See other companies on Welcome to the Jungle

Kona

Employee experience platform

Kona logo
21-100 employees
  • B2B
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • HR
  • SaaS
Remote, US

Jump to section

Company mission

To make empathy the default at work.

Our take

Since 2020, 75% of Americans have experienced burnout due to work and with the shift to remote work, employers are increasingly expected to establish a long-term remote wellness plan for their employees.

Kona is helping remote teams develop their emotional intelligence so they can better understand their team. Managers are using Kona to conduct daily emotional check-ins via Slack, allowing them to identify and mitigate instances of burnout quickly.

Since its inception in 2018, Kona has welcomed over 300 remote teams into its customer base and led multiple successful funding rounds. The capital gained will be put towards growing the company's team and expanding its product, as it looks to establish itself as a must-have for remote teams.

Freddie headshot

Freddie

Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle

Benefits

  • Health, Dental, Vision: Your holistic health is our responsibility. We cover 75% of insurance costs.
  • Work From Anywhere: We're 100% remote and always will be. We take pride in timezones.
  • Minimum PTO Policy: We require a minimum of 15 PTO days in addition to holidays.
  • Mentorship: We're backed by some of the best. Get access to our network of mentors.
  • Stock Options: You're building something great. Get a slice of the pie.
  • Fully-Paid Retreats: We may be remote, but we meet up too.
  • Learning-Oriented: We support learning, whether it's a conference or book or advisor.

Company values

  • Transparency & Trust: We always default to transparency, everyone has visibility into every aspect of the business. You'll have the reins on your role - we value independence and avoid micromanaging. Trust does not have to be earned.
  • People > Customers > Company: Kona is only as strong as the team is, and meaningless without the overall well-being of everyone. We prioritize authenticity and showing up as your whole self. And it's okay to not be okay - we see vulnerability as a strength.
  • Intellectual Honesty: When in doubt, restart with the basics. We avoid buzzwords and ensure we don't get carried away in Silicon Valley hype. True psychological safety means everyone is comfortable with healthy debate, pushback, and sharing diverse perspectives.
  • Optimize for Learning: We know that growth comes from making good mistakes. We're relentlessly curious - we celebrate learnings over outcomes and welcome failure as a team. We always experiment, avoid excessive perfectionism, and keep it simple, stupid.

Funding (2 rounds)

Jul 2022

$4m

SEED

Dec 2020

$1m

EARLY VC

Total funding: $5m

This company has top investors

Leadership

Andrew Zhou

(Co-Founder)

Experienced Software Engineer having worked at Side and Apple. Also an Official Member of the Forbes Technology Council and part of the LA '20 Cohort at Techstars.

Yen Tan

(Co-Founder)

Previously worked as a Marketing Coordinator for Accel Employment Services.

John Bell

(Co-Founder)

Co-founded Logos, a decentralized news platform.

Siddharth Pandiya

(CEO)

Previously worked in Product Management at Zumper, Product Space, and UCLA DevX.