#08 - Pitribe (UK, HR Tech) | Founder journey - Erika Giorgana, Founder & CEO

03/21/24 • 26 min

Erika is Founder and CEO of Pitribe.

Pitribe is an HR Tech startup based in London, UK. Pitribe is an Agile HR Management System for corporations to streamline their core human resources processes and to build an agile culture. Pitribe is used by over 20 large corporations across Europe and the Americas, including Fortune 100 companies.

Erika is originally from Mexico City. She is married and is the proud mom of three children. Erika had a 14-year tenure at Unilever, a multinational corporation behind leading consumer brands such as Dove, Knorr, and Ben & Jerry’s. At Unilever, she held multiple HR-related roles across Mexico, Latin America, and Europe. This led her to understand the importance for large corporations to evolve into agile and people-centric organizations and to start her entrepreneurial journey.

Content:

02:45 Erika’s roles as mom, wife, and entrepreneur helping organizations become more human

04:30 Why companies are becoming purposeful, high-impact, human systems

07:00 Erika’s North Star to be light so others can shine

08:15 Her professional journey in HR at Unilever and the foundation of Humand, Erika’s consulting company

10:00 Why building her own business vs continuing her corporate career

11:40 How Erika came up with the ideas behind Humand and Pitribe

16:00 Erika’s initial business hypothesis and its validation

17:50 How new companies are being built following an agile mindset

19:40 Erika’s career abroad in Latin America and UK

21:30 Her connection to Mexico

23:50 Erika’s advise to pursue entrepreneurship if you have a big idea and have done an initial validation

Learn more:

Erika in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erika-giorgana-b5804516/

Pitribe in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pitribe/

Pitribe website: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pitribe/

Episode page: https://www.mexpreneurs.com/podcast-pitribe

Our supporter for this episode: https://www.partnershipleaders.com/

Erika is Founder and CEO of Pitribe.

Content:

02:45 Erika’s roles as mom, wife, and entrepreneur helping organizations become more human

04:30 Why companies are becoming purposeful, high-impact, human systems

07:00 Erika’s North Star to be light so others can shine

08:15 Her professional journey in HR at Unilever and the foundation of Humand, Erika’s consulting company

10:00 Why building her own business vs continuing her corporate career

11:40 How Erika came up with the ideas behind Humand and Pitribe

16:00 Erika’s initial business hypothesis and its validation

17:50 How new companies are being built following an agile mindset

19:40 Erika’s career abroad in Latin America and UK

21:30 Her connection to Mexico

23:50 Erika’s advise to pursue entrepreneurship if you have a big idea and have done an initial validation

Learn more:

Erika in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erika-giorgana-b5804516/

Pitribe in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pitribe/

Pitribe website: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pitribe/

Episode page: https://www.mexpreneurs.com/podcast-pitribe

Our supporter for this episode: https://www.partnershipleaders.com/

Previous Episode

#07 - Skyflare (Germany, Cybersecurity) | Startup & Team - Juan, Zaher & Claudia, Founders

Juan Ocampo from Skyflare joins us again together with his co-founders, Zaher Mazuq and Claudia Nagel, to talk about their startup and their team.

Skyflare is a cybersecurity startup from Berlin, Germany. It was founded in 2021 with the mission to make e-commerce safe for webshop owners. Last year, the company saved over 600,000 euros in marketing expenses to their more than 40 B2B customers through their click fraud protection solution.

Zaher is CEO, Claudia is CFO, and Juan is COO.

Zaher is originally from Israel. He moved to Germany in 2017 to become the CTO of KIWI, a PropTech market leader in the DACH region in access systems for residential buildings. Before KIWI, he worked at IBM and developed security solutions for banks.

Claudia is a German serial entrepreneur, tech investor, and holds a Professorship in Logistics. In 2018, she founded High Rise Ventures, which invests in early stage PropTech startups. Before High Rise, Claudia founded KIWI, worked for a decade at McKinsey, and founded other ventures in e-commerce and B2C.

Juan is originally from Mexico. He moved to Berlin in 2013 to study a Masters degree. He then joined KIWI, where he met Claudia and Zaher and raised through the ranks during 5 years, starting as a working student all the way to becoming Head of Operations. He later continued working with Claudia at High Rise as Venture Development Manager before co-founding Skyflare.

Content:

03:00 Skyflare’s mission to make every webshop secure, especially the small ones

08:00 The role Skyflare’s plays in the cybersecurity stack of their customers, starting with click-fraud protection

12:00 The initial ideal behind Skyflare based on the founders’ struggles with online shopping

15:00 The “Aha! Moment” who brought the founders together to start Skyflare

17:35 Why every euro spent in AdWords by a startup matters

18:30 The role from each founder and why they are deliberatively building a small team of max 10 people

22:20 Why the founders are the winning mix to make Skyflare a success

24:30 Skyflare’s priorities for the next 12 months: fundraising, customer acquisition, and integrations

26:10 The trust-based hiring process used to build the team and culture

28:30 Their top advise for aspiring founders building small, high-performing startup teams

Learn more:

Juan in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ocampojuan/

Zaher in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zaherm/

Claudia in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-ing-claudia-nagel-0b66395/

Skyflare in LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/skyflare/

Slyflare website: https://skyflare.com/en/

Episode page: https://www.mexpreneurs.com/podcast-skyflare

Our supporter for this episode: https://www.partnershipleaders.com/

Next Episode

#09 - Pitribe (UK, HR Tech) | Startup & Team - Erika Giorgana, Founder & CEO

Erika Giorgana from Pitribe joins us again to talk about her startup and team. Erika is Founder and CEO of Pitribe, an HR Tech startup based in London, UK.

Pitribe is an Agile HR Management System for corporations to streamline their core human resources processes and to build an agile culture. Pitribe is used by over 20 large corporations across Europe and the Americas including Fortune 100 companies.

Pitribe is a solution developed in-house at Humand, a UK-based strategy and business transformation consultancy.

Erika is both the CEO of Pitribe and Humand and is currently, in parallel, managing Humand’s successful consulting business while also building Pitribe as a rising tech startup.

Content:

03:00 Why companies are becoming simpler, faster, and closer to the consumer and the market gap that gave birth to Pitribe

06:55 The challenges big corporations, “the elephants”, are facing to evolve vs startups, “the leopards”

08:50 Why big corporations should aim to become “elephopards”

11:15 The limitations of existing core HR management systems (HRMS) to support this transformation

12:45 How Pitribe integrates with the tech stack of big corporations

17:40 How Pitribe is ending with the “line manager monarchy”

19:20 Pitribe’s customer base, how it started within Humand, and is now ready to fly on its own

22:50 How Pitribe and Humand as organizations are evolving

25:45 The benefits of Pitribe growing inside Humand

26:50 Pitribe’s priorities for the next 12 months

28:55 Erika’s best advise for aspiring founders: solve a problem that resonates with you at a personal level