It is with deep pride that I share the news that we’ve hired Lattice’s next CEO, Sarah Franklin and that I'll be moving into the position of Executive Chairman. This is an important next step in Lattice’s journey and one that comes as the result of long consideration and careful planning. She’ll start in her new role on January 2, 2024, and I am so, so excited for what she will do for this company.
Lattice’s culture is defined by the blend of being high performance given our products and high humanity given our mission to make work meaningful. It’s important that the next leader of the company embodies our culture, understands product strategy and product development, has a strong intuition for what our customers value, and is highly commercial — a rare Venn diagram to line up. With Sarah, the more time the Board and I spent with her, the more confident we became that she is the perfect leader for Lattice’s next stage of growth.
Sarah has the sort of confidence that only comes from deep experience and success. She knows what greatness looks like, having run all of Salesforce’s marketing, and having served as the GM of both the Platform and Trailhead businesses. She’s also worked directly with some of the best leaders in the software industry like Marc Benioff and Bret Taylor over her 15 years at Salesforce. Her pursuit of excellence is balanced by the sorts of cultural aspirations we hold dear at Lattice; she oozes compassion, integrity, and joy.
Lattice is on strong footing: we’re in a great financial position, we have a 550-person organization that is built for the moment, and we’ve built a brand new HRIS that early adopters are excitedly implementing. We have a leadership team that inspires me every day; and we now have an incoming CEO in Sarah who has the ability, tenacity, and drive to create a refounding moment and take Lattice to the next level.
I love this company more than I can easily express: we have the best customers and teammates I could ask for, our products today are exceptional and I believe the potential of what’s to come in our space is even bigger, and above all, we’ve built a culture that I’m proud to be part of every single day. Our mission is to make work meaningful, and in the process of doing this for our customers, the people at Lattice try very hard to live this every single day. That is something special.
I’ve been running Lattice for over eight years, and I’ve loved almost all of it. But I’m a huge believer that we can only become world-class at our work when we love it to such a degree that it hardly feels like work. And the simple truth is that for the next stage of growth, Lattice deserves someone who loves the type of work required of a CEO of a company of many hundreds of people. It’s deeply important and impactful work, and I’m so happy to have found someone like Sarah who is simultaneously so talented and so passionate about it.
It’s easy in a moment like this to think back on the last eight years and relive special memories, wince at missteps, and just generally stand in awe at the chaos of it all. You sort of can’t believe how many sagas and side quests get packed into a startup journey until you’ve lived it. But at the end of each of our struggles, there has always been a solution. And one of my favorite things about the people at Lattice is their determination to find it. As I’ve always said to the company, the road to date may feel long, but there is much more in front of us than behind us. And each new chapter is an opportunity to get better and stronger.
On January 2nd, Sarah will be CEO and I’ll be Executive Chairman. But this won’t be an overnight transition. In my new role, I’ll partner with her and the rest of the leadership team closely to ensure a smooth and thoughtful handoff. Once the CEO portions of my duties are fully transitioned, I look forward to an ongoing role as a key partner to Sarah and the company. I’m not going anywhere; I’ll show up wherever I’m invited and try hard to stay out of the way where I’m not needed :)
Lattice is bigger than any one person; it has a life all its own and I’m so proud. I want to thank each of you for your hard work and dedication to Lattice, our customers, and our mission of making work meaningful. Building Lattice and working with each of you has been the greatest privilege of my career. I look forward to the new heights we’ll reach together with Sarah at the helm.
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