Pros
-Able to learn a lot on the job due to limited staff numbers
-Mission driven colleagues who were very passionate and always pleasant to work with
-Start-up nature
-Able to grow by taking on additional tasks outside of your role, if you want to
-If you believe in their mission and want to make a difference, you can do it!
Cons
-Lack of support from HQ to field teams
-Due to limited resources, many policies and procedures were not in place, which over time caused issues
-Not enough experts in the organization (e.g. if you are looking to win USAID contracts than make sure your finance team in HQ has a background working on USAID projects)
-CEO had brilliant ideas and the organization would put time, effort and resources into launching these ideas, but then the CEO would be bored and move on to the next idea. There was no realization that doing things right takes time and iteration.