As our October passed, a little recap is in order.
Why Our October?
The 10th month of the year carries a specific weight for us. It is in that month that Mistral first opened its door for business in 2010. This October 18th however, had a one in a decade momentum – it was our 10th anniversary! This monumental event brought many feels and made this insanely strange year better. Much better!
We’ve entered into the second Mistral decade with a team of 175 colleagues and here is what we did to commemorate and celebrate this gigantic milestone:
1) In cooperation with our friends from the Let’s Do It organization we planted a tree for each member of our community on Bjelašnica.
2) In memory of our deceased but forever beloved colleague Emir Zec, we organized a special scholarship program through which we support young talents. We decided to honor his memory in this way because Emir was a great mentor to many and a humanitarian with a heart of gold, – always putting others before himself. Additionally, we even came up with the “most selfless person award” where the person with the most votes picks a charity for Mistral to make a generous donation to.
3) Our regular Coffee with the Founders wasn’t so regular on the Friday prior to our company anniversary that fell on Sunday this year. Sanin and Mersed surprised us by announcing multiple new engagements on the horizon with clients that will be an honor to cooperate with! That wasn’t all they announced, but we’ll keep some things to ourselves at least for now. Let’s just say: Amazing days are ahead for the Mistral crew!
4) We partnered up with multiple small local businesses to support them in these times of weakened economy by purchasing valuable goods that we love. This partnership resulted in a 100% organic, hand-made, and unique Mistral gift.
Mistral multiple purpose bags were made by three women from a small tailor shop lead by Enisa. Inside, we placed carefully selected goodies provided by:
Fadil, from a small coffee shop. He grounded 17 kilos of Maksuzija coffee for us;
Adnan, from Franz & Sophie tea house in Sarajevo, who even let us change the name of his original tea from Voćni mix to Moćni mix;
Vlado from Biona, who made a special edition of sweets for us that cannot be found in the market and featured some of our favorite flavors;
Local print shops who helped execute our Hollywood-like designs for each employee!;
Igor, who made 175 unique wooden USBs that contained a happy birthday video featuring Mistral community members;
And Mersed – our CEO who spent many nights writing personalized letters to each of us.
Nothing would be possible without the diligent Irman, a 19-year-old drummer and a student of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Sarajevo, who together with his 5 friends drove all around BiH to ensure each Mistral member received their gift on time.
5) A number of internal virtual gatherings and kind words from partners and friends that came from all around the world – were just icing on the cake.
Our milestone anniversary went as good as it gets in the times affected by the coronavirus. On one hand, we were as careful and causes as possible, and on the other – closer than ever.
As a community, we survived a roller-coaster of good and bad this year and came out more productive, united, and stronger. We couldn’t be more proud to be in this moment of time, right where we are, with this exact bunch of incredible people.
Here is to another decade of knocking IT out of the park!