Ep. 24 pt. 1 - Leaving jobs at Google and Amazon to start a podcast tech company
Financial planning, risk management, stars that needed to align, etc.
Listen to Metacast: Apple, Spotify, YouTube
We’ve been dying to record this two-part episode about careers and business!
“So I'm coming back from Tulum, Mexico back home… next day I'm joining a meeting and I look at those rectangles of people in Google Meet who connect to the matrix from their bedrooms.
It was so bizarre. I'm like, what am I doing here? Basically, for me, it was a realization that whatever happens, this I cannot do anymore.”
— Ilya, after coming back to work from a 10-day retreat
We’re taking a short break from our usual programming about podcasting to dive into what’s next for us.
I quit my job at Google on June 1st and Arnab left his job at Amazon last year. On this episode, we’re discussing why we decided to jump ship, how we manage risk, financial planning, etc. We’re also going a bit personal and talking about our approach to career planning.
Spoiler: Arnab’s approach is pretty much orthogonal from mine. He engaged a financial planner who showed him what’s safe to do to allow a comfortable retirement, while I live my life in bets and am ok to bet the farm if the opportunity looks good.
“And then we did some scenarios, what if I don't earn anything for two years or three years or five years, What is the difference between that net worth at the age of 70, 80 and 90? And turns out, thanks to the wonders of the finance world and compounding interests, there's almost no difference.
And that's what made me feel secure that, I have the time. Let's do it. If I don't do it now, I'll not do it.”
— Arnab on financial planning for starting a company
Here’s what we’re covering in this episode:
[02:21] Ilya’s left Google to work on a podcasting company with Arnab
[03:23] What did Ilya do at Google?
[04:54] Google’s “defragging” of Google Reader
[09:48] Getting tired of a corporate job
[16:07] Wantepreneurs vs. entrepreneurs
[22:35] Realizing I can’t do it anymore and conquering fears
[25:53] Preparing finances to jump corporate ship
[33:48] Indie development model
[37:06] Preparing the family for leaving your job
[43:12] Health Insurance
Post scriptum
In this episode, I was defending Google for changing its ways about killing products. Well… After we recorded the episode, we learned that Google was selling the Google Domains business to SquareSpace upsetting developers and enterprise customers yet again.
We mentioned a digital map that I built back in 2003. I thought it’d be cool to show the visual of what it looked like. It was a Windows program written in C++ backed by a Microsoft Access database. It was a fun project.
Show notes
Podcasts
Alex Hormozi on The Diary of a CEO podcast
Books
Movies
(Un)well on Netflix
Software
Other
Post-production
This episode was produced by Mike Semashko
Get in touch
We’d love to hear from you!
Email: hello@metacastpodcast.com (both of us get it)
Arnab’s Twitter: @or9ob
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Bye for now.
