Having a job is riskier than starting a business now
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The Solopreneur Copilot P.S. read an web version of this email here: barrontech.kit.com/posts/ I had four jobs before I found one I actually cared about. TurboCare, Siemens. Honeywell. Vestas. Then Neudesic, which was the first time the work and the technology lined up enough that I gave a shit. That took 15 years. Fifteen years of commuting, fluorescent lights, eating lunch in my car to get alone time and going to bed early so I could be fresh for something I didn’t care about. That’s the deal corporate America offers. They burn through your best years at your expense, and you don’t notice until you’re 38 and exhausted. I noticed in March 2023, in Mexico, on spring break with my family. Everyone was napping. I was wide awake thinking about deals. Anxious mess. The thing nobody told me back then: the trade I was making wasn’t safe. It just felt safe. Here’s what I think is actually happening right now. For the first time in a long time, having a job is riskier than starting a business. AI is going to chew through middle-management layers that exist mostly because people were too scared to do their own thing. Healthcare is the leash that keeps people tied to companies that would lay them off in a heartbeat. The “stable” 9-to-5 is a story we keep telling because the alternative is uncomfortable, not because the math still works. Ask yourself a real question. Do you actually like your job? Not “is it tolerable.” Not “are the people nice.” Do you wake up wanting to do it. I think for 95% of people the answer is no, and they’ve never let themselves answer it honestly because once you do, you can’t unhear it. The reason I think a job is riskier now is pretty simple. When AI takes your role, you walk out with no pipeline, no audience, no product, no skill that compounds outside the company. You walk out with a resume. The next job pays less, takes longer to land, and probably has the same expiration date. When you start something, even small, even badly, you start building assets that don’t disappear when one client or one boss decides you’re inconvenient. A list. A reputation. A piece of software. A skill you got paid to develop. Repeatable outreach. A few proof points. That’s the safety net most people think their employer is providing. The catch is you have to start before the wheels come off. You can’t wait until you’re 38 and burned out. You have to do it while you still have energy to come home and put 90 minutes in after the kids go to bed. Here’s where I land for myself, and where I’m landing for my four boys. I don’t want them to spend 15 years figuring out what they care about by working at companies that don’t care about them. I want the entrepreneurial mindset baked in early. Curious. Scrappy. Able to communicate. Persistent when they don’t know the answer. That’s the actual skill for the next 30 years. College might still make sense for one or two of them. Probably not all four. The default assumption that you go into debt to land an underpaid job you’ll hate is breaking down in real time, and I don’t want them to wake up at 38 wondering why they played a game they hated that they didn’t have to play. If you’re reading this and you’ve had that thought lately, the realization itself is the asset. Most people never get there. Most people will work the 9-to-5 until they’re 65, complain about it the whole time, and still tell their kids it’s the safe path. It isn’t anymore. Start something. Even small. Even messy. Even at night. The risk is no longer the side hustle. Play the decade game with me. To your solopreneur success, Matt Barron P.S. All previous emails can be read here: barrontech.kit.com P.S.S. - follow me on all my socials here: |