eePulse was founded as an outgrowth of over 18 years of research on the drivers of long-term firm performance. But it was not research alone that resulted in the growth of eePulse. The company's products and service are at the intersection of research and today's business reality.

Dr. Theresa M. Welbourne, the company's founder, President, and CEO conducted predictive research on what drives firm performance, and the results of her research were presented to numerous CEOs who engaged her in various consulting projects to make the research come "alive." It was the insights of these CEOs, and in particular Bob Felton (formerly CEO of Indus International) that led to the business process eePulse uses today.

Dr. Welbourne conducted her original research studies using traditional, paper-based, 150 plus question surveys, and when working with organizations going through change, she quickly learned that the traditional survey process did not provide them with the results they wanted or needed to improve their businesses. Bob Felton asked Theresa to conduct a study with his firm as he was going through an IPO and a merger -- with one caveat: "you can't do what you have been doing - you must change your processes - do what we in business do - make your research process faster, make it simple, and make it work for us." As a result of listening and responding to the business needs of Bob and other senior executives, Dr. Welbourne applied academic research principles and knowledge to invent something new. The Pulse Dialogue metrics, eePulse process, and enterprise-wide technology solution were then refined and further developed by the team at eePulse.

Through the initial work that Dr. Welbourne conducted as a faculty member at both Cornell University and the University of Michigan Business School, she found empirical evidence that human energy at work drives performance.

Energized employees go "above and beyond", energized customers continue to do business with you even when the economy is trending downward, and energized students get higher grades in class.

But energy must be optimized not maximized. Too much energy leads to burnout; too little results in unproductive behaviors.

Dr. Welbourne and the team at eePulse learned how to measure energy at work, how to assess optimal levels (which vary for different occupations and departments), and how to optimize energy so that firm performance improves.

eePulse's research shows that energy is a predictive measure of employee turnover, performance ratings, customer ratings, student test scores, department performance, and more. At the firm level, energy predicts stock price growth, earnings growth, and long-term survival. Thus, the energy construct provides for a rigorous and predictive path to performance.

Energy is optimized when managers remove the blocks to productivity. Many of these blocks are small things, and they are not the type of thing you would ever find in a traditional annual survey. However, by using frequent shorter Pulse Dialogues, with open-ended comment data, we learned that managers find actionable opportunities immediately. When managers act, productivity is improved. When productivity improves, employees are more energized. When communication improves, then the relationship between the employee and his/her managers and the company overall is improved.

eePulse knows how to measure energy, use energy at work as a predictive tool to help managers be successful, and more. But we quickly learned that measuring energy alone is not enough.

We use our original research on energy, our continuing client-focused research, metrics from our partners, and our technology to customize a question strategy for each client. The eePulse process is built on rigorous research, and we continue to conduct new research in a customized manner for every client.

In addition to standard research reports that are available using eePulse's technology solution, the research team at eePulse can provide clients with customized research reports, including but not limited to, the following:

• Summary reports and/or executive summaries at any reporting frequency: weekly, bi-weekly, monthly.

• Quarterly reviews with action analysis.

• Special research reports linking employee and customer data and/or establishing paths between individual, team, business unit, and firm performance data. 

• Benchmarking or Trendmarking reports.

• Case studies for executive education.

• Best practice reports.

• Clients who use the Energy Pulse receive quarterly calibration of their metrics. Each manager's optimal "zone" is re-calculated on a quarterly basis.