Unexpected Startup Lesson #1: Quitting the day job | Hacker News Reader

Unexpected Startup Lesson #1: Quitting the day job

currentlyobsessed.com

64 pointsmmaunder21 comments

Something to keep in mind: the MBA wasn't intended for entrepreneurs...way back when it originally was created it was designed for major corporations, like GE and GM, who needed professional managers. Business schools and MBAs are designed to produce them.

I'm not going to say that an MBA is useless, but it serves a specific purpose...and that purpose is not to foster creativity and entrepreneurship.

Like Dave has suggested in the past, there's a need for some sort of EBA--entrepreneur business school. Steve Blank also talks about this idea...his point of view is that the E-School (as opposed to B-School) should be attached to the engineering department (as opposed to the business department).

Here's a link to Steve Blank: http://steveblank.com/2010/05/10/entrepreneurial-finishing-s...

We have an entrepreneur focused MBA school here in Austin called Acton MBA (http://www.actonmba.org/). I almost went there, but decided to go to the University of Texas for my MBA instead. I learned entrepreneurship from several killer professors: Rob Adams and John Doggett. I am an entrepreneur and always will be, and I learned a tremendous amount from my MBA. It wasn't anywhere near worthless. In fact, I think it was the opposite. I feel that I can do any job in the realm of business or technology in big or small companies. Just like an undergrad degree, an MBA provides options. If you know you want to be a programmer and have the discipline to read all the programming books on your own, then you don't need that undergrad CS degree. Same with MBA.

This post looks like a great example of networking :)

It looks like the blogger, the guy who posted the link (1 hour ago) and all the 8 commenters are based in the same town.(I also know that many of them know each other) Most of the commenters have karmas less than 25 and it is probably not unreasonable to assume that most of the 29 upvotes came from people who know these 8 commenters.

Nothing wrong with any of this, and no offense intended, but I often see posts asking how posts get to the front page. Well, for all of you, here is one example of how posts can get to the front page.

I'm a friend of Joe's and I read his blog so I posted this. I know some of the commenters - some of them were in the YCombinator program. If I knew you and you wrote a great post I'd probably be inclined to vote for you too and my comments might be a little more positive so that you're more likely to buy me a beer next time we run into each other.

I don't know the author of that blog at all, but I upvoted it because I thought it was a great article.

I had a similar experience. No doubt, it's an expensive education, just a different kind.

If you set aside a $100k a year job to make nothing, you're "leasing-to-own" that equity and that education for $8,500 per month. Once you can pay yourself an insulting $50k salary, you're leasing it for $4,250.

Financially speaking, it's a helluva lot more painful than an MBA... But (for me) it was worth it.

I have to say this again, be careful with giving advice like this. To me, what should be encourage is people to think for themselves; just as you can figure out this start up game most other's can too. 41% of Entrepreneurs succeed on their first go; I think advice like this just taken as static algorithm for success without considering the context of your situation can be very detrimental.

I agree. This was my own experience, obviously. People debate these sorts of questions all the time (i.e. what's best X or Y?") and I think there are a couple of things that hardly get any attention that are more important factors than any particular decision...and those are: tenacity and intelligence.

  > 41% of Entrepreneurs succeed on their first go;

That's awfully precise. Not 40%? Not 42%? What is the sample size? Where did you get the data?

That's the source: http://www.kauffman.org/uploadedFiles/ResearchAndPolicy/TheS...

You claimed that 41% of Entrepreneurs succeed on their first go, and then quote the above link, but now you've got me very confused. The paper says that of those being surveyed, 41.4% were on their first business.

Interesting paper, but I don't think it supports your assertion.

For example, it may be that 100% of entrepreneurs succeed on their first go, but that 41% of those interviewed are on their first (of many yet to come).

On the other hand, it may be that all of these on their first business will fail, but potentially go on to succeed on subsequent attempts.

In short, that 41% doesn't at all say that 41% of entrepreneurs succeed on their first try.

Can you explain your thinking further?

Once a person has made the decision that they'd like to start a company, I only see one reason to consider an MBA, and that's the networking element. OK, a second could be to have a great support infrastructure during ideation, testing, development, etc.

But, the cost/benefit just isn't there, especially not for people who already have solid professional networks -- for those, they'd be much better off diving in with a good partner.

And, if things don't work out after 1-2 years, there's always the MBA option then, and you'd have so much more knowledge about how businesses work, and what makes you excited.

Great advice. Part of my decision to do the MBA was based on market timing...I applied just as the web 1.0 bubble was bursting. I hadn't considered much just doing a startup during the down economy, but that would have been a good time, and I know many others who did and it paid off big for them.

I like the ideas expressed in this article except it lacks specifics, examples etc. For instance, he says "about 4 to 5 months after quitting my job I was already ROI positive in terms of networking, learning and satisfaction." And he leaves it at that. He doesn't expand on how he networked, whether they're from school, social group or whatever. And it's short. No offence but I don't see how this article got this much upvotes

Joe seems to be one of those hybrid hungry entrepreneur types that happens to have an MBA. I went through the same debate and decided to skip the MBA, but I have friends that went Joe's route and it can clearly work. So in the end, it's more about the person and whether they have the stuff and circumstances than any particular degree - at least imo.

Chewing on these types of questions was totally unproductive and made me feel shitty. I’ve come to realize that doing startups is mostly an irrational choice. Just effing do it.

Right on. I went through this same unproductive time and finally came to a similar understanding. Though I'd argue that instead of "irrational" I'd characterize it as "extremely risky". To many people in technology and business those are the same thing. Which leaves the rest of us to take on such irrational risks and occasionally succeed...

Right on! Good way to characterize it. If you are strafing from zero, the downside risk is low, relatively speaking....so might as well go for it. This is why (in my view) it is good to go for it when you're young and/or it is a bad economy,

I think the MBA gets an overly bad rap these days, but looking forward to reading the next installment.

I think the MBA in the post is just a story of "How I got into debt after some entrepreneurial education". It could have been "After my first 4 startups failed to go huge and I was in debt up to my eyeballs I decided to start another".

Yes, totally (that was my point). Not dissing the MBA -- it was also an amazing experience and investment / risk. My real point was about weighing the financial considerations of taking the startup plunge against the intangible benefits. There are many forms of "debt", from forgone salary, stress on one's marriage, sacrifices to personal health stemming from high sodium intake from top ramen, etc.

Good point, I've just seen a lot of 'screw business school, spend your money on a startup instead' type posts recently, which certainly wasn't the case in this post.

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