<p>I am starting a Managed Service Provider focused on office automation (computers, VOIP, networking, printing) and SaaS (SugarCRM, Joomla, DekiWiki, Zimbra) and will be looking to attract high end talent.</p>
<p>Since capital is limited, I want to know what would attract top-notch engineers other than financial compensation.</p>
<p>Positive aspects that I see from a management perspective would be:
1. Employee-owned company
2. Profit/gain sharing
3. Cutting-edge technology
4. Freedom to work from home or office.
5. First employees will become future leaders of company.</p>
<p>Are these attributes attractive to high-end engineers/scientists/physicists/mathematicians and/or is there anything I am missing?</p>
<p>Health insurance, dental, vision... Retirement/401(k)...? Or is that a problem because of limited capital?</p>
<p>My company buys my bus and rail pass so I can roll out of bed, walk a block, hop the bus or light rail, ride ten minutes, and stagger into my downtown office building every morning. It's really convenient, and they make things easy for us.</p>
<p>We get fresh fruit every Tuesday. We get good coffee. At my old firm, they lured us in with a fridge fully stocked with free soda.</p>
<p>My current firm offers training <em>all</em> the time. They offer seminars, sometimes two and three times a week, and they order in lunch. Training was huge for me... I'm young, there are things to learn.</p>
<p>My old firm advertised that if you adopted a child, they'd pay the legal fees. I'm sure it was a benefit that their employees didn't use often, but it was amazing to see. Incredibly unique, really emphasizes that family is important to them, too.</p>
<p>There are lots of things you can do that are unique and cheap. If you do just a few things along these lines and stand out from the rest, it'll help show that you've thought about your employees' needs and that you're not just spouting off things you've heard in a seminar on human resources.</p>
<p>I would recommend providing profit sharing and other benefits to other staff as well (at an appropriate level). When H worked for a small, employee-owned company, he had loyal and dedicated support staff who were always willing to work late to get a proposal out, for example, knowing that they would be included in the bonuses and profit sharing if they won the contract. Turnover among the staff was practically non-existent which kept things running smoothly and allowed the engineers, etc. to concentrate on their own work. The company also allowed for very flexible work schedules, which made it possible for H to complete his doctorate while working full-time. (They also covered his UC tuition, though back in the 80s it was less than $1K a term.)</p>