Starting a business while working full time sounds simple until you actually try to do both at the same time.
For me, that has meant working as an engineer during the day while also building MKé Exchange around everything else going on in my life. I have moved between states, hosted events, recorded interviews, met people, changed ideas, changed the brand, and tried to keep moving even when I did not have a ton of time to give it.
I used to think the biggest challenge would just be finding enough hours. That is definitely part of it, but I do not think that is the hardest part anymore. The harder part is deciding what deserves your attention when there are always ten things you could be doing.
The hardest part is deciding what gets your attention
There is never really a point where I look at MKé Exchange and think, alright, everything is handled. There is always another idea, another person I could reach out to, another event I could attend, something on the website I want to fix, content I could make, or some completely new direction I want to explore.
At first, I treated almost every good idea like it needed to happen immediately. That gets exhausting fast, especially when the business is not the only thing in your life. I had to learn that having a good idea and having the capacity to act on it right now are two different things.
That has probably changed the way I think about progress more than anything else. Progress is not always doing more. Sometimes it is deciding what not to do yet. If I know what matters most right now and I can move that forward, I am good with that.
I have also stopped expecting every week to look the same. Some weeks I can put a lot into the business. Other weeks work is busy, I am traveling, moving, or just dealing with normal life. I used to look at those slower weeks like I was falling behind. Now I look at it more like this is just what building something on the side actually looks like.
My job and my business are not as separate as I thought
For a while, I looked at my job and my business like they were competing with each other. If I was at work, that was time I was not spending on MKé. I think a lot of people who want to build something on the side probably feel that way.
But over time I started noticing how much of what I was learning at work was showing up in how I approached the business anyway. Engineering teaches you how to deal with problems that are not perfectly defined. You have to work with different people, communicate clearly, manage projects, make decisions with incomplete information, and keep moving when the first answer does not work.
All of that carries over.
Even moving through different roles and cities has helped me. I keep getting exposed to different people and different environments, and that changes how I think. Sometimes something I learn at work gives me an idea for the business. Sometimes somebody I meet through work changes how I think about relationships, leadership, or what I want long term.
And there is another part that people do not always talk about: having a full-time income gives me room to experiment. I can try something, learn from it, and change direction without needing every single move to make money immediately. There are definitely days where balancing both is frustrating, but I do not think quitting your job is the only way to prove you are serious about building something.
A lot of my progress has come from people
If I look back at some of the best things that have happened with MKé Exchange, a lot of them did not come from sitting at a laptop trying to force growth. They came from conversations.
Hosting socials introduced me to people I would not have met otherwise. Interviews turned into other introductions. Going to events opened doors to new relationships. Sometimes one conversation led to another one that I never could have planned for in advance.
That has changed how I think about networking too. I used to think about networking more like something you were supposed to do because it was good for your career or business. Now I care a lot more about simply being around interesting people, asking questions, listening, and seeing where relationships go naturally.
Especially when you are building something while working full time, that matters. You do not have unlimited time to figure everything out by yourself. Sometimes somebody else has already dealt with the problem you are stuck on. Sometimes they know somebody you should meet. Sometimes the conversation itself is enough to change the way you were thinking about the problem.
I am still figuring out what this becomes
One thing I do not want to do is write this like I have everything figured out because I do not. MKé Exchange has already changed a lot from what I originally imagined, and I know it is going to keep changing.
Some ideas I was excited about did not work the way I thought they would. Other things became more important after I actually tried them. I have learned a lot more from putting things in front of real people than I ever would have learned from sitting around trying to make the perfect plan.
That is probably the biggest thing I would tell somebody who wants to start a business while working full time. Do not wait until your schedule is perfect, your idea is perfect, or you feel completely ready. Start small enough that you can actually do something. Talk to people. Pay attention to what happens. Keep what works. Change what does not.
There are going to be stretches where it feels like you are moving fast and others where it feels like barely anything is happening. I have had both. I have had ideas I was convinced were great, ideas I dropped, events that went well, things that did not go how I expected, and plenty of moments where I had to rethink what I was doing.
But I am still building. I am still learning. And right now, I think that matters more than pretending I have some perfect formula for balancing a career and a business.