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We have all been there at some point in our lives, where we really want that expensive item (insert whatever that may have been here, for me it could have been a car all the way down to a really nice pair of shoes) but our financial situation at the time was limiting us (or least it should have been, if not, that is another story).  This example, my friends, is called having a champagne taste on a beer budget.

For those that have or are currently working for a startup, understand how that same concept plays out in the work place.  Startups are scrappy, they typically (although there are exceptions to every rule) start from humble beginnings and do not have a lot of money in the bank.  If they are lucky, they raised a decent angel round to get them going and got a good series A, but that money does not last forever, especially if you are pre-revenue or just starting to generate some revenue but are a far way from being profitable.  So, as a company, you cannot affortd to pay every employeee outragous wages, otherwise what money you did raise would be gone quicker than you can say series B anyone?  Faced with that dilema, you want to be able to provide your employees that champagne taste on a beer budget.  You want to be able to maximize the benefits that you offer them while minimizing the cut into the bottom line.  This can be accomplished in several ways, from paying a substantial portion of their healthcare coverage (or in some cases covering it all) to providing food and drinks in the office (does not have to be catered lunches per se, but perhaps coffee and snacks, they go a long way) to games for your employees to blow off a little steam.  You could even do a quarterly event, does not have to be extravagant, but simply getting everyone out of the office for some fun.

At the end of the day, everyone has their reasons for going to work for a startup, but whatever that is, they all have certain needs.  By providing that champagne taste on a beer budget, you are going a far way in making sure your employees’ thirsts are quenched.

These are two things that I think are extremely important when trying to build a team for a startup (of course they are important as well for larger companies).  However with the size of a startup, typically very small, the impact of talent and dedication (in my opinion) is felt a lot more than it would be in a larger organization.

As most of you know (and if you did not already) I work for a startup and we are not short on either talent or dedication.  In the perfect scenario, you try and build the dream team because you know that you are going to be working side by side in the trenches with these people for the foreseeable future, and you want to make sure you have the best damn team you could imagine.  Like I said, I think we have that team at Mixx.  With that being said, there are times where just when I thought we could not have anymore talent and dedication, someone surprises me.  The latest surprise came to me compliments of our CTO (although looking back, it should not have been a surprise, after all he is the overall brains behind the product).

However, even he is subject to surprise me once in awhile.  The latest surprise was something that I would have never been able to pull off (well, simply because I am not an engineer), but he could and he did.  We had a situation recently where we were having some performance issues and it looked as if there was not a simple thing we could turn to to say that is what was causing the issue.  Like he is so inclined to do, Dr. Dzoe jumped right into the log files to see what may be causing the problem.  A little poking and prodding later, and he uncovered something that might be causing the issue.  In typical Dr. Dzoe fashion, he made some tweaks and had a fix ready to go in no time flat.

To me, that was an amazing display of his talent and his dedication.  What I failed to mention is that while this issue unraveled in the office, Dr. Dzoe was absent attending to what I presumed where personal matters, he too needs to take time for himself once in awhile.  Even given the fact that it was after hours, and that he had been out in the afternoon, he still took the time to figure out what was going on and how to make a fix.  Some might say, well of course he did, that is his job.  I would respond by saying, yes it is his job, but it was after hours and a lot of people would have waited until tomorrow to take a look at it.  Not Dr. Dzoe, and that was a great example of how and why talent and dedication is so important to a startup.

Thanks for continuing to amaze me, you work does not go unnoticed (but something tells me you already knew that ) .