Job decisions... Advice woud be appreciated

[Ricardo C]

For the past year and a half, I've been working part time at a local elementary school, teaching computing. It's a very enjoyable work, the classes are small, I have a lot of freedom with the lesson plan, it pays... Not well, but just enough, and most importantly, it leaves me enough free time to work on my game projects practically full time. Except for the so-so salary, it's an ideal stuation for an aspiring indie.

Now, I'm being considered for a teaching post at another school. Much bigger deal, partially owned by American companies, which means it could be good for networking (several former teachers there have been "imported" by US schools thanks to connections made while in this institution), the salary is better, benefits kick in after a year, Christmas bonuses, etc.

But it's full time work, lots of take-home work, weekend work, etc. My indie time would be cut by more than half. And I'm dreading that very much.

My friends and family think the choice is obvious, and that I should go for the "sure thing". But is it a sure thing, given the political turmoil in my country (Venezuela)? With the constant sniping between the Chávez regime and the US, how long can it be before one of the two breaks off diplomatic relations and this school closes due to lack of funding? Or before it's taken over by the State (in 2001 and 2004 Chávez has introduced decrees that give him great deals of control over even private schools).

Part of me says I'm just looking for reasons not to take this job, part of me says that after all this country has gone through in the past 15 years (two coup attempts by Chávez, one by his opponents, thousands of political deaths, expropiated lands and businesses, etc.), my fears may not be all that outlandish.

What would you do, were you in my shoes? Even removing the political issue, how would you feel about sacrificing your indie time for a better paycheck?

EDIT: Crap, I could have sworn I was in Indie Life. Mods, sorry.

[Savant]

My friends and family think the choice is obvious, and that I should go for the "sure thing".
Nobody ever got rich going for the "sure thing".

[MibUK]

My advice, as an about to be extremely poor self employed full time indie,

Do what makes you happy, not what makes you rich (or comfortable).

If your lucky, doing what makes you happy will provide more money than you need. If your unlucky, your doing a job you enjoy, and enjoying life.
If you go for extra money you'll be working more, seeing your family / freinds less, so you'll have more money but less time to spend it, and you wont being doing what really makes you happy anyway.

Everybody gets given the same number of minutes in a day, how you spend them is up to you.

[GBGames]

Do you have plans to make your indie work pay? That is, you don't get paid too well with your current job, but it allows you time to work on your indie stuff. Do you plan for your indie stuff to pay you enough so that you don't need to take a better paying job?

Think five years out from now, which might be difficult in a situation that is kind of unstable due to government coups and such, but can you look back on the next five years and say that you did the right thing if you took the job or continued working as much as you can on being an indie?

[Sakura Games]

Just for curiosity, what is an average salary in Venezuela?
It should be a "poor country", so you should have much bigger chances to make a daily living with indie than someone living in europe or UK (freaking USD!).

I suggest you base your decision on that. If you can live well enough with 500usd (just guessing a figure) then shouldn't be a hard goal to reach with indie earnings and you should give it a try I think.

[princec]

Stay where you are, stay happy, and enjoy the fact you have free time to do your own thing as well. I envy you.

Cas :)

[vjvj]

I still have my full time job, and while the paycheck is very nice, the amount of indie dev time I'm sacrificing is my greatest torment.

Ironically, one alternative I've been looking at has been teaching. I wouldn't mind taking a paycut for a cut in hours.

I'd say if you can live off what you're making now, just stick with it. You're probably going to regret the productivity hit on your indie projects if you take that fulltime job (and the hours are as you say they would be).

[Ricardo C]

Thanks for the advice, everyone :)

I'm leaning towards staying where I am. I'm gonna go in for the test and interview, and hear what the exact offer is. If I can make it work for me (low fixed hours), I'll make the move. But I'll turn it down if I have to commit full time.

Another thing that bothers me is that if they took me on, training could start next week, and I still have two weeks left at my current school. No way could I leave them on a lurch like that, even though the curriculum has been covered. I still have to cover my hours.

Sakura Games, you've hit on an important point. Venezuela's economy being what it is (current oil boom notwithstanding), salaries are quite low. If you can make $500 a month, you can get by on your own. If you make $1000 a month, you're comfortably middle class. Not in the lap of luxury, but you can pay your bills and still have a decent bit of spending cash. More than that, and you can really enjoy life here. So yeah, a moderately succesful indie who still needs a part-time gig in the US or Europe could actually be a full-time indie here. I know very few developers actually make it to the top, but I do have enough self-confidence to believe I can realistically attain at least that modest level of success.

Well, test starts tomorrow at 8:30, and supposedly lasts longer than the SATs. We'll see what we'll see :D

[Pyabo]

If you make $1000 a month, you're comfortably middle class.

Repeat to self: "Just fifty sales. Just fifty sales. Just fifty sales." :)

[electronicStar]

Well it all depends of the degree of seriousness with which you consider starting as an indie.
Maybe you should give yourself 6 more month in your current job (maybe your new job will still be available in 6 month)
And during this time, start working really seriously on your indie career. Start building things and taking contacts and engagements. You'll see if there are no big impassable obstacles to being an indie develloper and if that's what you really want to do.

[Escapee]

I'm in the same kind of situation , I was just offered an opportunity to work in USA by my current company . The job involves lots of travelling, management of electronic subcon around the world, process control and stuffs . The pay will be many times better than my current salary, but if i take the job , i would probably have to give up funpcgame.com (http://www.funpcgame.com) to fully pursue an uninspiring path that is totally against my long term passion/interest ( self -employment doing something i 'm passionate about ).

I have until next monday to inform my decision to my boss , most likely it will be a "NO" .

[Ricardo C]

electronicStar, that's what I'm planning to do. Basically say "no thanks" when they give me the terms, probably using my existing commitment to my current employer as the reason, and then go into "indie crunch" until the end of the year. By then I should either have finished a game, or at least have something sufficiently advanced to know whether I'm on the right track or not.

Escapee, I WOULD take the US job, but that's because the situation here is so
volatile that I would welcome the chance to relocate. Malaysia is probably much safer, though, so go with your heart :)

[Ricardo C]

Heh... Was just reading an interview with Johnny Depp, about the upcoming Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Came across this little gem:

"The idea of commercial success never bothered me necessarily. What bothered me was striving for that, and lying to get that. If I was going to do something, it had to be on my terms—not because I'm some hideous control freak—but because I don't want to live a lie. You really don't want to look back on your life and go, 'I was a complete fraud'."

If there are signs from above, I think I just got one :p

[dmikesell]

How many hours are we talking here? And is it 12 months a year?

[Ricardo C]

Well, I just got back.

As they say, I came, I saw, I KICKED MAJOR ASS :D

They're in love with me. And this after I explained about not wanting to leave my current employer in a lurch and telling them I'm a programmer by trade and that I do my own projects in the afternoons and evenings. The interviewer told me "if we take you on, you'll be able to choose your own shift, you can work both if you want, but you can certainly take just mornings and do your software stuff the rest of the day". I was blown away, in a very good way.

dmikesell, I'm gonna shoot for 4-6 hours a day, which would secure a nice paycheck and a lot of free time. Yeah, the job is year round, for the first year at least.

[zoombapup]

Just a FYI, the class prep is the major part of teaching, not the actual delivery.

Having said that, if your schools are anything like ours, you should get a good deal of the year off work.

I'm a lecturer at a university, we have an even sweeter deal and roughly 5 months a year free.

Its a very "indie" friendly lifestyle. I do have the added bonus of teaching games dev too, so I get the double whammy of my boss WANTING me to do it :)

[Applewood]

(two coup attempts by Chávez, one by his opponents, thousands of political deaths, expropiated lands and businesses, etc.)...
What would you do, were you in my shoes?
Me personally, I would emigrate!

I'd usually tell anyone to get/keep a real job until he knows *for sure* that he can make a living doing this. But in your case, I'd buy into "the system" as little as possible as it might not be there soon anyway - sounds like a nightmare to be caught up in.

If what looks good today might not be there tomorrow, ignore it - that's the reason most people drop out of mainstream games development so it should hold for other career paths too.

The other thing you got going on is if a grand a month is all you need to live ok, then that should surely be doable if you're any good at all. 2 sales a day is all you need and that can come from multiple products after a while.

[Bromoc]

My rules for a job are:

It pays enough for Roof over head and food on table, and suplies your gaming tools

It is challenging enough, (don't get boring so the day goes by faster, so you can go home and program your game)

You goto bed with a smile on your face most nights.

If a job can not provide me with all three thats when i move on. Of course ideally want my hobby and my job to be the same. I should have the professional experience in a year or two (AT least now I'm getting paid to program on stuff that ships) for that to be but until then..

[Escapee]

The location of the job offer is in sunnyvales CA , i've heard it's an extremely boring and depressing place like Nebraska where i used to study and the job itself involves tons of travelling which would reduce my life expectancy by 30% so I'm prepared to say 'no' to my corporate master tommorow and 'yes' to freedom and sanity.

Yay , Fun PC Games is here to stay to "serve the community":p and call me stupid or gay for not living the "American dream" ;)