I once started a computer game company without first knowing I could make games lots of people liked and would pay me for.
Which is to say, with the benefit of hindsight, I did not do sufficient product-market discovery and validation upfront before I went "all in" on it.
I/we got sales but it never came within even an order of magnitude of how much FT engineering salary I was missing out on. By some metrics it was a success but by net USD impact on me it was a fail.
Was a great experience and I learned a ton though.
Which is to say, with the benefit of hindsight, I did not do sufficient product-market discovery and validation upfront before I went "all in" on it.
I/we got sales but it never came within even an order of magnitude of how much FT engineering salary I was missing out on. By some metrics it was a success but by net USD impact on me it was a fail.
Was a great experience and I learned a ton though.