This article was supposed to be an interview with questions and answers, but ended up being a lot more than that. Alina opened up and told us her story from the early beginning until this exact moment and we have to say that we loved it and you will too.
“I came to the US, a completely foreign country to me with a completely different culture, with a desire to work in tech. I felt like an outsider. Understood no political or sports references in work conversations. Understood no business references. My colleagues would often make me repeat myself because of my accent. I even got reported to HR for “acting strange” because I had hugged a colleague who just found had cancer for what they deemed too long. I felt I didn’t understand anything about this strange world I found myself in.
To make matters worse I was paid a meager hourly rate; my job was in NYC so it was challenging to pay the rent and food at the same time. So I was piling up debt — a concept I didn’t understand at all because in my home country no one was able to do such a thing. The concept of debt was completely new to me as well.
From my past life experiences in Romania, I knew that if I worked harder and smarter than everyone else I would prevail over my circumstances. And I did. After 10 years of hustle, I had climbed the corporate ladder and made the kind of salary I couldn’t even think I could dream of. $300 000 a year was the kind of money that could buy anything I could have wanted.
So when I sold everything I had and told everyone I’m quitting my corporate life everyone thought I was out of my mind. Starting a company with zero experience in an environment where most companies fail was not something anyone expected. But to me, it was the right time. I had learned enough to know how the economy works in the US. How products are built. How products are sold and marketed. And in addition, I had no fear of failing. I was ok to be completely broke. I was ok to sleep on the streets if I failed.
In addition, I had the right encouragement from the people that mattered to me. My friend from Romania, Carmen who has a successful fashion business on her own kept prompting me to try it, saying that I would love it because it matches my ever entrepreneurial spirit. And my husband was whispering in my ear for years to come join him and use my product skills to build something from scratch.
All of that was happening at a time when I was watching companies like SAP and Oracle building massive businesses on products that I thought at that time had suboptimal UX and felt I could do a lot better. In 2016 I poured all my knowledge and all the grit I mustered throughout the years to build the kind of company I always wanted to work for, into Chili Piper.
The kind of company where I can work from anywhere, where I know how I can progress in my career. Where we can have an impact on social issues. Where I can directly see the impact of my work in my stock options. Where my colleagues would be the best in the world at what they do. All while having fun. It was a long journey but now 6 years into our company is evaluated at a billion dollars. And I’m having the time of my life.
I came back to Techsylvania because I want to give back to the country that shaped my spirit, my work ethic. I hope that by employing talented people from Romania at Chili Piper they can be exposed to the same opportunities I was exposed to and have the same kind of opportunities to give back.
My early employees became millionaires already, the ones that are joining now have the same kind of opportunity to build their stock options into the kind of wealth that propel their dreams forward.”
These being said, we cannot emphasize enough how excited we are to have Alina again on our stage because we still have so much to learn from her journey and experience. She is the living proof that if you believe in yourself and your skills there is nothing that can stop you from achieving great things.
Motivational stories are what drives us sometimes and inspire us to start working on our own projects, so this time we’re in luck, because Alina will be at Techsylvania in person and tell us everything we need to know.
Alina Vandenberghe is a Romanian native that created a tech billion dollar company from nothing, Chili Piper, and this is exactly the topic she’ll be talking about on Techsylvania’s stage on June 28 and 29.
Co-founded with her husband Nicolas, Chili Piper boosts buyer engagement for companies like Spotify, Airbnb, Twilio, Shopify, and many more. With more than 240 employees in over 40 countries, Chili Piper has been spicing sales up since 2016.
