A Total Compensation Cloud Solution That Addresses All Aspects of Compensation and Performance: beqom

There is probably no more emotionally-charged issue for employees than what they are paid for their contributions. That pay has huge impact on employee motivation, and also can be an important lever in aligning the behavior of employees with the corporate goals. People behave in the way that will bring the most reward, so it is critical that the rewards are designed to produce the right behaviors,  that they are fair, accurate, and communicated effectively. How their compensation package is designed, delivered, and communicated makes the difference between a satisfied employee and a disgruntled one. A happy workforce is the biggest asset to any organization, and clearly communicated compensation, fair relative to the market and linked to company goals, helps people know they are valued and understand exactly what is expected of them. 

beqom drives happiness by allowing business managers to lead, align and motivate both employees and partners. The beqom Total Compensation software, delivered through a cloud computing platform is used globally across all industry sectors by over 100 large companies such as Microsoft, Vodafone, and PepsiCo. Founded in 2009, and headquartered in Switzerland, beqom addresses all Performance and Compensation aspects such as Salary Review, Bonus, Long Term Incentives, Commissions, Benefits, Non-cash rewards and all key drivers towards Employee Performance and Sales Performance. 

A conversation with Fabio Ronga, CEO 

What led to the genesis of beqom?

Before launching beqom, our focus had been on financial and business analytics software. The decision to launch beqom was triggered by a discovery, almost by coincidence. We realized that most large companies in America, Europe and Asia were still using spreadsheets to define and compute employee compensation. This represented a market opportunity like we had never seen before. Then, the enabler was the eagerness of the ex-Outlooksoft team to get back together on a new venture; this team had the required skills to seize that global market opportunity. 

Discuss about your first project.

Our first customer/project was Stryker, with whom we signed the contract in October 2009 and successfully rolled them out that same year. It has been a great success and still is 8 years later. An important factor at beqom is that we completely auto-financed the company for the first 3 years. So fast success was a must and a project failure was not an option. 

What were the challenges faced during the company’s early years?

The main challenge was probably driven by the fact that we were auto-financing our business: we forced ourselves to have a cash-flow positive operation. Our filing at the end of 2010, our second year of operations, was already showing a neutral cash flow. This self-inflicted constraint forced us to act smart and quickly identify what matters most in an organization: our people. 

What is the vision of beqom and what is your approach toward achieving it?

Our vision is to make the 130 million people working for the 5,000 largest companies happy. To be happy, these people need to understand how their day-to-day job contributes to the overall mission of their employer; they also need to be compensated fairly for doing their piece. In 2015, we addressed 1% of this population. We just announced a large capital raise from Goldman Sachs to reach out to 10% of that population as fast as possible. While we expanded and are still expanding the geographical footprint of our company and the functional richness of our solution, we kept our original focus. 

Can you justify what makes beqom one of the best places to work?

Yes. Certainly I can! Two-way communication is an essential part of beqom’s culture and our organization is designed for functional efficiency, not for hierarchical power. As a result, the organization is still fairly flat and constantly evolving. Another example is each month I host a call with the entire company – during which any topic can be raised by anybody. We also bring all employees – without exceptions – together in an off-site location for several days.

What are the future prospects of the company?

I see a much larger organization to cover the 5 continents, but with the same DNA and culture we currently have. Furthermore, 2018 will be a big year for the beqom software. 

Client testimonials

“By gaining key insights from the beqom solution, Orange has reduced the amount of overpaid commissions by up to 100,000 Euros per month.” - Eric Jacquinet, Head of Compensation & Benefits, Orange Partner Network. 

“beqom was the only provider that could meet our compensation needs. We needed a single, integrated compensation management system deployed globally that enables us to centralize our compensation processes whilst still maintaining flexibility at the local level. It was also important for us that beqom has a global presence and can easily engage locally with our team.” - Robert Gerdes, Vice President of Compensation and Benefits, CNH Industrial. 

“beqom is a proven solution in managing multi-country and multi-company projects. It is key for Campari to have a globally consistent compensation process covering different local operations with specific requirements.” - Roberto Gollin, Head of IT, Campari Group.

Meet the CEO 

Fabio Ronga: Ronga drives the company strategy and makes sure everyone understands it and is equipped to contribute to it. Coming from SAP, he spent his career creating, marketing and implementing innovative enterprise software in North America, Europe and Asia. Ronga served as Vice President of International Operations at OutlookSoft Corporation. Prior to OutlookSoft, he spent many years with Hyperion through a variety of field and corporate positions in Europe, the United States and Asia. He has over 13 years of experience with BI/BPM software vendors. Ronga is a Graduate of HEC Lausanne, with a degree in Economics and a Master degree in Business Information Systems.

“Happiness Is the Best Driver for Success. Our mission is to make the workforce of our customers happy.”

Keep in touch: www.beqom.com