Dive Brief:

• Email startup Hiri wants to help improve business emails by allowing people to rate the emails they receive based on clarity, tone and brevity.

• The typical employee spends 2.5 hours a day on work email, checking it almost 100 times a day, according to research from the University of Loughborough in the United Kingdom.

• The startup hopes the ratings will allow people to improve their email communications and targeting skills.

Dive Insight:

The goal of Hiri is to motivate people to consider how they communicate and use email in order to streamline and improve business communications overall.

Hiri CEO and co-founder Kevin Kavanagh says email takes time away from other tasks and also makes it difficult for employees to stay focused.

Another feature of Hiri requires workers to wait 30 minutes between inbox checks. The tool also helps users organize email communications by asking them to distinguish between emails that are FYI only and those that require follow-up.

While Kavanagh admits penetrating the enterprise market will be challenging, he also believes a tool that can help improve productivity could have serious potential.