# Life after the switch



## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Having owned businesses, I've seen this personally numerous times...

In business, employees usually reach a stage where they feel they're being "exploited". They find out how much the company is making off them, compare it to their pay, ignore things like overhead, getting paid even when the company isn't billing for their time, etc. and become disgruntled.

Some of these people quit and try to go it alone by starting their own company. Most, if the statistics are true, fail within 3 years.

Another good scenario is the union employee who moves up to management...some of the biggest union supporters I know who are now managers are now totally repulsed by union demands and attitudes.

Now, in my experience, a lot of people become much more humble after making the switch, as the realities and complexities of life set in...

I'm wondering if this is generally true in other's experience.


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## none (Jan 15, 2013)

A lot of people always want more than they are entitled to. That is true both for union members as well as business managers.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Oh the irony...


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## jcgd (Oct 30, 2011)

I'm currently working towards breaking out on my own. Not because I feel they aren't paying me enough, likely quite the opposite. I just don't feel challenged enough and my employer isn't allowing me to take on more responsibility so I am trying to build my own company for the challenge. Hopefully though, with lots of hard work I will reap the possible income benefits of having my own company.


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## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

Just a Guy said:


> In business, employees usually reach a stage where they feel they're being "exploited"..


I am in this category.

I don't necessarily think I am underpaid. My issue is with fairness and work/life balance.


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## lightcycle (Mar 24, 2012)

Just a Guy said:


> I'm wondering if this is generally true in other's experience.


I've had second-hand insight into how risky starting a business is, plus the expertise, hard work (and luck) required to make it successful.

I know my personality and limitations. I am not an entrepreneur. I know I wouldn't like it. But what I can do is to maximize the revenue potential of what I do, making myself an invaluable contributor, someone that the company would not want to lose to a competitor.

I think on some level, even the most vocal, disgruntled employees never do start their own business because deep down they realize they are not the type of people to do so, or they know how much effort and sacrifice it takes. Staying at their job becomes a begrudgingly unspoken affirmation of this fact.


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## tygrus (Mar 13, 2012)

My issue during my cube life was never really about wages or titles or recognition, it was more about control and watching the incompetent suck ups all around me. I can take honest direction from my boss, what I can't take is him lording over me and I could never buckle under and take that. So in 2009 I walked and started my own deal which is hard and sometimes uncertain but I couldn't be happier. Should have done it when I was 25 instead of keeping ramming my head against the wall.


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## donald (Apr 18, 2011)

Def true,i have this problem.(small business owner)
And it does not matter if you truly are paying fair market wage for their work/services.(always strange people don't think of the owner who is risking it all)
These are dangerous people(esp small/family company)they can be a cancer and kill the moral of the other employees
It is tough call how to handle it but i think the best course of action(if there can't be a resolve)is to cut them loose.
Ironically,in a lot of cases it is a ''bluff'' and they really really don't want to leave.
Just like bosses can lord over employees so can employees over bosses.
the worst is hedging to much control over a project and being vulnerable and the employee know it,it is a reversal.


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## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

It can be worse than you imagine. What about a business executive who has worked for some big corporation all his life and thinks he knows everything about running a business. Then he retires with a golden parachute and an ego as big as a haystack.

Next thing you know he has invested his retirement money starting some business he knows nothing about. He figures he is going to astonish the world with his brilliance and become a multi millionaire. Six months later he is broke with no job, no money and no chance of ever getting another job as good as the one he gave up.

I have seen this happen more than once. The sad thing is you can't tell these guys anything.


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## donald (Apr 18, 2011)

Whats really bizzare is when one gets what one is asking for,and still is disgruntled.
I think there is a fair number of people who don't know what to if there is not some problem(they are always a victim).
ie)the pay will take a back seat(right after a raise) and a new issue that wasn't so present/concern/brought up surfaces(like whack a hole).
I've manged people like this and that has got to be the biggest piss off.
I find trying to manage people one of the hardest skills to learn(because of all the different needs/personalities ect)


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