Having a good job is no longer the preferred way of making money among the younger people. This is why:

Starting a company is. This way of money making is riskier but more straightforward than working a job. There is no boss to decide what happens to you. There are 4 protagonists: you, your customers, your investors, and your co-founder. If you succeed, they succeed. And the way to making money for you looks like this:

  1. Find a product (or idea) that is popular but not yet perfect
  2. Buy one and study it in detail
  3. Figure out how to improve it
  4. Make a prototype
  5. Show the prototype to 100 people
  6. Remake it until people are willing to pre-order (for example on Kickstarter)
  7. Find a co-founder who can build it with you
  8. Split the equity – give your co-founder 50%, but use a vesting agreement so that their share becomes worth more the longer they work on the company
  9. Find an investor. This can be a person who has a lot of money (an angel investor)
  10. Give her or him 10% of your company
  11. Make the product
  12. Sell your product to 1 Million people
  13. Get more money (this time from VCs)
  14. List your company on stock exchange (this is after you’ve either raised a lot of money or have a lot of revenue, or better yet profit)
  15. Sell a lot of shares when you list on stock exchange
  16. Then just wait out the cooling off period (about 6 months) and you will have your money

 

by Anna Vital, Funders and Founders