How To Start a Business and Quit Your Job

Updated: August 26, 2021

Do you want to quit your job and start a business? My advice is don’t do it, at least not in that order.

Because the better way is to start your business first, and then quit your job.

By doing it this way, your cash flow won’t just suddenly stop and you can minimize the risk of going into bankruptcy.

So how do you exactly do this? Below are the steps I took.

Step 1: Manage your personal finance

If you cannot manage your own money, then you’ll have a hard time managing your business. So the first step is to start within you.

When I decided that I didn’t want to be an employee anymore, I immediately studied my personal finance. I worked on eliminating my debts, minimizing my unnecessary expenses, and following a monthly budget.

It was hard but I told myself that the skills I will learn in doing so are the same skills I will need when I start running my own business.

Step 2: Commit time to build your business

Since you’re not yet quitting your job, your business would need to be built during your spare time. Study how you currently spend it and commit to a schedule for working on your business.

Be willing to sacrifice time with your family and friends, and prepare to let go of the things you do that won’t help you run a business in the future.

This is the reason why I stopped watching television.

Step 3: Let go of the employee mindset

You are preparing to be an entrepreneur, so you have to start thinking like one.

First off, realize that even though you are still an employee, you are no longer working to get that promotion; winning “Employee of the Year” is not your goal anymore.

Just be a good employee and do your necessary work, but reserve your energy and best efforts into building your business.

This part was quite liberating for me… realizing that I don’t need to impress my boss any more.

Step 4: Stretch your vision at work

When you start thinking like an entrepreneur, you’ll see things in a different light. Your office will no longer be just a place for work, but also a place for learning.

Start with your company’s mission, vision, and values and observe how it is being applied. Analyze your products and services and find the reason why people buy them.

Observe how everything’s running like a well-oiled machine, and study all the moving parts. Because after all, you’re building your own machine soon.

Step 5: Go on an idea hunt

Use your spare time to hunt for business ideas. Start with your own hobbies, and see if you can make a business out of them.

Moreover, look around you and observe what’s making people annoyed, irritated, disappointed, or angry (AIDA for short). Because these things are problems that you could solve with your business.

I love playing LAN games and back then, my friends and I would often wait a long time just to get seats inside a computer gaming shop. This was one of the reasons why I started an internet cafe business.

Step 6: Write a business plan

This is the most boring step but the most essential.

Writing a business plan requires much research and meticulous work. It is, after all, the blueprint of the business machine that you’re trying to build.

If you can’t make your business run on paper, don’t expect that you’ll be able to run your business in real life.

Step 7: Execute your plan

Truth be told, this will be the most difficult step — to start and run your business while still working as an employee.

Your time and energy management skills will be put to the utmost levels. And if one night, you ever find yourself crying inside your room out of stress and frustration, take comfort in the fact that we’ve all been there.

Indeed, it’s always amusing when I talk to entrepreneurs and ask if that ever happened to them, and I would always get a resounding “Yes” and then they’ll say that they’re glad that they didn’t quit and just pushed on.

When you reach this stage, don’t quit and just push on.

Step 8: Quit your job when you’re ready

When should you quit your job? There’s no definite answer to this question but what I’ve learned from experience is that you’ll eventually know it’s time.

Often, it’s when your business is already running smoothly, and the only way to grow it is to give it your full attention.

And sometimes, you don’t even have to quit your job because you’ve successfully built a business that can run without you.

It all starts with a decision

It took me more than two years, and one failed business before I was able to build a successful one that allowed me to eventually leave the corporate world.

The journey from employment to entrepreneurship is hard, but it’s a journey that sometimes, I wish I took sooner than later.

If you’ve always wanted to have your own business and quit your job, then I encourage you to make that decision now. Trust me when I say that there will never be a better time to start one than today.

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