Capital Part 2 | The Day Job

There is a tendency for those with “brilliant” ideas to immediately abandon everything they are doing and focus completely on the development of that idea. I see this as the equivalent of betting the farm, your house, your car, and your kids on lucky number 27 because you believe it is definitely the right time.

There are many reasons not to quit your day job while starting up your business. Some of them are boring reasons that are pretty much statements of the obvious. Others are less so. I am going to take a different approach to the topic than prey on the fear of failure. Beginning with failure in mind is not exactly productive. Instead, of “Don’t Quit Your Day Job” we’ll change it to this:

How can your day job support your startup and vice-versa?

1) Social Networking. While these days social networking seems to immediately conjure images of websites where you make “friends” with virtually anyone you know and quite a few people you do not, social networking is more than poking that person you think is really cute and waiting for a comment on your wall. Even LinkedIn is leaning towards a thinly veiled market for sales guys to make their pitch.

However, work will place you in a close network with many other individuals who know people who will be able to help you, or that can offer advice, or that you can learn from in other ways.

The temporary web developer that you keep talking to is definitely disillusioned with his current job. This is not the future he dreamed he would have. Odds are he would love to at least try a startup. You might not have to pay him.

Write this down.

His replacement will probably be the same way. Get to know that guy too. Start building the team.

Write this down too.

Keep your notes somewhere safe of course, but when you meet people who have the skills you need and unrealized dreams, these are the kind of people that you should remember and that you should include.More, you can use work to meet clients of all kinds, to get a feel for what’s out there. I do not recommend working for someone you will later compete with, but if you work in a field that is third or fourth degree connected to your field, you should also be keeping your eye open for who would be interested in whatever it is you have to offer.

Get their card. Write them down.

2) Skill Development. Virtually every job you perform at an office will allow you to acquire the needed skills to help some aspect of your startup.

Working in HR you can learn how to recruit people, how to deal with workplace conflict, how people should be paid, rules and regulations governing people, how to develop policies, etc. You will also learn how to look for candidates and how to evaluate whether they are qualified. Staffing is probably the most useful area of HR for a startup.

Marketing will offer the basics on promoting your business, trade shows, sponsorship agreements, and all kinds of venues of advertising.

Working in Accounting/Finance you can learn how to monitor the performance of your business and how to evaluate budgets, projections, etc. You can also learn control structures for money and systems that can be used to prevent embezzlement from the company. Depending on the size of the company you work for, you can learn a wide variety of skills. Generally, the smaller the company, the more you will learn.

Working in Legal you can learn about laws governing your area, about contracts, about how to deal with complaints, and how to properly retain your business records.The list goes on.

Regardless, the main point here is your career will give you the personal skills necessary to add value to company. Always remember how these skills can help. If your job is not giving you useful skills, it also is unlikely to offer advancement. If this is the case, get a new job, don’t quit your current one until you have it – start interviewing. Your time in life is too short to be stalled in one place and always be cognizant of when that is happening.

However, this is not just a one way street. Your experiences in a startup can be vital to building your resume.

In a startup you will get an opportunity to work with a title far above what your experience would allow in a normal company and you will get to do tasks that you would not get to do in a normal company. Regardless of the profitability of the startup you can confidently say that you have lead a project team, that you have managed an expensive marketing campaign, that you have hired a staff of twelve, that you have coordinated with distributors and handled logistics – there are many, many, many skills you can pickup in a startup.

For those less experienced in a field a startup can also add a year or years of experience to your resume. This will get you past the basic qualifier questions and will get you to the interview where you can keep going up. A startup also shows that you have ambition or the fire necessary, and that by definition, you are a self-starter. It will provide you with great answers to interview questions.

And if the startup is a success, you may not need to apply for another job again – the jobs will come to you.

3) Business Processes. Beyond skills businesses have many common situations that they all have to deal with and many basic tasks which must be performed in order for them to be successful. Working at a business will allow you to observe the processes it has in place for managing common situations. These processes are often similar at many businesses due to consultants roaming about and delivering sermons on them. However, while the processes are around you may was well learn from them. If you see something clever your company is doing…Write it down.

The exception to this is if it is a trade secret, confidential knowledge, or if you intend to compete with your current company (not recommended, lawsuits do not just happen on TV).

4) Capital. Boring, boring, boring argument. But also a true argument. If you want to take the bootstrapping route you will need to continuously infuse your own capital into the company. This involves having a continuous stream of income. Jobs provide that.

5) Productive Use of TimeDuring certain phases of a startup you will be waiting on people, planning meetings, waiting on projects, on developments, etc, etc, and quite frankly there will not be work to be done. So, you can maximize your effective time by developing your own personal revenue stream. Remember, whether in your personal or financial life you should always be making effective use of time and work is very likely the most effective use of time when creating a startup.

I am sure there are other great reasons. But these are the main ones.