Amplio Digital

Amplio Digital delivers comprehensive strategy and execution for businesses looking to increase growth and drive revenue leveraging digital platforms.

PIVOTAL MOMENTS: Amplio Digital was asked to help an individual grow his Amazon sales. The result: an increase from less than $2,000 a month to $250,000 a month in three years.

THE DISRUPTION FACTOR: Amplio has refined a playbook of strategy for what works on Amazon and in digital marketing, but it recognizes the individual needs of each client. Competitors might promise a “proven formula,” but Amplio prefers to act as a professional coach who knows how to change the playbook when it’s not working for a particular team.

COMPANY CULTURE: Amplio prides itself on fostering work/life balance. Need to take a call with a client? Take it on a walk-and-talk. Need some time to connect with friends and family? Take all the time needed. All new hires receive plans for their first three months to ensure goals and expectations are in alignment. Leadership and supervisors regularly check in with employees to ensure they’re tracking to goals and adjust as needed.

COMMUNITY IMPACT: A company core value: “Give before you get.” Beyond donating thousands of dollars to nonprofits, the company regularly opens its office space to the community in downtown Boulder, hosting such events as Startup Week and acting as mission control for Healthy Boulder Kids, a successful 2016 ballot measure. 

Karrikins Group LLC

Karrikins Group is a global growth-oriented business consulting firm.

PIVOTAL MOMENTS:  In 2001, founder and CEO Peter Sheahan published his first book, “Generation Y,” laying the foundation for his business consulting platform. In 2016, a fourth book, “Matter,” solidified the merging of practice areas and resulted in a global rebrand as Karrikins Group.

DEFINING INNOVATION: Karrikins Group has gained competitive advantage through unique product development, thought leadership and service offerings. Its Growth Enablement Organization (GEO) model is a framework for converting opportunity to value, providing critical levers required to drive innovation, unleash opportunities, channel energy, remove friction and create accountability for its clients. By applying innovative research techniques to its initiatives, the company has developed cutting-edge methodologies — such as its culture diagnostics tool, discovery canvases and exponential producer’s framework.

THE DISRUPTION FACTOR: Karrikins’ corporations reorient themselves to play more significant roles in the communities they serve and are inspired to drive greater levels of impact — not just contributing philanthropy for philanthropy’s sake.

COMPANY CULTURE: Employees engage in brainstorming and co-creation sessions to solve problems facing clients. Constant learning is encouraged, as is striving to be in service of one another, supporting personal development and career goals. Leadership is not static or title-driven; the most appropriate person takes the lead based on situation and capability.

GIVING BACK: The company’s Community Investment Solutions Practice Areas develop in-school programs on subjects such as financial literacy, digital safely and health and wellness and blend social impact with customized brand- building for organizations like Apple, Sony and IMB. In 2016, the company delivered more than 40,000 workshops in thousands of schools across the world, directly impacting the lives of more than 1 million kids.

Pinnacle Healthcare Consulting

Pinnacle Healthcare Consulting (PHC) is a health-care consulting company providing a range of strategic, financial and operational services to hospitals, health systems, physician groups and other health-care organizations.

PIVOTAL MOMENTS: In 2005, Pinnacle developed a fair market value (FMV) tool, an innovative approach to physician compensation that differentiated the company in the market. In 2016, Pinnacle created three new companies within the Pinnacle family, added a fourth principal to the leadership team, strengthened technical knowledge, expanded its geographic presence and cultivated new clients.

COMPANY CULTURE: Recent growth — from a one-office, 18-member firm, to a company with 50 team members and 25 active independent contractors across 12 states — has challenged the company to create different means of communication and to schedule more frequent meetings, as well as providing new ways to reaffirm the Pinnacle culture.

GIVING BACK: Pinnacle supports the foundations of its hospital clients and donates to three organizations selected by team members through a friendly competition. Since the start of “the games,” team members have made contributions to 10 different personally selected organizations.   

Velocity Global

Velocity Global is an international professional employer organization (PEO), providing human-resources services to hundreds of companies.

DEFINING INNOVATION: Velocity Global takes the approach that if you are going to create a new category, it requires completely rethinking how to approach people, processes and technology. Velocity’s approach has enabled companies to reduce their time to enter markets by 90 percent and costs by 50 percent or more, while maintaining client satisfaction.

THE DISRUPTION FACTOR: As one of Colorado’s fastest-growing private companies, Velocity has helped hundreds of companies employ more than 500 people across 185 countries. In three years, the company has achieved a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 337 percent. The company regularly fields inquiries from large multinational service firms about what it’s doing differently.

COMPANY CULTURE: Each full-time employee can give two spot bonuses per year to anyone in the company living its value of “being of service.” Employees are encouraged to visit a client employee that Velocity Global supports around the world each year, at company expense. After surpassing the companywide stretch goal in 2016, the entire team took a vacation to Cuba.

GIVING BACK: Velocity Global has helped fund more than 100 charitable and/or entrepreneurial initiatives through micro-financing platform Kiva and allocates a portion of its proceeds to lend to entrepreneurs around the world, typically in more challenged and war-torn areas. Velocity CEO Ben Wright is also actively involved with First Descents, a Denver-based nonprofit that provides support and assistance to young adult cancer survivors.

ON THE HORIZON: In the next six years, Velocity Global will bring in more than 200 new jobs to Colorado and is projected to have offices on six continents and more than 1,000 global employees with revenue topping $1 billion.