
Why I Turned Down My Investment Banking Offer to Launch a Startup - pleahy
http://patrickleahy.me/post/17158167548/why-i-turned-down-my-investment-banking-offer-to-launch
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sachingulaya
This is also another boring HN meme akin to "how I learned to program".
Normally I wouldn't call out a post like this but I think it's necessary for
the health of the community that we don't promote thin content. A simple "Show
HN:" would've been better.

Congrats, Patrick.

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pleahy
Thanks for the feedback! I'm sorry you feel that way. I really though this was
a story HN would want to hear. If you don't mind, I'd be happy to talk further
offline. leahy16@gmail.com. Best wishes.

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jvandenbroeck
did you do any validation of your idea? (airtime) / how did you do it?

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jcnnghm
I'd like to see if the author is still happy about his decision after a couple
of years. In particular, if he can't raise funds because he is unable to
bootstrap for long enough, or get big enough from bootstrapping alone. The
benefit of working before starting a startup, especially for an investment
bank, is that you can save a bunch of money, then fund some of the stuff to
get the company rolling internally, which will make raising money much easier.
You don't want to end up in the situation where you can't expand (fast)
because you don't have the money, and you can't raise money because you are
too small and unproven. In retrospect, I wish I would have gotten a good job
before doing a startup, it would have made things much easier.

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michael_miller
On the other hand, having a salary can be quite addicting. Going from making
>$100k straight out of school(probably $150k with stock+bonus), to living on
$30k (or whatever your 'ramen salary' is) is quite a challenge, especially
when you know what it feels like to have disposable income. Ignorance is
bliss.

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thechut
As a third year student at a Business School in the northeast. I can relate to
how you feel.

You're being pushed and herded through internships and boring classes into
what you think will be your dream job. But then you realize that none of that
is what you love.For me and it sounds like for you this is when I realized
that computers and technology are my passion and that's what I love.

Everyone always says that people should do what they love, and that's how to
be happy. I think that for some people that's easy and for some others it's
really hard. I usually find myself having to do the wrong thing before I
figure out what the right thing (or way) is.

Lots of respect for taking a chance and doing what you think is awesome. I
wish I had the courage to do the same. Goodluck with your first startup, I
hope it's a blast :)

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jacalata
"A salary is nothing more than time you spend in a structured fashion for
somebody else. When you don’t own your own time, no matter what the paycheck,
you are not free and you will not be happy."

That's a touch overgeneralised, forgiveable in a kid straight out of college
but still worthy of an eyeroll. Not everyone itches to throw off the shackles
of employment for a startup, and I wish startup folk would wrap their heads
around this somehow and stop with the condescension.

I'm curious about the comment 'especially onerous for me': are you saying that
you have massive student loan debt that you need to cover, and that this is
uncommon among your fellow prospective i-banker students?

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samstave
Just out of curiosity, what salary level is a fresh grad offered?

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kai-zer
Standard street pay is 70k base and usually bonus in the 40k area (all pro-
rated) first year out.

