Today I saw a great special on Fine Living TV called Quit Your Job!. Five little companies were featured to showcase the owner’s decision to leave their daily rat dace of a life behind and dive into the uncertainty of following their dreams. Here’s the kicker: These 5 companies are some of the most mundane, normal, average little companies out there.
These companies aren’t going to beat Google, they aren’t building a better iPod or bread slicer. There’s no “the next Facebook” and not a mention of angel funding. These entrepreneurs are doing simple things they love and making a pretty decent living from it. A cool daycare for pets. An artist who markets her own work to local wineries and restaurants. A movie and dinner theater. They didn’t leave their careers to make millions, they just made a lateral change to a job that is more fulfilling and makes them happier.
Becoming the next big thing is a dream harbored in the hearts of just about everyone I know. But what about that other dream to do something simple, something known, something that doesn’t take $20 million in VC funding? Small steps towards those simple dreams are more rewarding in the long run than jumping the rungs on the corporate ladder any day. In my opinion, a VC is just a creditor, and should never be what you dream of obtaining one day.
You can start your own design shop. You can write a book on programming. You can create a web-based application and make money off it. You can even open your own pet daycare. Is the only thing stopping you this idea that you need a bunch of money first?
There’s a lot of talk of billion dollar acquisitions in the media and in blogs, but the truth is those are the minority of businesses. Profitable small businesses exist in every city, owned by people who love what they do. Some of them will make millions of dollars each year – doing what they love, waking up each morning happy to go to work – regardless of which tech blogger ever notices.
Life is too short not to love what you do, and it’s much, much too short to wait around until someone hands you a billion dollars.
Charles Martin
on 23 Apr 08I go to a Thai restaurant in Irving, TX owned by a guy who chose to go this route instead of accepting a promotion to VP at a technology company. He said he is so much happier and doesn’t have to deal with corporate politics. And anyone in his restaurants who tries to introduce politics are shown the door. I would also love to do that too… but only after I pay off my current debts.
Erik Peterson
on 23 Apr 08The silly thing is that a fair amount of these small businesses (10% or so) will end up growing into some pretty large companies. The doggy daycare that I take my dog to occasionally started out as just one guy with one location (he even slept on the floor next to the dogs for the first year). Now they’ve got more than a dozen locations in three states, and the guy is a millionaire.
Just do what you love, and even if you’re not trying to become a millionaire, it might just happen anyways.
Don Schenck
on 23 Apr 08Find what you’re passionate about and go in that direction. I’m passionate about public speaking; I need to move in that direction.
Thanks, Sarah, for the nudge.
SH
on 23 Apr 08@Erik – Exactly. That’s the greatest point to make here, that you can start small and make it big, it just may take some more time, energy and elbow grease. It doesn’t hinge on these mythic billion dollar figures.
@Don – Go get em!
Yohami
on 23 Apr 08I couldnt agree more.
Yet, you can still go big without a VC who is going to own your dream at the end anyway.
Don Schenck
on 23 Apr 08First, the book …
Nick
on 23 Apr 08Amen, very inspirational! I am in the process of bringing my pet fashion business live but am trying to do it without having to quit my day job at first.
Al
on 23 Apr 08Thanks for this positive nudge in the right direction Sarah. You have just moved me one step closer. And above everything elses your post also shows that there’s a big market in doggy day care. A market that is fairly untapped in the UK where I live! Hmm, now let me think, I’m gonna need a good pair of walking boots…
Marc
on 23 Apr 08I’m really getting tired of reading the past few days 37signals constantly bashing VC!
Let’s not forget that 37signals took on Bezos as an investor.
Jonathan Fields
on 23 Apr 08Love it. I think a lot of people who would love to do something more fulfilling get scared away from entrepreneurship with stories about the all-consuming nature of start-ups, being beholden to VCs and having to grow something into a giant to succeed.
But, the reality is, the last Kaufmann report I saw revealed something like 80% of small business owners in the U.S. are actually one woman/man shops.
It’s okay to build a business around (a) what makes you come alive and (b) the lifestyle you want to live. To keep it simple, be able to do it as long you enjoy it and generate enough money to enjoy life and live comfortably in the world.
Yeah, that’s still called success!
SH
on 23 Apr 08@Marc, Jeff Bezos is a minority investor in 37signals. He’s not a venture capitalist, nor did he fund 37signals as a start up. There’s a big difference.
Robby Russell
on 23 Apr 08Great post. It’s been about four years since I quit my last job to start doing Planet Argon full-time. I haven’t regretted it… but will be the first one to say that the grass isn’t completely green on the other side.
At the end of the day, staying in business takes work. It requires a fair bit of self-discipline and focus on what’s important. There are so many things that are competing for your attention in a small business and it’s crucial that you constantly evaluate your values and motivations.
In my case, my story didn’t start out by me aiming to do what I do today. I wanted to do part-time freelance work and focus on my music career. Now I find myself not having time to focus on music at all… so I still have some restructuring to do and posts like this remind me to spend less time in the office. ;-)
Kelly
on 23 Apr 08I totally agree. I am starting small (not quitting my day job right now), and over the next few months (hopefully) I plan on building up my own design company. Baby steps right now will hopefully turn into something that I can do full time one day!
Chris Mills
on 23 Apr 08Wish I could be satisfied with this idea now …when the wife and kids come along, this is where you’ll find me. Until that day comes, “Hey VC’s, I’ve got something over here!!!”
Don Schenck
on 23 Apr 08@Chris Mills: Chin up, you’ll do it.
Daniel Tenner
on 23 Apr 08Good post!
I can see one rationale for wanting to aim big when you quite your job though… some people quit their job not because they don’t find them interesting or too stressful or not rewarding enough, but because they believe they can do even better on their own.
A lot of my friends are investment bankers in London (well, not for long with the current market). They make a lot of money and though they don’t love their jobs, they’re reasonably happy. They would tend to see starting a new business as a way to climb up the social ladder even faster than by “staying put” in a high-pressure banking job and receiving a fat bonus each year.
So for them, if they’re gonna quit a job that pays them £200k/yr with employee rights and all that, the new job with no protection better have the potential to make a lot more!
That said, I agree that one should aim for an enjoyable lifestyle first and for untold riches second (though I think aiming for untold riches is also worthwhile ;-) ).
Daniel
Hasan Luongo
on 23 Apr 08if you need mega millions just to start then your not going to make a billion, all the majors: google, youtube, fb, myspace, all started v. small – vc was a bridge to next stages of growth. So whatever your dream is, big or small – start small and start today.
Gary
on 23 Apr 08There’s a great book on the topic…
Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big by Bo Burlingham
Jeremiah Dodds
on 23 Apr 08One of the things I like the most about the period of time that we live in is that thanks to the internet, it is much easier for people with a passion for X to start up their own little business for X and make enough money to live – given that they have a nerdy friend who is willing to help them set up a web frontend, or have enough money to pay someone professional to do it for them.
I think that in the end, one of the things that matters the most is that people are able to get some sense of fulfillment out of life, and being able to make their living doing what they love goes a long way towards that.
Tom G.
on 23 Apr 08I always wanted to own my own business and be my own boss. I started my business because I wanted a great place to work and love what I do. I can safely say that business ownership is not for everyone but it’s one of the best decisions I made in my life.
I like to think that owning a business is in many respect like becoming a parent. You don’t really know what you’re in for until you do it. It is far harder than you would suspect, but the rewards are greater than you could imagine.
If you’re not passionate about the work you do, it’s hard to imagine how to motivate yourself to do everything it takes to build a successful business.
Joshua Emmons
on 23 Apr 08YES! YES! YES!
I graduated in ‘99 and went straight into startups in the “silicon alley” of NYC. Some were my friends’, some were my own, and all failed—not, I think, because we didn’t have strong product or business plans or talent, but because we defined success as being successful. My third grade teacher knew that you couldn’t use a word in its own definition. She was really on to something.
I can’t seem to leave city life behind me, so (even if chi-town is multiples more reasonable than NYC) I still have to code to pay the bills. But I code in what I enjoy (cocoa, nu, rails) as opposed to what is most likely to get picked up by a VC. And when I’m not paying bills, I’m writing comic books. “Success” in this endeavor is sometimes as insignificant photocopying and stapling sheets of paper together, and yet nothing has been more satisfying to me.
This satisfaction is something I was missing in my startups. If any of them had succeeded and made me rich and prosperous, I might have missed it my entire life.
JB
on 23 Apr 08A VC is just a creditor
VCs are not creditors.
Naresh
on 23 Apr 08Funny that this would be on ycombinator today, I quit my day job yesterday! You’re exactly right, life is far to short to not do what you enjoy. I’d rather survive month to month doing what I love, than have ample money doing what I hate.
My Two Cents, Naresh
Joseph LeBlanc
on 23 Apr 08You might want to keep your day job if you’re planning on writing a programming book. I speak from personal experience, and John Resig agrees with me: http://ejohn.org/blog/programming-book-profits/
Ted
on 23 Apr 08Each work has its own problems. Each person has his/her own problems.
The only way to enjoy life is if you accept it.
As long as you have ambition, there will be “needs”. As a human, our needs are forever.
I agree with one of the commenter, if you don’t enjoy what you’re doing, it’s hard to know if you enjoy your next job/work/business.
Plan is just a plan. At the end of the day, either you’re meant to be it or you don’t.
IF 37Signals weren’t meant to be like it is today, it will not be. You guys didn’t plan to be like this I’m pretty sure of that.
You were a web design/consulting company that enjoy your work and move along one day at a time. Solving little problems as time goes by.
I would advise people to enjoy their current job first before they moved to the next one.
SH
on 23 Apr 08@JB, In my opinion, they are, whether you pay them back with money, equity in your company or control of how it’s run.
SH
on 23 Apr 08You were a web design/consulting company that enjoy your work and move along one day at a time. Solving little problems as time goes by. I would advise people to enjoy their current job first before they moved to the next one.
This is true, Ted, but somewhere down the line, our company started because someone chose to quit their job. Someone was fed up working for someone else, someone was sick of churning out projects that didn’t matter to them, someone wanted more control over their future. All it takes is for that someone to make a move.
Matthew Scott
on 23 Apr 08Sarah,
I really appreciate this post and the comments provided. I started a strategic Life + Work design called men@pause exclusively for executive and entrepreneur men in transition.
Yes, as a former Army Special Forces Officer, you can imagine the jabs I took from my friends on starting a business called men@pause!
I even interviewed Jason F. from 37 signals last month to discuss his own transition to professional success and personal significance.
I just see men and women growing tired of compromising a job that sucks the life out of them and perhaps the alternative of taking an oath of poverty, yet having a life outside of work.
There is a better way.
Thanks for this post.
Matthew Scott men@pause
Don Schenck
on 23 Apr 08@Matthew Scott: What? ... you couldn’t make it as a PJ??
I’M JOKING! :-)
Jon Orana
on 23 Apr 08Indeed, life is too short to waste. Plan and jump.
Don Schenck
on 23 Apr 08@Matthew Scott: Just visited your site and learned about the ICF!
Thanks! JUST what I’ve been looking for! Seriously! How’s THAT for “Intention”?!! Woo-hoo!
Hasan Luongo
on 23 Apr 08there is a great series of papers published by Intuit and the Institute of the Future called the Future of Small Business, the third paper is called the Artisan Economy – it speaks directly to the trend they are referring to, exciting stuff, especially if your targeting the fortune 5,000,000. http://preview.tinyurl.com/38r7us
Mike Flouton
on 23 Apr 08But in reality, 50% of all businesses fail within a year and 95% of all businesses fail within five years. The idea that 10% of small businesses become large enterprises is way off.
Feelgood stories like this are great, but there’s a serious selection bias at work here. For the five people they found for this show, there were 95 that are now probably in serious debt (or have liquidated their savings) and have returned to the corporate workplace.
By no means am I discouraging anyone from trying to pursue this avenue. I’m an entrepreneur myself. Just don’t kid yourself into thinking this will be easier than your current 9 to 5. It will either be much, much harder or you will fail for not putting enough into it.
HP
on 23 Apr 08The last time I had a boss, I held a well paid position with good career/promotion prospects at a fairly large and quickly growing company. Despite all that, I did not enjoy how I was required to do my job, the corporate politics/environment and all the baggage it comes with, and increasingly the people I had to deal with on a daily basis.
The day a mere thought of going to work made me feel like crap I did four things. I called in to let my boss know that I would be late, typed my resignation letter, stopped by the Secretary of State office to register my own business and then submitted my resignation. Two weeks later I was out for good.
This July 1 will be five years since I started my own business and I have enjoyed each and every day of it. All things considered, and not everything worked out or went according to a proverbial plan, it’s been one the best decisions I have made so far in my life. As an added bonus, the company has prospered and grown beyond anything I could imagine at the time (for what it’s worth, when starting out my ambition was to do well enough to earn a decent living doing what I enjoy and do so on my own terms).
I know that circumstances differ, but doing something just because of pay is not worth it regardless of how good that pay may be.
Bystander
on 23 Apr 08Sarah, are you going to quit your job?
Jeff Putz
on 23 Apr 08My problem is that I don’t dislike working for The Man enough to give up the big fat paychecks he writes to me every two weeks. It was easier when I was forced into the situation by unemployment (and I did write a book during that time!).
Nicholas
on 23 Apr 08I’ve quit my job to instead develop Rails applications for a small but well-established web development shop here in Austin, TX. I’m 110% a believer in do what you love. If you arn’t waking up every day excited to go into work— get a new job and stay excited!
Peter Cooper
on 23 Apr 08Very good post! Just common sense, but that’s missing a lot nowadays. :)
I wanted to second the comments on programming books above though.. you’d never do it for the money, and not even for enough money to live on, unless you can keep multiple books rotating in the market (or you have very rare success in selling your own stuff, POD, or e-books). Even if you have a book with “good” sales (as I have) the money is incredibly poor.
This is all pedantry though; the post’s point still stands! But you might to try having your own mini publishing empire and sell products and services ancillary to your book.. that’s where the money is :)
Simon Graham
on 23 Apr 08Here, here.
My clients who are the most successful are all those that did something they loved first. The passion and enjoyment from this meant their clients loved them and the businesses grew.
Matthew Scott
on 23 Apr 08@Don: Dude, you are spot-on about the PJ thing. Have met many and I am a shell of a man! They are truly heroes.
Thanks for your comments.
John
on 23 Apr 08Why not just… find a job you like better?
Also, if you’re really not all that talented, do you think that’s why you have a job that sucks (even if you’ve climbed the ladder)? Or maybe you just started out? Or got a late start.
Finally, the ability to do this when you are young, is not to be overlooked. My guess is that JF was around 22-24 when he started 37s. How about trying that with a few kids and mortgage payment.
Anyhoo…
Ray Grieselhuber
on 23 Apr 08I’ve quit my job twice to follow my dreams and both times have been extremely rewarding.
The first was so I could travel around the world for a year with my wife. That was an unimaginably good decision.
The second was just earlier this year to start my company. Sure, there’s a lot more uncertainty but we lived way below our means and saved money so we now have the freedom to pursue our own goals. All the while, we watched our friends spend money on big houses and expensive cars and become slowly trapped by the things they own.
The worst thing you could ever do is to sacrifice what you really want to do in life for some notion of security. Besides, there is often more security in creating your own source of subsistence than relying on others to create it for you.
Eduardo Sasso
on 24 Apr 08That’s was exactly what i did! I quit my seven year job to work at home, creating small web applications and i never been so happy!
wenbert
on 24 Apr 08I totally agree with this. Although I cannot risk losing my dayjob, I still work on my “idea” after office hours and on weekends.
At the end of the month, me, my friend and my cousin will start renting a small place—dev house/incubator/place to hangout. We use money from our sidejobs for the rent and other expenses (can’t find angels here in the Philippines :P). And we plan to keep this up until the product is finished :) Very exciting _
And if our product succeeds, hell yeah im quitting my dayjob :P
SmellsFishy
on 24 Apr 08Most people posting have been fellating 37signals but few have asked whether 37signals can speak to this with any authority.
Sure, we all like the idea of just quitting our jobs to do our own thing, but I know of not one 37signaler who has taken this advice and struck out on their own.
Am I crazy here? Or are the posts on this blog getting to be a bit ridiculous and out of control?
My Life In a Cube
on 24 Apr 08All I need is a little push!
Actually… if i quit… I’d have nothing to draw about at http://www.MyLifeInaCube.com
decisions, decisions…
Don Schenck
on 24 Apr 08Shane: NICE artwork! Keep it up.
Don Schenck
on 24 Apr 08@SmellsFishy: Yes … your post IS “a bit ridiculous and out of control”! :-)
SH
on 24 Apr 08@SmellsFishy, you’re totally wrong about that.
I spent a great deal of time in cultivating a career that would pay me a good deal of money as long as I wanted to stick to it. I hated that job, I was burned out, and I literally walked out of work one day after saying, “I quit.” It was a huge stupid risk I took without planning for it, but I needed to do it because I wasn’t happy.
I became a freelancer, and worked happily for myself for almost 3 years before finding the job that to me is entirely perfect. The job I do has nothing to do with my college education, nor does it reflect my professional experience. But it’s what makes me 100% happier.
I’ll let the other Signals chime in if they want about how they struck out on their own, but rest assured, this sort of life decision isn’t foreign to any of us. Sure, we all have “jobs” now, but those are jobs we love, jobs that fulfill us professionally and personally, jobs that make us happy.
business
on 24 Apr 08Yes, I was just thinking about this. I know a lot of small business owners who are making well into the deep 6-figures doing normal everyday things like dry-walling, selling home decor, interior design consultant, etc. Doesn’t all have to be off the wall crazy bleeding-tech ventures.
Grant Ferguson
on 24 Apr 08Life will pay the price we demand, not the other way around. Unfortunately, too few have the brass to set their price and even fewer have the tenacity to keep making the demands until life pays up.
For those who do, most find the path to success narrower and longer than imagined. Fortunately, successful processes used by others mark the trail; but we must be willing to heed those signs.
That brings me to the real issue: ideas are a dime a dozen; ideas implemented are priceless!
It’s a different ball game working alone rather than for others. Even if it’s something you love, results (not just intent) are required.
The person who diligently pursues a dream has the greatest opportunity to generate measurable results. Whether that effort produces a pound or a ton of money remains secondary to the personal satisfaction produced by each win.
Because life will pay what we demand, we can set our price high enough to cover the cost of our heartfelt desires while expanding our wallets.
SmellsFishy
on 24 Apr 08Respect, Sarah. :)
Shafqat
on 24 Apr 08Great post! I did just that (quit my job) and it was the most liberating feeling in the world. We were building NewsCred part time and interest suddenly exploded (interest exploded, not users since we are in private alpha). I felt a moral obligation to follow my dreams and let the passion burn bright. Who knows what will happen. But atleast we’re giving it a shot!
prince
on 25 Apr 08Actually we could quit from our job , who could be to do that? may be we could make a better choice for our job style and make us more happier… and enjoy our life…. just my opinion…:D
Serge Lescouarnec
on 25 Apr 08There is a nice movie theater that offers meals, beer and wine in Portland (Oregon) named ‘Living Theaters’...
I mentioned them on Serge the Concierge (with some photos of the place).
As for quitting your job, there is an alternative called Slash Careers.
Have a great week-end
Serge
This discussion is closed.