Torben Rytt, CEO, Siteimprove
Torben Rytt is overseeing rapid growth as CEO of Siteimprove, whose web governance tools identify broken links and other problems on client organizations' websites.
Denmark-based Siteimprove has added 60 employees this year, Rytt said, bringing the total at its U.S. headquarters in Bloomington to 150. Rytt launched Siteimprove's U.S. headquarters in August 2007 after moving to Minnesota from Copenhagen, where he worked for a sister company.
Siteimprove offers quality assurance and web governance for client websites with software that automatically checks for code and content errors, accessibility for people with disabilities, compliance with regulatory requirements and style guidelines and search engine optimization, Rytt said. The service, sold as a yearly subscription, eliminates time-consuming manual checking of individual web pages for problems.
Siteimprove clients include Boston Scientific, Microsoft, Waste Management, Delta Dental, Stanford University and the Minnesota Department of Revenue.
"One thing they all have in common is they have content-heavy websites, and they care about the user experience," Rytt said. "That's getting to be about everybody. That's why this potential (for Siteimprove) is so massive."
Siteimprove, recognized the past two years as a Star Tribune Top Workplace, offers a culture that combines the efficiency and processes of American firms with the work-life balance of Danish companies, said Rytt, who has a degree in engineering, information and communication technology from the Engineering College of Copenhagen.
Q: How does Siteimprove appeal to millennials and other candidates?
A: Millennials are very passionate; passion is one of our values. Work-life balance is very important to them. Benefits are very important to them. They also give back a lot. … They have some expectations of their employers but most of those are fairly reasonable and something we've been doing in Europe for a long time.
