
How quitting my corporate job for my startup dream f*cked my life up - awjr
https://medium.com/swlh/how-quitting-my-corporate-job-for-my-startup-dream-f-cked-my-life-up-3b6b3e29b318
======
thatfrenchguy
"One day, I even found myself asking my girlfriend for a few cents because I
had no money to buy bottled water"

In general, when you have no money, tap water is better than bankruptcy.

~~~
nadezhda18
exactly! bottled water is a good that is well-known to be over-priced

~~~
SteveNuts
Over priced and 100% unnecessary, unless you live in Flint

~~~
awqrre
That is 100% untrue, even the flint water could be treated to be potable.

~~~
SteveNuts
In your home? If you knew the water was that contaminated would you trust your
home water treatment equipment to remove everything? In that situation I think
I'd buy bottled water until things are resolved.

~~~
mplewis
Distilling water with an activated carbon filter does remove everything.

~~~
SteveNuts
Sure, how much does that system cost and does it actually taste good to drink?
I've heard distilled water tastes horrible.

~~~
awqrre
if you remove everything from the water with this method, or any other method,
there is systems to re-mineralize water... (Reverse osmosis would also remove
most of the lead)

------
scient
So a guy working as a highly paid consultant that does not have time to spend
any of his money runs out of it in less than a year... And his top "warning"
for the whole thing is social pressure. Is this a joke?

~~~
elcapitan
I would imagine that once you're into a certain lifestyle (i.e. not leading a
student life anymore) you have very high monthly expenses and lifestyle
choices that are not that easy to get rid off.

~~~
deong
You'd think, "if your salary goes from $250k to $20k, start living like you
make $20k" wouldn't really need to be communicated out like some sort of
secret.

~~~
huac
I promise you, they don't teach you that in business school

"There's 2 things they don't teach you at Harvard. How to handle failure, and
how to handle a shotgun. I'm about to do both" \- the dude from the Simpsons
movie

~~~
sumoboy
Consultants are rarely entrepreneurs, he would have been smarter hiring 1-3
people to build his startup idea, then quit his job. People with startups have
this fascination they can do it all themselves, it rarely works.

------
alexc05
So he wrote this from a beach in Thailand while sipping a fancy drink? He no
longer works at a job he hates. He went on a two year journey attempting to
self actualize - but discovered his actual self is a bit of a failure?*

How has his life been fucked up?

What's the word (some sort of portmanteau of entrepreneur & porn) which we use
to describe this Tim Ferriss style trash?

*that last point is a bit harsh, trying to be sarcastic/funny there, not mean

~~~
stepvhen
Entrepornography?

------
basseq
Maybe it's consulting outside the U.S. (guy was a Senior Associate at Bain for
1 year), but the consulting intro doesn't ring true. Both personal experience
and an extensive network into MBB: I don't know anyone at that (junior) level
who a) is flying trans-Atlantic on a weekly basis (to the U.S. no less), b)
doesn't know where they're going until last minute, and c) changes projects
every week.

It doesn't happen. This isn't _House of Lies_.

Guy appears to be a professional blogger now, so this is very much a grain-of-
salt perspective.

~~~
exelius
He's not necessarily lying - I have several MBB friends (engagement manager
level) who have been flying trans-Atlantic nearly weekly from the US for the
better part of the last 3 years. Hell, I still fly coast to coast on a regular
basis myself.

MBB-level consulting has changed a lot in the last few years. Clients are no
longer willing to pay their rates for full projects, so a lot of their
projects are now 2-3 week due diligence projects to validate the output that
some internal team or a Big 4 accounting firm's consulting division put
together. One friend of mine has worked at McKinsey for 4 years and has yet to
work on a project longer than 6 weeks the entire time (most of her projects
are 2-4 weeks).

Even then, it's basically just the "MBB tax" you have to pay to whatever
consulting company your board of directors used to work at. These projects
could probably be done remotely, but those firms calling card is to massively
over-deliver every project they get in order to justify their rates.

All of this leads to a situation where projects are shorter, less valuable,
and happen with less lead time than they used to. The pipelines have been
getting shallower every year - look at how MBB are all trying to branch out
into operations consulting with mixed results.

One thing to keep in mind is that while MBB tend to exude this aura of
invincibility, they're actually struggling right now. I wouldn't be surprised
to see some consolidation happen in this space soon.

~~~
huac
I thought the point of having SF, LA, NYC offices was to cut down on travel
time, to the benefit of both the consultants and the client.

~~~
PaulHoule
There is a high element of bullshit social control in situations like this.

You could probably hire a few people in (say) Eastern Europe and set them up
with great process, tooling, and telecon and beat the hell out of consulting
groups that run their consultants ragged, but running them ragged is a
mechanism of control. You are so committed to it you are not going to question
any assumptions.

It is like the way that if you want to succeed in certain professions you
pretty much need to move -- it satisfies the ideological idea that "we are
hiring the best people from all over the world" and it separates you from
friends and family and once more makes it almost impossible you will question
the unspoken assumptions your career is based on.

~~~
exelius
> but running them ragged is a mechanism of control.

This is actually wrong. I used to think that, but again, the world has
changed. Running your team ragged is purely a dog and pony show to win follow-
up work. When you go into a client you don't know at all, and you do 6 weeks
of work and develop a business strategy... the only way that works is if you
walked in with a strategy. Which you _always_ do.

You then proceed to run your team ragged over the next 6 weeks to produce
mountains of work and show the executive team at the client "Hey, look at our
guys and how hard they work!" The work itself is usually just 120 slides full
of busy work with so many assumptions baked in it's all but meaningless, but
you make a great first impression and cemented your company's brand perception
at the executive level of that client. You can then sell much lower-quality
follow-on work for _years_ on the strength of that one 6 week project.

In consulting (ESPECIALLY strategy consulting) politics, perception and
packaging are far, far more important than the quality of the output.

Therefore, running your people ragged isn't about control or producing quality
output. It's about impressing the client by working your ass off, and
establishing a brand perception that hopefully will extend down to the other
types of work your company does (which may or may not be of very high
quality).

Anyway, I firmly believe that most strategy consulting work in 2016 is really
just pipeline development for operations consulting. Important for sure, but
not really what most strategy consultants signed up for.

------
jimothyhalpert7
I remember reading this a while ago and feeling completely duped. The author's
definition of a 'f _cked up life ' is what I would love my life to be,
assuming I would have an idea to devote myself too, and would be in an
environment where that wouldn't seem strange.

What is f_cked up it the situation when you're doing it backwards: instead of
jumping into a business, and dealing with those _problems_ , you start
believing that the normality of your life is what's holding you down, so you
artificially create those problems, without having a decent reason for doing
so...

~~~
jimothyhalpert7
I wonder if all the upvotes are due the content, or my accidental use of
_italic formatting_...

In case of the former, would anyone care to elaborate? Do you solely agree
with the message, or do you find yourself in a similar situation as described?

~~~
jonah
Everything looks more _important_ with _formatting_. Maybe _you_ should become
a consultant. ;-)

~~~
jimothyhalpert7
I'm way ahead of you :)

------
Loque
The title is incredibly annoying. Leaving your corporate job for your dream
has a very high chance of fucking up your life for a myriad of very obvious
reasons.

Not only that, but the idea that following your dream by creating a startup
would provide you with more free-time is beyond basic logic.

------
bottled_poe
This appears to be a thinly veiled marketing exercise.

------
S_A_P
I work as an independent consultant as my "startup". I had been consulting for
about 5 years for other people and saw less and less value in letting the
consulting company take 65% of the money they charge for me. I made a good
salary, but I never took health benefits, though I did use 401k matching.
Anyway, it took a while, but I made the correct contacts and was able to sign
MSAs with the 2 major software vendors I do work for, and now can land my own
work. I now bill for about 85% of what the other companies charged for me, and
even after paying both sides of the employment taxes I have come out way
ahead. I found an 18 month project that was planned so that nobody would work
> 40 hours a week and have a 7-4 work schedule. There is a possibility of
travel, but I will increase my rate for those gigs to make up for the
"hardship".

I dont know that I could really call my business a startup, but I do think
that if you are working your ass off as a consultant and have a legitimate
skill set and the right contacts, you can make your life better. It sounds
like this guy just traded one sweatshop for another of his own making.

~~~
avs733
I took a fairly similar path for a couple years and honestly felt it was
pretty much the best of all worlds (corporate/consulting/startup). The only
hiccup was growth...I found myself taking on and wanting to do more and it
slowly became more than I could handle myself or through the part time online
services available at this point in time. People under appreciate their value
as an independent consultant so often I am really surprised.

------
xhrpost
I'm not quite sure what to make of this article. Especially the end quote
where he is sort of suggesting going this "dangerous" route, but sort of not.

> No matter how much your journey f*cks up your life or how difficult it will
> be, enjoy the ride and keep following your passion. As Tony Gaskin puts it
> perfectly: “If you don’t build your dream, someone will hire you to help
> build theirs.”

------
miloshadzic
Posts like these are the new infomercial.

------
ececconi
I've been working at a consulting firm for almost six years. Tons of people
quit to make their own startups or go into another industry. For me, I'm just
thinking of taking a six month leave next year so I can live in Europe, not
work unless I want to, and pursue the arts. I'm thinking of doing a lot of
traveling, photography, and writing.

I think a lot of the angst people have about corporate jobs is that people
think about what they are missing out on. I think it's really important to not
lose sight of what you enjoy, even if you only have a few hours a week to
enjoy it.

~~~
plant42
Definitely agree. If you're thinking that you're missing out on life then make
the change, go down a tangential path. Do not go through life bitching &
whining that you didn't make the most of an opportunity.

Take the sabbatical and go to Europe for 6 months. If it turns out to not be
what you expected, so what, you've learned something and grown.

~~~
ececconi
The only real expectation that I have is that I'll come out of it with tons of
experiences. Who knows what'll happen or not happen.

------
dineshp2
It's important to understand what your expectations from a startup founder
life are. There are very few resources that explain what to expect and that
it's really just hard work on problems that you care about.

The way the media glorifies the startup founder life is very misleading to
budding founders.

The opening lecture in Sam's startup class was an eye opener in many ways and
put into perspective what being a startup founder really means(especially the
part that Dustin Moskovitz talks about).

[http://startupclass.samaltman.com](http://startupclass.samaltman.com)

------
gaur
I am suspicious of work/life advice from people whose ultimate life goals
involve tropical vacations and alcohol.

~~~
peterwwillis
I don't see what your ultimate life goals - or even having any - has to do
with work/life advice. If you spend half your time working, and half your time
on a tropical beach with a margarita, how is that a bad thing?

~~~
Spooky23
It's a signal of an immature/not quite baked thought process. Try spending a
month on the beach sometime. It gets old.

~~~
peterwwillis
I grew up in Florida and Mexico, so i'm aware that too much of the same thing
gets old - which is why I spend up to a week on a beach at a time, and work
the rest of the time in a big city. The dichotomy is blissful.

But even the idea that it can get old is very dependent on the person - some
people's life goals are to surf, eat ceviche, and drink cerveza while fishing
with friends. They may not get sick of it, while you or I might. Their
work/life balance might be giving diving lessons in the spring in Trinidad and
working a WWOOF off-season, interspersed with consulting work (a friend of
mine). The dude in the article likes beaches and tropical drinks. As long as
they can identify how to achieve a healthy balance, doesn't matter what it is.

------
exelius
There's an oversupply of ex-consultants and they all fancy themselves as the
next Jeff Bezos (Bezos is ex-McKinsey and his company operates like it). As a
current consultant who sees so many of his co-workers with this dream, I feel
many of them are being unrealistic about their prospects. It's not like an ex-
McKinsey consultant is really unique in VC pitches anymore.

But many end up bailing because these companies have an "up or out" culture
(meaning you either get promoted or fired every 3 years -- with about 80% at
each level getting the boot) that makes it very stressful. So it's pretty easy
to say "Yeah, fuck this place, I'm gonna go be a startup founder!" when you're
90% sure you're getting fired next year. And being fired from
McKinsey/Bain/BCG doesn't mean you're bad, it just means you're not a good fit
for the role above you (i.e. if you're moving up from being an engagement
manager, you're gonna get laid off if you're not a natural salesperson).

Thing is, being a startup founder is basically the same thing as working for
McKinsey/Bain/BCG. It's still "up or out" with each round of funding, and the
chances of success at each step are honestly smaller. You also don't have the
firm's built-in network and research tools to help you be successful.

I don't even think the average payoffs are better in the startup world. I mean
sure, if you can build your company into a unicorn _and keep the momentum
through an exit_ you will come out ahead. What are the chances of that,
0.0001%?

A better exit from McKinsey/Bain/BCG IMO would be to shack up with a "second-
tier" consulting firm like Deloitte, PwC, Accenture, etc. Depending where you
come in, you can pretty easily make partner within 4 or 5 years (anyone coming
from the world of top-tier consulting is already used to the crazy workload
required for this). Get to that point and you're pulling in $250k-$1M a year
without much risk at all for as long as you want to keep doing it. And a
generous pension (laugh if you want, but large LLPs are one of the few places
where pensions make sense) to retire on whenever you decide you don't want to
do it.

And then, if you still have the urge to run a startup, you're in a position
where you'll have the knowledge, connections and financial security to go run
a startup as the CEO who comes in and runs the show after the founders realize
their limitations. IMO this is a better path because 1) any company hiring an
expensive outside CEO is likely on an upward trajectory overall 2) VC funded
startups are getting more risky, not less, so let the founders take that risk
and 3) you can assess the cultural / product / market fit before you take the
job.

~~~
jaredmck
You keep saying Bezos used to work at McKinsey, but I don't see that info
anywhere else? He used to work at the trading firm D.E. Shaw, and Amazon seems
to operate in a very un-McKinsey way in many ways (i.e. they don't use
PowerPoint), so this is confusing...

~~~
mikeyouse
Maybe he's confused since Jeff Bezos's wife is named Mackenzie? Mostly
joking..

------
mark_l_watson
That is a good article but it was on HN a few years ago.

A mistake I think people make is optimizing their lives for income rather than
experiences and contentment. I have thoroughly enjoyed my career but I have
kept my working hours to under an average of 25 hours a week for the last 30
years (not counting time writing, which is more of a simple pleasure in life
than consulting).

~~~
matwood
Experiences can also cost money. Traveling can be done less expensively, but
is not cheap. Being out in a boat out on the water every weekend is not cheap,
but is an experience I live for. So when optimizing you have to find a balance
where you can make enough money to enjoy the experiences you want to enjoy.

~~~
thatfrenchguy
Travel is cheap if you're not doing it the five star hotel way :-)

~~~
matwood
Plane tickets are often 1-2k per person. Even cheap travel is expensive for
most people. I never do the 5 star hotel way and it is still not cheap.

~~~
kaybe
Travel costs time or money. I can travel for about the same price as staying
at home, basically. But then I occasionally like hitchhiking and couchsurfing,
and cooking with strangers in hostels, and hiking with a tent (areas in Europe
allow you one night's stay on unoccupied land if you don't bother anyone)..
takes a lot longer than the faster ways, but it's basically free. I only spend
money on food and gifts to hosts. (It is also a priviledge of youth and
health, I admit, to be able to take the bike to the next
country/city/whatever.)

------
Nr7
If you have no free time and feel overworked in your current job then surely
starting a start up won't fix that.

------
jessegreathouse
What I learned from this: If you have to call your mommy when you quit your
job, you're not ready to start your own business.

Also, 2 years after the call to mommy is not quite mature enough to start
doling out advice.

------
tarsinge
This can't be serious, I know it's from 2014 but the author seriously showing
of his egotists needs with a facebook photo (725 likes whoo) despite talking
about not to care about social pressure is beyond understanding. And living
from "inspirational" blog posts to wannabe entrepreneurs (= selling shovels
during the gold rush) in a tourist resort? Be sure which dream you are
following before quitting your boring corporate job, it's usually more
meaningful than what you'll be end up doing, from what I'm seeing in this kind
of posts.

Edit: sorry for the tone, I'm a bit emotive because I fell in this trap too,
and now that I see through the marketing stuff I don't understand why this
kind of post continue to be upvoted.

------
Kiro
> there will be so many hidden costs, accountant fees, lawyer needs

I don't understand this. I do my own accounting and have never spent a single
dime on a lawyer. It feels like I'm doing something illegal though because
people keep saying this is such a huge cost.

~~~
gearhart
Personal experience from having been through both sides:

People who come from corporate backgrounds tend to think having accountants
and lawyers is necessary even when it's a one man company because they're used
to being specialists, and accountancy / legal isn't _what they do_.

People who come from lean startup backgrounds tend to think they can get by on
their own work and the advice they can get over a pint with a lawyer forever
because they're used to being generalists. Doing things that they have no
expertise in is what they do every day.

The reality tends to be somewhere in the middle. Doing your own accounts when
it's just you is ~as hard as getting someone else to do it. Doing your own
accounts when you're a team of 20 is enough of a time sink to drag down your
overall productivity significantly. If you do go down the "professionals"
route though, costs mount quickly.

------
mark-r
Reminds me of something I once heard:

Starting your own business is great, you can work half days! And you get to
decide which twelve hours that will be!

Sounds like he would have considered himself lucky to keep it to twelve hours.

------
pink_dinner
"Entrepreneurs are willing to work 80 hours a week to avoid working 40 hours a
week."

This statement, but itself, doesn't really give you the entire picture. I've
had my own company for the last 10 years.

Running a company is more about controlling my own destiny, than the amount of
hours I'm working. I can choose if I want to work 80 hours a week or 20...and
I don't have a boss or a manager leading me on a path I know will be a
failure.

------
ryanmickle
So much life is about the intersection of preparation and timing. What Ali
fails to mention is how his startup prepared him and supplied perspective for
the lifestyle approach he is now taking. You rarely go from corporate job to
traversing beaches with wi-fi access.

------
btbuildem
How is this on he front page?

------
greggarious
So there are literally zero consulting companies that will pay a fair wage for
40 hours work? Or is it just that the fancy ones like McKinsey all want to run
you ragged?

------
andremendes
My read of this article could be summarized as: Want fanciness without the
stress? Don't go for corporate world nor start a startup.

------
dsugarman
it was a good read, but a better title would have been,

"how quitting my dreadful corporate job for my startup dream lead me to a
happy life of self-employed consulting."

------
kelukelugames
Can we change the sensationalist f*cked up title?

