tool I can depend on.
The tools I rely on can be wielded in different ways from one company to the next. What works in one place may correlate to another, but rarely are they copy and paste. My focus: Strengthen, polish and become an expert with my current tool set.
The new skills need practice. They need opportunities to fail and succeed. My focus: Learn and develop new skills.
Like the best drummers, my right and left hands need to work independently and simultaneously. Learning, developing, strengthening and polishing. It’ll take time, but I know I’ll get there. Patiently.
Emerge’s digital freight marketplace is a logistics management platform for shippers and carriers in the trucking industry.
Describe your company culture in one word.
Supportive.
Every team member that I have worked with, regardless of department, has taken the time to share their freight knowledge and expertise with me. I started at Emerge with very little freight experience and I feel that I have received an onboarding experience that went above and beyond.
What’s the coolest project you’ve worked on recently, and how did it help you grow professionally?
I’m only four months into my time with Emerge and have already worked on some really cool projects. My favorite is our new award optimization service; it’s given me an amazing opportunity to learn our contract product from top to bottom. It allowed me to put myself into the shoes of our users and figure out the best ways to save them time and money.
