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Today, we are joined by Mike Malloy, who has followed an amazing professional journey with 13+ years of experience as a Deloitte management consultant, Waveborn sunglasses CEO, Halcyon Incubator program director, Georgetown adjunct professor, trusted advisor, mentor, sales consultant, and career coach.
Over this time, Mike has quit his job twice to follow entrepreneurial ventures. The first time Mike got inspired by a social mission sunglasses company that donated a portion of profits to fund life-changing cataract surgeries around the globe called Waveborn. While the company achieved some incredible growth and milestones over his 6 years, he dealt with shutting down the company and all of the financial implications of that decision. While Mike’s positivity is infectious, he is extremely open and vulnerable about the hardships and isolation that he went through during this period.
This led to him paying it forward with other entrepreneurs and helping them navigate the difficult waters of starting their own business. He turned this skill into a full-time job as the the Program Director of the Halcyon Incubator, which equips early-stage social entrepreneurs with the support they need to transform their ideas into scalable and sustainable ventures in order to change the world.
Over the past year, Mike quit his full-time job again to be able to continue working remote from the beach. Learning from his previous mistakes and experiences, he was much more thoughtful about the process the second time around. He founded Malloy Industries, where he focuses on helping growth-stage companies build systems and repeatable processes to scale from $500k to $5M revenue. He looks for clients with impactful work that he is passionate about, while prioritizing his own lifestyle design. If you are interested in connecting with Mike, you can check out his website here!
Check out the conversation as we dive into the following:
How one cold email changed the trajectory of his entire life
His rule of thumb of how much revenue to generate before quitting your job
How entrepreneurship is a life sentence and the isolating side that does not get talked about
How he was much more thoughtful quitting his job the second time
How he values lifestyle design more than a reliable paycheck
Why he believes entrepreneurship is a positive sum game and how we can all help each other
Listen to Mike share his story and get inspired with his amazing advice to people thinking about following a similar path. Check out the full conversation on YouTube or Spotify by clicking the links below.
Know someone who should be on Why I Quit? We’re looking for all types of stories and people to feature at the top of the show. To nominate yourself or someone else, email dave@foundersapproach.com and tell us your name, where you’re from and what you want to talk about.