Why I Invested: Lattice

Why I invested: A writing series on early stage angel investing chronicling the rationales behind various early stage tech bets by Pete Kazanjy.

From my time at TalentBin I was very familiar with the HR / Talent Management Suites that were cobbled together acquisition frankensteins (Successfactors, Taleo, Cornerstone, etc) and could only service large orgs because of their high implementation costs and outside sales motions. Many of them had gone on to be very large outcomes. But it was unlikely that with their level of complexity they would ever be able to service the lower segments of the market.

All that said, talent management - the practice of making the people who make up an organization better at what they do was a powerful promise - especially in organizations where the people were the most important part of the business (knowledge worker organizations).

It was clear there was a talent management opportunity in the mid-market and SMB, and for high end workers where the minimal performance features of horizontal HRIS systems like Namely, BambooHR, Zenefits, or even Workday would not suffice. And if you thought about the next “thing” that HR departments would be budgeted to pay for, after the Applicant Tracking System, the HRIS system, and Payroll…talent management seemed likely. Hence…Lattice.

Jack and Jzac are great and I had met both in early 2018 through Brett Berson of First Round Capital (who has exceptional taste in people). I had also sold to them at Atrium and saw how they ran a company (very well), so I asked to invest in their next round - which ended up being an A bridge ahead of their Shasta B.

Should have put in $25k but was feeling nervous because of my historical lukewarm point of view about HR Tech…so put in $10k. Whoops. Facepalm. Have gone on to raise a B from Shasta, a C from Tiger, and a D from Tiger again. Tsk tsk, Pete - should have bet on a killer team.