January 2021

Jay Mahabal is a UI Engineer at Lattice, where he’s worked for over a year. Here, we talk to him about how cartography led to his engineering career, his favorite part of working at Lattice, and more.

How did you get started in UI Engineering?

I really loved maps as a kid growing up. When I got to college, I ended up taking a cartography course where we designed maps using Illustrator. It was a really interesting class, but it was also incredibly limiting to do everything by hand. As I continued my map-making journey, I ended up learning GIS, and then Python, and then finally Javascript, for making interactive, data-backed maps on the web.

From there, it evolved into data visualization and front-end development more broadly. At the end of the day, it’s all about communicating effectively and elegantly with your audience.

What drew you to Lattice?

Definitely the mission. We spend so much of our lives at work, how come we aren’t better at making that time worthwhile and efficient? I know so many people who have poor relationships with their managers or who work for companies that don’t have proper career planning. I was really excited to come and build solutions for those problems.

What’s your favorite part of working here?

In my interview, I was really impressed with how low-ego and collaborative everyone was. I’m really happy to say that even a year later that’s true! Everyone is incredibly kind, respectful, and dedicated to helping you be the best version of yourself. I also love how I’ve been able to make connections with people outside of my immediate team, even when everyone’s been remote!

What ERGs are you a member of?

I’m a member of LOUD (Latticians Organizing for Unity and Diversity).

I’ve been super lucky in my career, and I never want to take that for granted or assume that everyone had those same opportunities. ERGs like LOUD are important in our work to create a more inclusive and equitable workplace.

Favorite Lattice Slack Channel and why?

It’s gotta be #feed-new-deals, which is where the Sales team posts the deals they’ve won. The energy in there is amazing, full of encouragement, celebration, and memes. As an engineer, my day-to-day is usually all about the product so it’s really nice to be able to see into other parts of the business.

What’s something you’re passionate about outside of your job?

One of the things that’s kept me going through quarantine and the past year has been a very active book club that I’m part of. We end up reading about two books a month and it’s nice to consistently have a date in the future to look forward to. I really appreciate the friendship and community we’ve built.

(We also have a book club at Lattice!!)

Best day at work?

We just finished the 2021 EPD Hack Week where engineers, designers, and product managers spent a week forming teams and working on a project of their choosing. At the end of the week, we presented the fruits of our labor to the rest of the company at our weekly All Hands.

I was so impressed by the vision and creativity of my colleagues. The projects were intentional and thought through and executed down to the details — all in a week — and I could tell that the rest of the company was energized as well!

One of the awards we gave out was for the winning project to be added to our roadmap. If this is what people were able to build in a week, I can’t wait to see what it’ll look like with some more time and space.

Cheez-Its or Goldfish?

Cheez-Its. There’s just something about the texture.

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Lattice works with People teams across the globe to turn managers into leaders, employees into high-performers, and companies into the best places to work. Interested in joining our team? Check our Careers page for all open positions across a variety of departments.

You know this feeling — you just finished your Employee Engagement survey. It went off without a hitch. Running these is like second nature for you now. Immediately after you have all your results, though, you’re left with crucial questions: Which areas are worth your teams’ and managers’ time to focus on addressing for improvement? Which questions are the most important for us to improve?

Answering these questions is not an easy task, and guessing is scary.

People leaders want to take action and make an impact. That requires deep listening to make sure employees feel heard, making data-driven decisions on where to make change, and a nimble response model that adjusts in real-time to meet their company’s needs.

But even the most well-intentioned teams struggle to do this because most Engagement tools don’t help users connect their results and their path to meaningful improvement.

Understanding what drives engagement is the first step toward improving it. So we asked ourselves how we could give every People team a roadmap to the most engaged version of their workforce and the tools to execute against it, which is why today at Lattice we’re launching Driver Analysis and Action Plans — two new Lattice features that wire insight and action into your Engagement DNA so you can impact your entire company every time you run an engagement survey.

One of the hardest things to do is prioritizing where to focus efforts for improvement so you can increase overall employee engagement. It’s not enough to simply choose your lowest scores or focus on questions that broadly influence engagement – forward-thinking organizations need to go beyond favorability scores and focus on the questions and themes that have the greatest impact specifically on their company’s overall engagement levels.

By using advanced statistical analysis, Driver Analysis is able to immediately identify the questions that have the strongest impact on the metrics you care about most, so you can prioritize the right things for your company. It’s like adding a Ph.D. in Statistics to your team every time you run an engagement survey so you have all the confidence in the world when action planning.

From there, Action Plans make it easy for companies to respond to and act on employee feedback in a way that promotes accountability and transparency. With collaboration between the People team, company leaders, and managers built-in, you’ll have the foundation to move from insight to action effortlessly with all the tools necessary to execute and track progress in real-time.

In addition to these new features, we’re also including a robust library of research-backed Suggested Actions that have been designed with impact in mind by Lattice Advisory Services experts right into the action planning workflow, so people leaders have the inspiration to start their process and managers can autonomously close the loop on their team’s feedback without extra help from HR.

To learn more about Lattice Engagement, Driver Analysis & Action Plans, check out our brand new Engagement webpage, or get a demo from our team.

Month: January 2021

“At the end of the day, it’s all about communicating effectively and elegantly:” Jay Mahabal on Building Solutions for Customers

Your Survey Results Are In. Lattice Empowers You to Tackle What’s Next with Driver Analysis & Action Plans