I'm Co-Founding a Tech Company

Making the leap from principal designer to startup co-founder

Apr 28, 2024

Hello! I'm Pat, your guide to great design, well-crafted tech, and a rich creative life. New here? Join our supportive community to fuel your creative journey!

1.

Hey Friends,

I'm putting my money where my mouth is - I'm co-founding a tech company.

For years, I've written about design, careers, and personal growth. Now it's time to walk the talk.

I'm making the leap into entrepreneurship, and I want you to come along for the ride.

2.

I left my job as a principal product designer at a tech startup last September.

During the pandemic, I poured myself into work to fill the social void, pushing hard from 2020-2023. That extreme imbalance combined with poor corporate dynamics led me to burn out last year.

The bittersweet side effect? I saved enough money to cover my expenses for the next few years without touching other savings.

I don’t recommend recreating my path. I regret sacrificing so much living for working, but I'm grateful for the financial freedom that allowed me to pause and reset. A painful, but perhaps necessary, mixed blessing.

I committed to taking the fall off to recover.

Before I knew it, fall turned to winter, turned to spring.

While I continued to write and experiment with Better by Design, a full 7 months passed before I felt ready to work again.

3.

Last month, I built a new personal website to exercise my design muscles and gear up for client work when an interesting opportunity appeared.

A friend and former coworker asked me about partnering to build a company around the software he’d created during the last few years.

He had kept me in the loop for early experiments but only recently discovered a business model that shifted the idea from an interesting side project to a product with significant business potential.

I felt immediately interested but also hesitant. Was I okay with the prospect of not earning money for several more months? Would dedicating myself to this project hurt my work on Better by Design? Would the potential rewards outweigh the risks?

After some deliberation, I decided to go for it.

As I’ve written about before, I’m no stranger to major career shifts. I like to surf the waves of my curiosity and learn as I go.

I’ll face many unknowns on this new journey and have to grow a lot in the process but that’s what excites me. Learning and growing have always been my primary motivations.

This opportunity is the challenge that will take me to the next level.

I'll have to use every skill in my arsenal to make it succeed.

4.

Building this business will refocus my writing.

I picked the name Better by Design for this blog because it felt expansive enough to cover my broad interests while giving me a clear starting point within design.

I also liked that it hinted at intentionality and personal growth.

Going forward, my writing will focus less on the design industry and more on the pragmatic lessons I learn from the process of building a tech company.

It will be a personal account of creative entrepreneurship and all it entails. For example, in the last few weeks, I’ve learned more about equity, corporate structures, and legal contracts than in the last decade of working for someone else.

I’ve always been most inspired by business writers like Derek Sivers, Paul Graham, Seth Godin, and Jason Fried. They’re formidable entrepreneurs and business operators who also happen to write well and share their ideas with the world generously.

That’s what I aspire to achieve.

At least at this point in my life, I am still a builder first and a writer second.

5.

Forgive me for being intentionally vague about the business itself for the moment.

But don’t worry – more clarity will come as we get more established. Until then, plenty of insights will still make sense in the abstract.

Here’s what to expect with my writing going forward:

I plan to write openly about my experiences and share lessons frequently.
I will be focusing on shorter, more personal, and more insight-dense posts. Like memos from a knowledgeable friend vs. articles from a journalist.
The publishing cadence will remain at least weekly. If anything, it might increase with the amount I’m learning.
I won’t be “building in public” – Radical transparency can be a strategic move for some businesses. It wouldn’t be for ours. I aim to share generously but I’m setting clear boundaries.
I'll need your support more than ever to grow Better by Design's audience. Over the last two years, I’ve been lucky to have many articles shared by design writing aggregators. I expect this will decrease due to writing about topics more aimed at entrepreneurship than design. So, if you’re open to helping me, all I ask is to share Better by Design with those who might benefit from it.

I’m excited for the journey ahead and hope you’ll come along with me on the ride.

Until next time,

Patrick