Startup companies all around the world struggle to attract, retain and motivate talent. If you ask any founder, this has to be the top 3 priorities of her personal time. To figure out what startup companies can do to build the right team, we need to first understand what makes employees tick?

Traditionally startups are considered to be exciting places, with lot of freedom to experiment, passionate environment, the romance of small team, growth potential, or in the days of dot com boom, irrational benefits.

We recently did an internal survey at our company, Vaatsalya, to understand why all of our team members choose to join and continue to work here with us. The actual question posed was "Vaatsalya is not the best company in terms of compensation, we have limited brand name, we are new company, no great benefits, work is stressful and unpredictible, and work is in non-metro areas. Then, why did you join Vaatsalya?"

In addition to all the traditional answers listed above, one element that is consistent and common across all answers is "I love the challenge that Vaatsalya provides me". This was echoed over and over again, from the frontlines to the management team.

Fundamentally, everyone loves a challenge. They want to prove themselves by overcoming the challenge. Every employer (startup or otherwise) has to ensure that employees are given a big challenge, which can really fulfill the ambitions of the team. 
This is very powerful learning for us as a team. As a startup we tend to focus on running the company and survive another deadline or meet another milestone. For the employee, this is the opportunity to better themselves. One more challenge to conquer.

As a founder, this really puts building a team in perspective. As a founder my job is to now ensure that we dont become complacent with our success, nor look for easy targets. My role is to push the envelope, and focus the company on a challenge which will stir the passions of my team.

Would love to hear more on what makes your employees tick.