Gurley cites Danny Meyer leaving a $200,000 salary forty years ago to pursue restaurants.
“Danny Meyer, when he, he walked away from a sales job, this company that sold these devices that hook into clothes so that you can't steal them from stores.”
Gurley realized by his second year as an engineer that repeating similar projects wasn't his long-term path.
“I was an engineer. I had an engineering degree in undergrad and you know, in my second year as an engineer, you know, we were starting the third project I had worked on and it looked like the second and it looked like the first”
Gurley cites Danny Meyer walking away from $200,000 salary forty years ago to pursue restaurant career.
“He was making over $200,000 a year and this was forty years ago. And so that's a lot”
Gurley is launching a foundation offering $105,000 grants to help people change career direction.
“I we'll see how it goes, but we're gonna offer a $105,000 grants to people who need a little boost to get headed in this direction.”
Gurley describes high school teacher who built football play categorization app with 700,000 followers after seeing his speech.
“And it took about five years, but he launched a website where he categorizes offensive football plays, and then he created created a software app.”
Gurley is launching Running Down a Dream Foundation offering $105,000 grants to help people change career direction.
“I we'll see how it goes, but we're gonna offer a $105,000 grants to people who need a little boost to get headed in this direction.”
Gurley asked himself if he saw himself doing computer engineering in thirty years, triggering his career shift.
“I was going home at night and studying something different. And I asked myself that question, do I see myself doing this in thirty years?”
Gurley describes how Tito's vodka founder launched number one North American spirit at age 40 with no prior industry experience.
“And that exercise led Burt Beverage, whose nickname is Tito, to launch the first spirit company in Texas, a vodka company that now is the number one selling spirit in North America.”
Gurley used the thirty-year test again on Wall Street, walking through senior offices at 10PM.
“I paused in each one of them and said, do I want to be here thirty years from now, like in that office? Assume I do great, but I've done this my whole life.”
Gurley notes forty percent of people shift away from college major within five years.
“I invested all of this to get to this college, to get to this degree. And if I move away from that, did I just waste all that time?”
Gurley recounts Matthew McConaughey's father telling him not to half-ass his film career switch.
“And he was afraid to tell his father, but when he did, his father said famously now, Don't half ass it.”