The $500k/yr Quant Offer

Being a top 0.001% math, design, writing, engineering, computer science, philosophy talent won't get you a $500k/yr salary as a solopreneur.

Solopreneurs cannot leverage the marvel that is specialization of labor like others.

When you're an A+ (or in the case below, likely a top 0.0001%) math talent, you can plug into companies that need a top tier performer in a very specific role.

Solopreneurs, on the other hand, have to be generalists. And so even if they are A+ math talents, they might be C+ writers and D- designers.

And they will need to spend time doing all of these tasks... especially in the beginning.

So your hourly rate as a 'quant trading consultant' might be some exorbitant number, but your hourly market rate as a designer might be closer to $25/hr

If this quant trader wanted to set off on their own as an independent consultant, they'd still need to:

• Identify and pitch leads (writing & sales skills);

• Onboard clients and handle objections (comms and customer service skills);

• Deliver work in a way that's understandable to the end client (some presentation design skills, no doubt);

• Build a website to showcase their work and improve their pipeline (web design, copywriting)

In the first years, your effective hourly rate will suffer, because you're doing a bunch of tasks where you are not an A+ talent.

So, two questions:

1. Why not hire help for tasks you're not A+ in?

2. Why do it at all?

The first question is interesting. My personal answer is:

a) Hiring and managing people is yet another skill that you may be a C or D player in, and you'll now need to spend many hours in this new role;

b) It takes time to establish whether or not a particular business model/structure is actually profitable for a solopreneur.

Hiring others adds pressure if you haven't yet proven what works.

Now, onto the second question: why do it at all?

The answer is you absolutely do not have to.

The point of this post is just to lay out the reality of being a solopreneur:

Namely, being an A+ talent in one thing isn't enough, and you will almost certainly get a better market rate for that specific talent by working in a company that needs you.

If you want to pursue solopreneurship, though, you need to comfortable doing things where you are a C- player (at least when you start out).

Of course, you want to build a business structured around your strengths--so that what you get paid for is your A+ skill.

But that takes time... and there will be no $500k/yr offers waiting for you on day 1, no matter how good you are.