

Ask HN: grad school vs full-time founder? - BadassFractal

I'm currently in my 2nd year of part-time master's at a top 3 US CS school. Also recently after half a decade working in the industry I left to pursue high tech entrepreneurship full time (I saved up for years just for this). We have 0 revenue at this point in time, and are still in the exploratory phase, so I wouldn't expect any income whatsoever for a long time.<p>I'm contemplating dropping out of school. Paying out of pocket for a private institution like that is extremely expensive. With that kind of money I could probably stay afloat for an extra year or longer (my goal is to avoid working for someone else again for alap). I'm also not learning much, at least not compared to the hands-on experience of actually hustling and building. The contacts are good though, lots of very smart and somewhat experienced folks all interested in the startup world.<p>Hypothetically, let's say I can no longer stay afloat in a couple of years, and need to go back to work for a company. Would they rather have an extra year of experience of me running my own company and building and pitching most of the software for it, or would they rather see a really fancy degree? I personally know how much that degree is worth, but does the rest of the world see it that way?<p>What other options are there out there for people who want to have some income while still working on their ideas? I'd join a startup, but that's mostly "just another job" that goes way beyond 9 to 5, and the employee equity generally isn't really a big incentive. I hear contracting is an option, although I don't know enough about it to be able to tell if I'd still have enough time for my own company and would make enough to feed myself.<p>Thanks, any suggestions are much appreciated!
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keiferski
A bunch of disjunct thoughts:

1\. If you aren't profitable now, and don't expect to be anytime soon, will
you ever be? Don't forget that the purpose of a business is to make money and
sustain itself, not merely to exist for as long as possible.

2\. Let's say you have X dollars, which can be used either for keeping a
startup afloat or for finishing your degree. Imagine it's a year from now, and
you've spent X. Either you'll have a degree (something that shows an
accomplishment) or you'll have work experience at a defunct startup. _Maybe_
you will have become profitable, but it doesn't sound like you're trying that
hard.

3\. HN probably isn't the best place to ask if a degree is worth it. You'll
get a lot of extreme answers from people in the anti-college camp.

4\. I don't have any personal experience with working for companies, but I'd
imagine that a degree would look much, much better than an extra year at a
failed startup. Especially considering that you worked on it for 1-2+ years
and still didn't make money (assuming you don't.) This sentiment will only
increase as the company gets larger; a small startup may understand that you
learned a lot from a failed startup, but a mid-size company or larger will
assume you just dicked around for a few years.

5\. A degree more or less sticks with you for the rest of your career,
especially if it's from a top 3 school. Will anyone care that you had a
(failed) startup experience in 10-15-20 years?

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BadassFractal
Interesting perspective, thanks!

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PonyGumbo
>Would they rather have an extra year of experience of me running my own
company and building and pitching most of the software for it, or would they
rather see a really fancy degree?

If you're interviewing with software startups, it's a tossup. If you're
interviewing with 'normal' companies, the degree is unquestionably worth more.
I decided to do the 9-5 thing for a while after selling my last company, and I
had to seriously downplay my entrepreneurial experience to even get
interviews.

