Re:Climbing the wrong hill (2009)
by peterwwillis on Monday April 17, 2017 @03:40AM
(#14129702)
First of all, if you know what you want to be doing in 10 years, and you are under 30, you are likely wrong. A lot of people change their plans in their 20s, and sometimes it just doesn't work out.
If you are over 30 and look 10 years ahead, it's 40 - body breaking down, retirement planning is well underway, some form of collateral, possibly a family, etc. If you're gambling on startups then, you better be damn sure it doesn't crush all the other stuff you're juggling.
Dixon's advice is misguided. He's trying to say "Don't fear starting over", which is good advice, because you will probably start over some time in your life without intending to, and it will be fine. But he's trying to make startups sound like a good idea, or "try random things" a better one.
I would not treat life like a CS problem - I would treat it like an Operations change management action. List the departments of your life that are affected by the change. List the change(s), the work needed to implement it, the expected results, a test to evaluate, and a rollback procedure. In this way you can make a risky change and understand fully what it involves, and have some plan for how to revert if things go awry. Definitely try new things, but when it comes to changes that have potentially bad side-effects, use due diligence.
If you are over 30 and look 10 years ahead, it's 40 - body breaking down, retirement planning is well underway, some form of collateral, possibly a family, etc. If you're gambling on startups then, you better be damn sure it doesn't crush all the other stuff you're juggling.
Dixon's advice is misguided. He's trying to say "Don't fear starting over", which is good advice, because you will probably start over some time in your life without intending to, and it will be fine. But he's trying to make startups sound like a good idea, or "try random things" a better one.
I would not treat life like a CS problem - I would treat it like an Operations change management action. List the departments of your life that are affected by the change. List the change(s), the work needed to implement it, the expected results, a test to evaluate, and a rollback procedure. In this way you can make a risky change and understand fully what it involves, and have some plan for how to revert if things go awry. Definitely try new things, but when it comes to changes that have potentially bad side-effects, use due diligence.