Working While You're Asleep

Re:Working While You're Asleep by crntaylor on Monday March 11, 2013 @10:44AM (#5356985)

This is the distinction between scalable and non-scalable. I first read of it in one of Nassim Taleb's books (where he advises people to pick a non-scalable career, since the outcomes are more certain and the risks lower) but I'm sure it's been written about many other times. Ben Casnocha talks about it a bit [0].

Startups aim to be scalable. But you should note that you don't have to start out scalable. Doing so might be seen as a premature optimization. You could hand-service your first dozen customers, and worry about scaling only when you start counting your customers in hundreds rather than tens.

[0] http://casnocha.com/2009/03/scalable-vs-non-scalable-careers...

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Re:Working While You're Asleep by graeme on Monday March 11, 2013 @11:57AM (#5357511)

At low levels, it's possible to enter scaleable businesses with relatively low risk.

I started writing e-books for an affiliate. Took ~2 weeks to make the first couple books. Early sales justified continuing. Then mid-run sales justified continuing on a longer term scale.

I ran out of books to write, so I didn't scale that high - but I produced some recurring revenue with very little risk. At each point I knew my efforts would pay off at a certain level.

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