Making the Leap: Full-Time Job to Full-Time App Entrepreneurship

Making the leap from a stable full-time job to pursuing your passion is an exciting yet intimidating endeavor. It is a decision that many contemplate but few follow through with, especially when financial responsibilities come into play. For the last year and a half, I immersed myself in developing my app, and now, I am pursuing full-time entrepreneurship with intentionality.

The Leap of Faith/Manifestation/Delusion!?

Choosing to leave a full-time job goes beyond saying goodbye to a steady paycheck. It’s a step into the realm of uncertainty and risk. And more than that, I believe that your self-awareness has to be firing on all cylinders to really succeed at this state, especially as a solo founder. As I approached my financial milestone— enough money saved to cushion living expenses and student loans for 8ish months—I finally found myself at that inflection point I had worked really hard towards, where I felt I could, in good faith, quit my 9-5 and go full time on Buckets.

Preparing for the Transition

Transitioning to full-time entrepreneurship demands careful preparation and intentionality months before you put in your two week notice. It is essential to have a solid plan so that when you finally have that time for focus, you can hit the ground running and not waste any time. For me, this meant crafting not only detailed business and product roadmaps beforehand, but being meticulous about my calendar, my schedule and where and on what I would be putting my energy towards should look like when I would be full time. I did my homework and read articles about how solo entrepreneurs, with specially interest in technical founders!, structure their schedules and I landed on structuring my weeks roughly similar to the format below, except I also work on Marketing (Plan/Make) and Product/Engineering (Make) on Saturday and Sunday mornings as well:

(Reference: The Founder's Schedule, Sean on Startups) Part of the beauty of working for myself at the building phase is that I can truly control my days and can be flexible with the hours, so sometimes I prefer an 8am workout and instead move my Plan hour/ half hour to first thing in the morning, as I get my pre-workout caffeine in, get the dogs fed, and prepare a game plan and positive mindset ready for the day. The key is allowing yourself to be flexible in your schedule and reap the benefits of being in control of your schedule but also being honest with yourself and remaining accountable by keeping a checklist of daily TODOs and ensuring the P0s get done at some point on the day they need to be done.

Continuous Humility and Learning

Stepping into this new role, I discovered that continuous learning is crucial. And so is the humility that should come with realizing there is SO much you need to know and you just don't. What helped me approach topics is mapping it to a school-like incentive structure. I have always loved and have excelled at school and am super grateful that my brain works in a way that aligns with the incentives of traditional school (rant on how that is a privilege and school systems should be more accommodating/ innovative to be approachable and digestible to a larger swath of learning types... later!)

This pursuit of knowledge includes engaging with online courses, listening to podcasts, reading journals and relevant articles of course, but mapping them to certain larger "OKRs" or professional growth outcomes has helped me quickly filter out the superficially helpful media. For example, I will often scan any episodes of my favorite tech, startup and business podcast channels and ask: What do I expect to learn from this podcast episode? To learn more about B2C marketing. How can I "test" that I have accomplished this? I need to free write for 5 mins after I listen to it (or create voice notes!) about my thoughts after an insightful episode. Being intentional about the media and information I consume helps me make sure I am streamlined in my learning and keeps me honest about how I am using my time. I can see the trap that founders can fall into, thinking they are using their time well by passively listening to podcasts or skimming random articles, and can convince themselves they are doing the work when it never really amounts to furthering their business or product.

Embracing the Fear & Cringe

Leaving my full-time job was more than just a bold career move; it represents my commitment to myself and to taking my dreams and goals seriously. Something I always regret about my early 20s is not taking myself, my potential or my desires seriously enough. I thought, at that time, that I was too young and I didn't consider that I too could start a startup or create something huge at a young age. It took me till my late twenties that these limiting beliefs were unfounded and truly delved into the mindset of "if they are doing, why not me?" My parents raised me on that belief; why shouldn't you be the best in your math class? Why wouldn't you be the captain of your volleyball team? And I truly give them credit for so many of my accomplishments because of that mentality they instilled in me. I felt that corporate America and its institutionalized and cultural micro-aggressions can erode that notion, so I am glad whatever it was in my late twenties/when I turned 30, that I realized there are no reasons why i shouldn't be doing what I want to and I started making plans towards full time entrepreneurship then.

And as for the cringe, I think that the leap into entrepreneurship has to entail putting yourself into uncomfortable situations, whether that is fundraising for the first time or simply putting yourself out there as a LinkedIn "thought leader." Lucky for me, I find it liberating to do things other might shy away from; yes, you may embarrass yourself at first or not quite get it right if you are doing something for the first time, but it catapults you into a realm that increases your surface area for opportunities and luck. Both of which are necessary for startup success. As a case in point, I am launching this blog! Something I definitely am not super comfortable with, fears of being misunderstood or exposing too much definitely surface from this practice. However, I hope being able to curate my thoughts, my experience and share it out to whomever it may interest will help me make sense of my journey and perhaps, more importantly, help, inspire or comfort someone else thinking of starting their own founder journey as well.