What are your expectations of an ideal work-spot/ professional environment?
Top criteria for me would include:
Challenging work (Just the right amount too!)
Ownership
Good Team
Good Manager
Flexibility
Proximity to home (The last two for work/life balance)
Nourish-n-Cherish 
– Small team
– Smart team
– Flat hierarchy
– People who are in a similar phase of their life. For instance, I can’t work with a team full of 20 year olds any more, they can do 100 hr weeks easily :).
I think that should do it.
Same for me too.
Challenging work is top most. else life would be hell!
Cutting edge work, that makes a difference in the world.
I like Anand’s points too.
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So that is the difference, smart teams will figure out how to create challenging work and move on. You don’t necessarily have to start there.
May be I am too old now :), but I realize most work in software development is ‘same old, same old’ [other than few paradigm changing stuff].
In fact, I would even trade off challenging work to work where what I do has a huge impact on the business. I think that gives you a lot more fulfillment.
There is this pretty interesting book called ‘Founders at work’ by Jessica Livingston. It is worth its weight in gold. Check it out. Great stories there.