I am about to throw in the towel after 35 years

[VK3DRB]

Hi fellow electronics friends.

I have worked in many electronics industries over the last 35 years: IBM, telecommunications, automotive, satellites, medical technology and safety products in various capacities, mostly in R & D. It's been a great career, BUT... I HAVE HAD ENOUGH WORKING FOR THE MAN, to loosely quote Roy Orison.

I never want to be an employee again. I am over it. Pulling the pin. Don't want to be a cog in the corporate machine anymore. With the company I work for, I was hired as a senior electronics design engineer and on the first day was promoted to an engineering management role. Sure, after 2 years in the role, I have learnt heaps. But it isn't what I like doing.

So I have registered a business name, have a plan, and there are companies wanting me to consult with hands-on R & D work now, and I also have some ideas I have already started developing on the side. So I should have an good income stream for at least a few months.

Yep, I am scared . Not financially, but because of life change and the great unknown. I only hope that in 12 months I can say, "Why didn't I do this 10 years earlier! "; rather than an epitaph "Here lies an engineer who got his last calculation wrong ."

Are there others here who have left many years of employment to do their own thing? Did you stay in electronics or do something completely different? How happy are you after the change?

[EEVblog]

I have worked in many electronics industries over the last 35 years: IBM, telecommunications, automotive, satellites, medical technology and safety products in various capacities, mostly in R & D. It's been a great career, BUT... I HAVE HAD ENOUGH WORKING FOR THE MAN, to loosely quote Roy Orison.
I never want to be an employee again. I am over it. Pulling the pin. Don't want to be a cog in the corporate machine anymore.

Yep, I'd never go back.

With the company I work for, I was hired as a senior electronics design engineer and on the first day was promoted to an engineering management role. Sure, after 2 years in the role, I have learnt heaps. But it isn't what I like doing.
So I have registered a business name, have a plan, and there are companies wanting me to consult with hands-on R & D work now, and I also have some ideas I have already started developing on the side. So I should have an good income stream for at least a few months.

Nice!
Never quit your day job on the hope of work or something taking off etc. Having people already lined up and asking for consulting work is great, go for it. You'll find it very often leads to more work. You can't do much in a "few months", so it's likely to be extended.

Yep, I am scared . Not financially, but because of life change and the great unknown. I only hope that in 12 months I can say, "Why didn't I do this 10 years earlier! "; rather than an epitaph "Here lies an engineer who got his last calculation wrong ."

If you aren't sacred financially then it's a safe bet you'll be happy with the change.

Are there others here who have left many years of employment to do their own thing? Did you stay in electronics or do something completely different? How happy are you after the change?

Yup.
But surely everyone knows my story.
Got retrenched from Altium with a wife who'd just stopped working and was 8 month pregnant. Decided to do some consulting work (Cochlear) and go full time at the blog. Things just fell into place after that.
And I have effectively changed careers. I went from full time electronics design to now rarely doing any actual hands-on electronics design. I just bum around my hobby lab and make random videos whilst wiling away the hours on forums...

[T3sl4co1l]

Been contracting for years now.  Working a job just this month, onsite at a well known electrical equipment company -- will be very relieved when it's done.  The bureaucracy and office politics and multiple levels of management are just as bad as I remembered.

I've never been worried about jobs, myself.  My skills will always be in demand, and it is my choice to whom I provide those skills, be it through direct employment or otherwise.

I did take a "risky" four months between jobs (as many years ago), but I had several times that in the bank, no problem to sit on.

YMMV.  I guess your average "working stiff" has more to be worried about, in terms of finding and keeping a job, paying greater expenses, and servicing more debt.  Not to sound elitist or full of myself, mind, I've just never had to worry about that since college.  (Which, on that note, since college is itself a huge economic issue today -- FYI, I grew up in that level of middle class which got just enough grants/loans to get by, but not comfortably so, and not without some family assistance.  So, not elitist like that, anyway.  And with tuition continuing to inflate aggressively, I'd have to recommend caution to prospective students today. )  (Yes, the US is screwed up.  We know.)

Tim

[PTR_1275]

I’m still working a day job but have a business on the side. That has been steadily growing and will hopefully be at the point it will take over as my main income in a few years (sustainably)

Be your own boss, choose what 18 hours a day you want to work

[BillB]

I actually went from being an employee to being a contractor for a while then back to being an employee.

I enjoyed the freedom of choosing the kinds of projects I was working on when I was independent.  However, unless you have a great number of contacts that are going to provide you a steady stream of work, you will be trading your management work for sales + management.

Independent contracting is a largely a sales/management job.  I was always having to keep one eye on the lookout for the next gig.  Then there is the business related overhead that you'll need to do as well (marketing, accounting, taxes, etc).

I'm not saying that it isn't rewarding, but that it isn't all design work.  After contracting through a few economic downturns, I had enough with the uncertainty of it all.


 

[bd139]

I lasted three years as an EE employee. Had enough of corporate politics pretty early on. It devalued what I love and left me empty and with no meaning.

I now do something I hate but there’s plenty of well paid work for on contract (IT) which means I have the energy to pick up my sword every morning and run into battle screaming. This works for me.

I’d rather do a Dave

[EEVblog]

Be your own boss, choose what 18 hours a day you want to work

In the case of consulting work though, you still have a boss!

[EEVblog]

I’d rather do a Dave

I can wake up tomorrow and decide "bugger it, I'm doing stuff-all today" and I still effectively get paid 

[PTR_1275]

Be your own boss, choose what 18 hours a day you want to work

In the case of consulting work though, you still have a boss!

My side business isn’t consulting. I don’t have the brains, knowledge or experience to do that.

[bd139]

As a consultant, I am mostly paid to repeat what google said 

[tggzzz]

As a consultant, I am mostly paid to repeat what google said 

Customer: "£100 bill? All you did was kick it!"
Consultant: "Um, OK... Here's an amended bill: £1 to kick it plus £99 for knowing where and how hard to kick it".

Nowadays you could add knowing which bit of google's results to ignore, and knowing that you should ignore all TEDx videos, and danger money for watching too many interminable rambling yootoob videos.

[ebclr]

Employed you have 1 boss,  working yourself. you will have hundreds of bosses, and one crappy partner the government who only wanna share the profits not the loses

[james_s]

For those in the US, one of the biggest obstacles to being self employed is the health insurance situation where most health insurance is an employer provided benefit and getting it as an individual is often absurdly expensive.

Personally I also find a great deal of comfort in a steady and predictable income and I don't particularly like large changes in my day to day routine. I like to get up, put in a day of work knowing there is a set of expectations I need to meet for the boss, then come home and do my own thing and know that I'll have a paycheck go into my bank account twice a month. If I don't have a boss it's hard for me to stay focused and work on what needs to be worked on instead of various useless pet projects that always seem to be more fun. It's not for everyone but I'm quite adept at navigating the corporate bs and playing the office politics game. Every real job I've ever had has been corporate so I guess it's the only thing I've ever really known.

[coppice]

I've never been worried about jobs, myself.  My skills will always be in demand, and it is my choice to whom I provide those skills, be it through direct employment or otherwise.

Skills being in demand is rarely the problem. Its maintaining adequate contact with enough people who need those skills.

[Mr. Scram]

I actually went from being an employee to being a contractor for a while then back to being an employee.

I enjoyed the freedom of choosing the kinds of projects I was working on when I was independent.  However, unless you have a great number of contacts that are going to provide you a steady stream of work, you will be trading your management work for sales + management.

Independent contracting is a largely a sales/management job.  I was always having to keep one eye on the lookout for the next gig.  Then there is the business related overhead that you'll need to do as well (marketing, accounting, taxes, etc).

I'm not saying that it isn't rewarding, but that it isn't all design work.  After contracting through a few economic downturns, I had enough with the uncertainty of it all.

Running your own shop definitely isn't all design work. There's a whole lot of work involved you'd rather not be doing. The major difference is that you can do it on your own terms.

[Mr. Scram]

For those in the US, one of the biggest obstacles to being self employed is the health insurance situation where most health insurance is an employer provided benefit and getting it as an individual is often absurdly expensive.

Personally I also find a great deal of comfort in a steady and predictable income and I don't particularly like large changes in my day to day routine. I like to get up, put in a day of work knowing there is a set of expectations I need to meet for the boss, then come home and do my own thing and know that I'll have a paycheck go into my bank account twice a month. If I don't have a boss it's hard for me to stay focused and work on what needs to be worked on instead of various useless pet projects that always seem to be more fun. It's not for everyone but I'm quite adept at navigating the corporate bs and playing the office politics game. Every real job I've ever had has been corporate so I guess it's the only thing I've ever really known.

The problem generally occurs when those expectations don't turn out to be the actual expectations. If it were just days of work, less people would be bothered by working for the man. It's the politics  and drama.

[coppice]

For those in the US, one of the biggest obstacles to being self employed is the health insurance situation where most health insurance is an employer provided benefit and getting it as an individual is often absurdly expensive.

Researchers say this is the main factor keeping the rate of entrepeneurial activity in the US so low.  Lots of people seem to think the US has lots of of entrepreneurs, because they see some prominent successful startups. The actual rate is quite low.

[bd139]

As a consultant, I am mostly paid to repeat what google said 

Customer: "£100 bill? All you did was kick it!"
Consultant: "Um, OK... Here's an amended bill: £1 to kick it plus £99 for knowing where and how hard to kick it".

Nowadays you could add knowing which bit of google's results to ignore, and knowing that you should ignore all TEDx videos, and danger money for watching too many interminable rambling yootoob videos.

That's a fair point for sure.

TEDx is perfect when you're stuck in a boring training seminar and need something to hate to keep you going.

For those in the US, one of the biggest obstacles to being self employed is the health insurance situation where most health insurance is an employer provided benefit and getting it as an individual is often absurdly expensive.

Researchers say this is the main factor keeping the rate of entrepeneurial activity in the US so low.  Lots of people seem to think the US has lots of of entrepreneurs, because they see some prominent successful startups. The actual rate is quite low.

Very true. Same in UK. The company I am currently contracting with is full of people who failed or are failing to run businesses on the side.

The reason they failed is because the idea was stupid. Don't have stupid idea and you will be fine. You only hear about the good ones and don't assume that the thing that keeps it viable is the idea you see - that's usually a front for some othe objective these days.

[coppice]

The reason they failed is because the idea was stupid. Don't have stupid idea and you will be fine. You only hear about the good ones and don't assume that the thing that keeps it viable is the idea you see - that's usually a front for some other objective these days.

Failure is very often because they only had one OK idea, and when that didn't play out they had no fall back position. The great majority of companies that IPO are doing something very different from what they set out to do when the company was formed. This is just as true for businesses operating well below the point of ever achieving an IPO.

[bd139]

Totally agree.

[VK5RC]

In a non EE area, I was initially (15yrs) part time employed part time consultant, and now full time consultant. From the job, I don't miss the politics,  the job involved some uni student teaching - that and the superannuation - I do miss.
One of the bigger issues is to make allowances financially for sick leave, holidays and superannuation. I employ 3 staff and the add on costs are significant.
You also can be quite an ardent task master to yourself!
The 3 As, affable, available and affordable! Probably in that order!
Rob

[coppercone2]

yea self employment in the USA. hey just walk off the cancer you get right?

i do wonder how power would shift if people are not scared they will die from a scrape when they decide to run a small business and be financially successful, without 70 hours work week. some very wealthy people capable of serious innovation actually still end up working shitty jobs because of insurance. you know, rather then starting decent companies. it's like being glued down.

especially people with a business mindset that actually know what a business will take to run and how much insurance will cost vs working vs their time.

[Mr. Scram]

yea self employment in the USA. hey just walk off the cancer you get right?

i do wonder how power would shift if people are not scared they will die from a scrape when they decide to run a small business and be financially successful, without 70 hours work week. some very wealthy people capable of serious innovation actually still end up working shitty jobs because of insurance. you know, rather then starting decent companies. it's like being glued down.

especially people with a business mindset that actually know what a business will take to run and how much insurance will cost vs working vs their time.

As far as I'm aware most self employed people make long weeks. Most are okay with that though, as you have a lot of freedom how to spend those hours. If you want a 40 hour work week, I don't think self employment is the right choice.

[IconicPCB]

I have been on my own since '92... cant complain.. the rectum hasn't healed over ..yet.

[bsfeechannel]

I can wake up tomorrow and decide "bugger it, I'm doing stuff-all today" and I still effectively get paid 

In some parts of the world this is called retirement.