Do Not Quit Your Job, Do This Instead

Jun 14

We are talking about why in a lot of cases, I don't think it makes sense to just quit your job to start a business - especially during covid - but what I think you should do instead.

And as always, please stay until the end where ill go over the exact steps I recommend you do to invest while you have that job.

This can apply to everyone but it applies mainly to people in performance-based roles.

Roles like sales, outcome-based accounting, and marketing jobs that work off projects and deadlines.

And most other corporate jobs especially where you can work from home during corona or just in general work on a computer and can take back some of your time.

Quick story.

A few years back, before covid, there was something really disturbing that happened in my corporate job.

There was a commission structure change, and a lot of people, who were expecting a large commission check, either didn't receive that check or they received a much smaller check.

And even WORSE they had to stay in order to see their money. As disgusted as they were, they couldn't leave... or they wouldn't get paid. Basically, they were about to score a touchdown and the officials changed where the endzone was...not good.

And a lot of people talked about quitting, but one of the top reps and mentors of mine at the time said something that ill never forget...

He basically said to a group - why would you quit? then you will never get paid.

In a big company like this, you can go a long time hiding out without anyone noticing. If you really don't want to be here, just do that and wait for them to fire you, it could be months but more likely years. the last thing you should do is quit.

I couldn't believe what he was saying. But he was right.

I can't speak for all companies, but in most large companies and especially tech companies in my experience, you have very little oversight... especially if you can maintain performance.

So before you consider quitting your job, I want you to consider these productivity tips/concepts to significantly lower your hours but dramatically increase your output in and out of the job.

Time management in general:

If we manage our time well, we can do a lot more than we actually think

Some of this is pulled from some of my favorite authors and writers such as Tim Ferris, Michael Hyatt, and Gary Keller.

But the concepts we are going to think about with time management are the 80/20 rule and Parkinson's' law, accountability, and leverage.

Between these 4 productivity concepts, I feel like there are very few things that can’t be accomplished.

1. 80/20 otherwise known as Pareto Principle:

This means 80% of your results come from 20% of your activity. Typically your top 2 customers will spend more than the next 8. This isn't always but it’s funny how life works. Good and bad

it goes the same way that a few people might cause the biggest headaches.

Once you understand this in your life, you can basically cut out the bottom half and focus on the things that actually matter.

Example: Certain real estate deals can produce way more profit than others, that's where I am going to focus.

2. Accountability:

This can come from posting on FB that you are starting something.

And or starting something and will do a public humiliation if you don't hit it.

This isn't for everyone and is not exactly my style either. So what you could do is find an accountability partner - for free - and just have them make sure you do what you say you are going to do. And you can tell them you will pay them 5k if you don't do it. Watch what happens

Example: You could also hire a mentor, coach, or join a mastermind. These are great and I have all 3 but they are only for people who are really serious about going to the next level...

3. Parkinson's Law:

Simply put - we let our work expand to the time we give it. Say you're going to film a youtube video.

If you give yourself 3 hours, you'll do it in 3 hours. give yourself 1 hour and watch what happens. We need to force pressure on ourselves with consequences. How do you think I make these videos? our editor needs them on Wednesday in order to meet our Friday release deadline..

Example: In this case, I actually have all 3 - 80/20 of knowing how to film videos quickly from taking a course, accountability to a team and editor, and Parkinson’s’ law as these videos need to be done on a certain day and time or we miss our goals. This works!

4. Leverage & Delegation:

You probably know what this means but from a high level. We need to drop our ego or excuse of perfectionism to stop us from getting the help we need. There's so much more here we can cover in other videos but what helped me was realizing:

They might like the activity more,

be better than you,

or should be doing it in the first place.

It's impossible to scale without leverage. The ones who understand this make the rules.

A small example: in my job, we had to have a certain number of meetings with partners.

Interestingly, these were not very productive usually. So I just decided to stop taking them. But instead. I just asked my inside salesperson, or my SDR to take these meetings for me.

They would be 15 min and she had clear instructions on what to do on these meetings so we could establish the next step. Small example, but bought me back hours.

Okay so now we know the 'what' - Let's get to the 'how':

Assess your time.
Where are you spending your time every day and what can you cut out, delegate, or batch.
There are time-tracking apps you can check out - the one I like is Clockify, but some love rescue time or just the Apple tool if you are on their stuff.

Regardless, you need to see where you are losing time on low-impact activities, remove them, and only focus on your 20% tactics. Ideally, you would batch them so you can do them in one sitting to get into the flow.
Setting expectations with your manager and putting yourself in your manager’s shoes.
Understand what they really need to see from you as a bare minimum and make sure to never miss that. If we're talking dating terms - you need to understand their love language. What do they need to see to feel good about you.

If their number one priority is seeing that you have a clean pipeline in your CRM, make that your 1 thing to never miss. He or she will love you for it and then probably let other things slide as they will be too busy chasing other people for this.
Optics
In addition to achieving the same or better results - continue posting on LinkedIn and leading/participating in all internal activities when possible.

We do not want to raise any eyebrows or have people asking questions about whether you're checked in or not.

Posting on Linkedin, sending out newsletters, and organizing team events should take care of that. Small things that don't take a lot of time but make it seem like you are all there. Trust me ;)
Do not let your performance drop.
The goal is to create 20-30 new hours in your week.

No one should notice that you aren't spending nearly as much time on the job.

This is because you have gone from being efficient to being effective. You went from being busy to being productive. If your performance drops, you are missing something. Either one of the 3 tools above or possibly leverage / general procrastination. There is almost always a fix.
Do this exercise each week and you will never look at the time the same way.

For my last year on the job, each Monday morning, my coach and I would ask this question:

If someone had a gun to my family's head, how could I do this job for 10 hours per week? And then I would write a weekly plan with my calendar open.

The main meetings, to-do's, and people I needed to lean on for leverage that week

Generating income - bonus tactics

You can’t get loans without a job. So max out your residential real estate debt immediately. My absolute favorite strategy around this right now is 2nd homes for Airbnb.

You can buy a 2nd home with 10% down - amazing financing terms - and rent it out on Airbnb with a property manager. Essentially getting paid to own a vacation home. My 2nd favorite strategy would be buying quadplexes in the Midwest for cash flow.
Test your business while you have a job. It doesn't have to be real estate but just remembers, there is no parade when you don't have the job that gives you all this extra motivation.
So do not let that be a reason to wait to start. You should build the parachute while you're still on the plane. If you cant build it now, what makes you think you'll be able to when you just have a few extra hours? Start now.
Network network network. The worst time to realize you need to be a better network is when you need something the most.

Most people realize this when they lose their job and realize they haven't been very nice for many years.

Don’t be this person. Make sure you have key relationships built with mentors in the space and people in the field that you are going towards.

I go through step-by-step tactics on each of these in my small group mastermind and our Facebook group of over 3500 investors

But that's it!

Enjoy the newest addition to my YouTube channel—check out the video! 👇