What is the most rewarding part of doing a start up?

What I've discovered for myself is that what's most rewarding is actually the little successes each day with the team. Whether it's something I did or someone else.

The "little successes" that keep us driving forward on the journey towards the biggest reward, the company surviving and thriving in a great environment that people enjoy. So a customer likes the new product release we just launched. A customer buys the product! Our first revenue. The ad campaign has a 5% clickthrough rate. The change on the website increased our conversation rate by 30%. Our CEO just signed an exciting partnership agreement. We had an excellent company planning meeting. An engineer has a great solution to a product development issue. I helped a young product manager learn about feature prioritization and she thanked me. That influential blog is going to write about us. The Board likes what we're doing. We won a sale from a competitor.

I try and enjoy rewards every day, not just in the ultimate goal. Then if I don't achieve that ultimate goal I don't feel like all the crazy time and emotion and passion and energy I put into it is for naught.

Good question. Really made me think about it.

Three things immediately come to mind:

1. I love creating a product that solves a real business problem while having full control over it's direction and vision.

2. I enjoy working directly with customers at all levels and watching them use our software in new and unexpected ways.

3. As boss, I can have an office within walking distance of my home and set my own hours.

well, success. YOUR success if you can achieve it. Nothing is sweeter than succeeding on your own and the independence it grants you. This is freedom.

The most rewarding thing for me is being completely, absolutely and totally responsible for my own successes and failures every day. The opportunities to grow and learn (personally and professionally) are only limited by the number of tasks I take on each day.

For me, it is the ability to create a work atmosphere where my team enjoys coming to work everyday because they are challenged, learning every day, allowed latitude to make decisions, and not overworked because we manage priorities effectively.

Work is easily 1/2 of your waking hours...do something interesting and have fun doing it.

Fulfillment and freedom.

The chance to be constantly learning - every single day! After 7 years I haven't had 1 day in which I didn't learn something new. Every day my limits are being pushed to the limit; my creativity is stimulated to full throttle.

Cash. Lots of it. ;)