Austin-based stealth startup creates eHarmony meets LinkedIn for work

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Ever wonder how to get through to a key member of your business development team, or why it's so difficult to see eye-to-eye with your lead programmer? The days of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator — an exercise popular with workplace psychologists thanks to its simple matrix of 16 personality types — are waning as employers seek a more accurate prediction of "culture fit."

An Austin-based startup is taking the study of personal and professional dynamics to the next level by developing what it calls "a platform for personality self-exploration, deep personal and professional relationship analysis, and workplace culture/harmony." WhoType "helps determine the depth of compatibility in any professional and personal connection."

Currently in stealth mode, the platform will integrate an element of crowd-sourcing into its proprietary analysis tool geared toward identifying patterns and potential connections, allowing users to enter feedback about themselves and one another.

This, explains founder and CEO Greg Genung, will help people better understand one another's motivations and compulsions at work, resulting in more meaningful interactions. "Using WhoType you and your friends can help each other in the path of self-exploration by crowdsourcing self-awareness patterns from the people closest to you," said Genung. "The goal is to celebrate meaningful connections with deeper understanding, as not all of our connections are equally as important either in meaning or social closeness metric."

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With a team of four working WhoType's look, feel and functionality as the platform readies itself for beta, Genung told Built In its algorithms and analytics have been completed, as well as the back-end technology that will run its motivation and behavioral analysis platforms.

As the American Psychological Association explains, "Workplace issues are of great interest to psychologists, since most people spend a third of their adult lives at work. Work defines people in the most basic way, which is one reason retirement is so difficult for many people."

For its part, WhoType plans to make that third more fulfilling, or at least bearable, with its service offerings. Describing itself as "Match/eHarmony meets LinkedIn," the brand says it will help clients by "harness(ing) motivational needs at every level in the company, including leadership, to help the world's leading companies mindfully and intentionally build company culture (and) workplace harmony, and maintain growth."

Genung said the year ahead will see the emergence of WhyType's roadmap, as well as its biggest new feature to date.

WhoType was founded in Austin in 2012 by Genung, a tech and security startup veteran of 15 years, formerly holding VP, directorial and managerial roles at 21CT, Praetorian, Denim Group, and NCI, Inc.

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