I've got a stupid question. When people quit their job and go solo like this, what do they do about health insurance? Do they just forgo it since their young and it's unlikely they will need it or are there affordable plans you can get when you don't have insurance through your employer? I've looked around the Internet but can only find vague information on the topic.<p>For example this <a href="http://www.ahipresearch.org/pdfs/2009IndividualMarketSurveyFinalReport.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.ahipresearch.org/pdfs/2009IndividualMarketSurveyF...</a> document seems to indicate that someone in their late 20's would pay just under $2,000 on "average" but the numbers seem to range wildly with location and some family plans going as high as 13k per year which seems ridiculous.<p>Edit: This thread though it contains helpful responses confirms my suspicion that getting non employer health coverage is a complete CF.
There are what like 20,000 or 40,000 people who work at Google? One of them leaves and feels compelled to write an article about it and then post it themselves to HN? What else was there in this article? You're going to work on Android apps because of some professor who inspired you, wonderful.<p>You know if I was to self-post something to HN, I'd at least try to mention something I'm working on, or some technology I'm using or some idea I have. There's nothing like that here. There's nothing here.<p>I don't understand what the upvotes are for? Moral support?
Your reasoning is synonymous with why I never accepted an offer from Google in the past. Big companies often have a lot of perks, but much like continually buying electronic toys every week, it's only medicating most people's existence.<p>Breaking out on your own to create your own products forces you to adapt in ways a "cushy" corporate job just can't stimulate. And although it's infinitely harder, the battle is worth fighting through. Seeing it through, persevering, and then driving home a success, all on your own (or with some help) is an experience you simply can't replace.<p>Best of luck to you. This is a great community to help see you make it happen. And congrats!
Jean has a picture in her album that is metaphorically Life in a Big Company:
<a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_jwxdZ0d5COI/TD-SgCdOmYI/AAAAAAAAHb4/pkkbb0HHjkc/IMG_2498.JPG?imgmax=640" rel="nofollow">http://lh6.ggpht.com/_jwxdZ0d5COI/TD-SgCdOmYI/AAAAAAAAHb4/pk...</a><p>* Walled garden.<p>* Various plants (projects) pushed into the corner. Tidy, but the organization of them is somewhat arbitrary. Some are taller and bushier, but some are looking kind of scraggly. Many are on the shelf.<p>* Watering can and broom: maintenance is always there waiting.<p>* Manager in the foreground asking "What are you doing? Why aren't you sweeping? When am I going to get fed?"
She graduated with a liberal arts background and was an engineer at Google? I graduated with a degree in computer science and I can't even get them to call me and setup an interview. I'm a smart guy with some good work experience under my belt already and my resume looks great.
A very good read. The job naturally sounds awesome: I mean, free gourmet food and heated toilet seats?!? (Oh yeah, and that other stuff: good pay, working with geniuses, etc etc ;-))<p>But equally, the ending really does IMO show that she's made the correct decision:<p><i>"After I turned in my laptop and completed my exit interview on my last day, I felt such exhilaration and relief. A whole world of opportunity was out there, and I drove home with a ridiculous grin on my face."</i><p>That definitely is a nice ending to a great blog post. Best of luck to Jean.
"I felt that if I stayed, I would look back at this time years down the road, and wonder, what else could I have done? After I turned in my laptop and completed my exit interview on my last day, I felt such exhilaration and relief. A whole world of opportunity was out there, and I drove home with a ridiculous grin on my face."<p>Love it! What great inspiration to anyone considering taking the leap into entrepreneurship. There will be plenty of challenges along the way, but there are few things in this world more rewarding.
Even if the article doesn't <i>really</i> mention why she left google one line jumped out at me:<p>> I really miss the heated toilet seats.<p>I never ever thought that that would figure in to reasons for leaving or staying at a company.<p>It looks like having her project canceled hurt her pretty badly, big companies have a way of axing projects that do not take the feelings of the people that work on them in to account at all. We all understand it has to happen, how you go about it can make all the difference.<p>I hope that she finds what she's looking for, if you're thinking about doing the same, it helps if you have a better idea of what you're going to do when you quit your job, it helps even more if you've already been experimenting with different avenues while still employed, that way you save some runway that might bite in to your savings in a way that you regret later on.<p>Having a good plan is really important, quitting without having a good plan may work but it will definitely complicate matters.<p>Best of luck to Jean, I hope she keeps us informed about how this all works out.
My question: Why didn't you work with your management to take a sabbatical leave?<p>One of the benefits of the major corporations is that they have policies in place for leaves of absence. Then you would've gotten the best of both worlds: 1) a fall-back plan if you fail to monetize in your venture 2) a rigid time-period where you need to finish your venture (and not just be open ended on figuring out your life)<p>I did something very similar, after a longer period of time (9+ years) in the corporate world. I needed that time to germinate my technical ability and understand my relevant skillset. For me, it was reading "Hackers and Painters" rather than the Princeton article you linked that got me to pursue my independent career.
If you look at her bio, you'll see this author already has a new job at a startup called Pulse. Somehow that dampens this act of bravery for me. For all the upvotes she's gotten, the ending I was hoping for was her decision to become a founder.