Invest Like the Best with Patrick O’Shaughnessy
Business:Investing
My guests today are Jack Altman and Miles Grimshaw. Jack is the co-founder and CEO of Lattice, an HR software platform. Miles is a General Partner at Benchmark, an early investor and Board Director at Lattice, as well as a former guest on Invest Like the Best. Jack started Lattice in 2015 and has scaled it into a multi-billion-dollar business that already serves over 5,000 organizations. In our discussion, we look at all aspects of building and scaling a software product from both an investor and operator’s perspective, which made this particularly fun to do. Please enjoy my conversation with Jack Altman and Miles Grimshaw.
Listen to Founders Podcast
For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.
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Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes.
Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.
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Show Notes
(00:02:55) - (First question) - How Jack & Miles met at Y Combinator in 2015
(00:04:22) - Lattice found a niche in mid-market HR software
(00:07:55) - Discovering Lattice's true market need
(00:11:14) - Fear of stalling drove the need for business growth beyond initial product
(00:12:06) - Deciding on multi-product focus over up-market expansion
(00:17:01) - Prioritizing quality of usage over frequency for customer health scores
(00:20:06) - Balancing customer health scores and actual needs
(00:24:31) - Prioritized community by spotlighting HR voices
(00:28:20) - Building community helps companies sell a vision or lifestyle
(00:31:05) - Cultivating broad awareness instead of hard-selling
(00:35:33) - Overcoming the culture of 'perfection’
(00:37:22) - Flywheel effect makes suites efficient: lower go-to-market costs, more focus on product
(00:41:06) - The challenges of juggling current needs and future demands
(00:46:27) - Navigating disagreements and trust-building within a company
(00:50:36) - Investors' roles extend beyond founders, focusing on their own goals and interests
(00:51:52) - How transparency eases the founder-investor dance
(00:55:16) - The changing employer-employee relationship
(00:58:37) - Navigating growth from startup to public equity
(01:05:43) - Lattice's ultimate aspiration
(01:07:42) - Evaluating founders' authenticity
(01:11:18) - What Jack & Miles are most embarrassed about, the most proud of, and the most excited for
(01:14:30) - The kindest thing anyone has ever done for Jack and Miles
Dr. Peter Attia - The Portfolio to Live Longer - [Invest Like the Best, EP.325]
Scott Davis & Rob Wertheimer - Lessons from the Industrial Titans - [Invest Like the Best, EP.324]
Sam Hinkie, Boyd Varty, Charlie Songhurst - Trail Magic - [Invest Like the Best, EP.323]
David Senra - Passion & Pain - [Invest Like the Best, Forever Episode]
David Einhorn - The Long and Short of Investing - [Invest Like the Best, EP.322]
Avi Goldfarb - The Economic Impact of AI - [Invest Like the Best, EP.321]
Auren Hoffman - A Deep Dive on Data - [Invest Like the Best, EP.320]
Trae Stephens - Find Good Quests - [Invest Like the Best, EP.319]
Doug Leone - Lessons from a Titan - [Invest Like the Best, EP.318]
Tim Urban - Idea Labs and High-Rung Thinking - [Invest Like the Best, EP.317]
Dan Rose - How Stunning Founders Operate - [Invest Like the Best, EP.316]
Jeff Green - Modernizing Advertising - [Invest Like the Best, EP.315]
Carl Kawaja - Dealing with Regime Change - [Invest Like the Best, EP.314]
Daryl Morey - Systems Thinking in Sports - [Invest Like the Best, EP.313]
Miles Grimshaw - The DNA of Software Companies - [Invest Like the Best, EP.312]
John Fio - Creating Magic for Consumers - [Invest Like the Best, EP.311]
Amjad Masad - The Future of Software Creation - [Invest Like the Best, EP.310]
Rebecca Lynn - Finding Your Customers - [Invest Like the Best, EP.309]
Michael Mauboussin - Sharpening Investor & Executive Toolkits - [Invest Like the Best, EP.308]
Jeremiah Lowin: Explaining the New AI Paradigm - [Invest Like the Best, EP.307]
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