4 Signs It’s Time to Turn Your Side Gig Into a Full-Time Business
Deciding when to quit your full-time job and commit to your passion can be difficult. Here are some signs that the time is right.
4 Signs It’s Time to Turn Your Side Gig Into a Full-Time Business. Well over 40 million people in the U.S. have a side hustle, in part because you can set up your own small business in less than two weeks.
Deciding when to quit your full-time job and turn your side hustle into your day job is hard. I should know: That’s what I did when I launched LogoMix. (More on that in a bit.)
If you’re unsure about whether to take the full-time entrepreneurial plunge, ask yourself these questions:
1. Is my full-time job still challenging and exciting?
The grass always looks greener on the other side of the professional fence. And it’s always tempting to be your own boss instead of working for someone else.
But at the same time, you carry the skills you gain from a challenging full-time job with you forever. If you’re still learning, growing and excited by what you do, think carefully about whether staying for six months or a year might pay off over the long run in terms of skill, experience and connections.
In my case, I enjoyed what I did in my full-time job, but I saw few things over the next year that would excite or challenge me.
What I knew would be challenging was turning my side gig into a larger business. I knew, unlike my full-time job, it would take everything I had — a prospect that definitely sounded exciting.
2. Is my side gig making money?
Generating revenue is one thing. Generating profits is another. If you spend more money running your side gig than you earn, you haven’t figured out a path to profitability. That’s especially important if you plan to bootstrap your startup by using revenue to fuel operations. If you’re not making a profit, you’ll soon run out of money and be out of business.
When my side gig that eventually became LogoMix started making money, it wasn’t enough to support me. But the results proved the potential — that building out operations would generate greater revenue and the business model could reliably turn a portion of those revenues into profits.
