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Keep your day job

The founders who kept a wage job lasted longer, and when going all in still makes sense · 14 min

In the early 1960s an Oregon accountant sold running shoes from the back of his car and kept his day job for years. His company became Nike. The myth says real founders burn the boats. Two studies of thousands of founders, and one honest post-mortem, say the side door is the safer road. Plus a two-hour test for this week.

Takeaways

  • In a study of about one thousand one hundred Americans, published in two thousand and fourteen, founders who started a business while keeping their wage job, and only later went full-time, were about one third less likely to leave that business than founders who jumped straight in.
  • In Swedish government records on about forty-four thousand men in technology and knowledge firms, more than half of all moves into business were made by people who kept their wage job. In the American study, cautious people were as likely as anyone to start that way.
  • Something to try: the founder-hours test. Name the two hours a week you will give the business, and the one thing you will find out in them. And count the months your household could live without your income.

Chapters

  1. Shoes in the back of a car0:16
  2. Burn the boats1:40
  3. The one in three3:01
  4. The jump that ran out5:38
  5. Same question, different answer8:06
  6. Two hours10:04
  7. The answer11:47

References

  1. Raffiee, J. & Feng, J. (Academy of Management Journal) — Should I Quit My Day Job?: A Hybrid Path to Entrepreneurship(2014)
  2. Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, academic newsletter (abstract record) — SHOULD I QUIT MY DAY JOB?: A HYBRID PATH TO ENTREPRENEURSHIP(2014)
  3. Folta, T. B., Delmar, F. & Wennberg, K. (IFN Working Paper No. 825) — Hybrid Entrepreneurship(2010)
  4. Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN), journal article record (Management Science 56(2)) — Hybrid Entrepreneurship(2010)
  5. Simon & Schuster (publisher's description of Phil Knight's memoir) — Shoe Dog(2018)
  6. Nike, Inc. — Philip H. Knight, Chairman Emeritus
  7. Portland State University Alumni — Legendary by Design
  8. Gallo, C. (Forbes) — Nike Founder Phil Knight's Memoir Packed With Career Advice For Graduates(2016)
  9. Stanford Graduate School of Business, Insights — Phil Knight on the Controversial Kaepernick Ad and Nike's Never-Give-Up Attitude(2019)
  10. CNBC — CNBC Transcript: Nike Chairman Phil Knight Speaks with CNBC's Sara Eisen on "Squawk on the Street" Today(2016)
  11. Higgins, M. (HarperCollins; BookPal product page) — Burn the Boats: Toss Plan B Overboard and Unleash Your Full Potential(2023)
  12. LeadershipNow, Leading Blog — Burn the Boats: Toss Plan B Overboard and Unleash Your Full Potential(2023)
  13. Kerwin, P. (University of Wisconsin–Madison News) — Research shows backup plans may keep you from achieving your goal(2016)
  14. Huertas, J., as told to Sidhu, I. (UC Berkeley Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology) — My Startup Failed(2015)
  15. Blattman, C. & Dercon, S. (University of Oxford, Department of Economics) — The impacts of industrial and entrepreneurial work on income and health: Experimental evidence from Ethiopia(2018)
  16. Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, academic newsletter (abstract record, AEJ: Applied Economics) — The Impacts of Industrial and Entrepreneurial Work on Income and Health: Experimental Evidence from Ethiopia(2018)
  17. Innovations for Poverty Action — Pros and cons of factory work, in new study from Ethiopia(2016)