Taking the Leap & Quitting Your Job

For 11 years I was a Health Inspector for the city of Lowell. It was a great career and I really loved being able to help my community and local businesses. I came from a family owned business and I understood the struggle and as a Vietnamese kid I understood the nuances of asian cuisine. There’s a big South East Asian community here and I wanted to make sure they were well represented. My family wouldn’t be where they are today if it weren’t for government assistance and I felt a lot of pride in being in a position where I could pay that back.

Of course, it was still a job…. As a Health Inspector, people don’t realize the variety of work we’re involved in. Most people know us as food inspectors, but we inspect rental properties, homeless camps, I’ve even been on a few drug raids. We also field pretty much every complaint you can imagine from weird noises, junk in your neighbors yard, poop on the sidewalk and tenant complaints about their landlord. As years went on, it became clearer to me that the most fulfilling part of my work was becoming the smallest part of my day, and so I quit…

At the time, I had been working on Draft Studios for many years and I just decided to finally go all in on it. If you look at it practically, it was a really dumb time to do it because, as I was voluntarily leaving my job, my wife was getting laid off at the same time. We have 2 young kids and on every logical metric, I should have stayed with my regular job at least until my wife found one. But nope, I’m an idiot.

I couldn’t stand another day doing something I knew I wasn’t going to try and be the best at. It’s scary, its stressful, and its incredibly challenging, but that’s exactly why I know I’ve made the right decision. After taking that leap, I can’t imagine ever going back. Once you’ve become an entrepreneur, a whole other world opens up to you. Everything is new again and you have infinite possibilities for growth and strategies you can try.

The best parts of my day were always helping small businesses getting started and setting them up for success. Now, I can say we have the privilege of doing that every single day.