This told essay is based on a conversation with Aashna Doshi, a 23-year-old former Google software engineer based in New York City. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I took a big risk and took a job at Google. I’m leaving it alone for now and taking another picture.
Around February 2024, a few months before graduating from Georgia Tech, I received a full-time job offer from Google.
But there was one problem. The offer was for an engineering role based in California, and I really wanted to work in New York City.
For many of my colleagues, the technology job market was becoming increasingly difficult, and the opportunity was too much to ignore. Still, I decided to take a gamble and decline the offer.
The risk paid off. Two months later, I accepted a software engineering position at Google based in New York City.
Little did I know that a side project I started around the same time would eventually lead to me taking an even bigger risk away from Google altogether.
I wanted something creative other than coding.
Overall, I really enjoyed my experience at Google. I learned every day and met many smart people from different backgrounds.
However, working as a software engineer is a very technical job, and I wanted to do something more interactive and creative than sitting at a desk.
I loved meeting people, listening to their stories, and learning from them. That eventually led to the idea of starting a podcast. In early 2025, while I was still working at Google, I started the 0 to 1 podcast with my co-host, a software engineer at Big Tech.
In addition to paying homage to our software engineering backgrounds, the show’s name comes from the idea that there is so much value between zero (where someone started) and one (where you are today). My co-hosts and I believe we can learn a lot from people’s journeys, and that sometimes too much focus is placed on where people are rather than how they got there.
We decided to start a podcast because we wanted a creative outlet outside of engineering, but also to expand our network and connect with people in much more senior roles than us.
Podcasts helped us “network up”
Many of our early guests came through cold DMs, our networks, and people we were close to. We interviewed founders, engineers, executives, and creators about their journey from their starting point to where they are today.
Things moved much faster than we expected. Within the first year, the podcast had over 100,000 views on YouTube. Ultimately, it made it easier to reach people and bring in leaders from big companies like Amazon and Microsoft.
Without podcasts, it was hard to imagine how I would be able to connect with people at the upper echelons of large companies.
I felt like it was the perfect time to leave Google.
In Big Tech companies, people are just one part of a much larger machine. I craved the ability to make decisions, act quickly, and see first-hand the results of my work.
On top of that, the AI tools available to builders today are unlike anything before. I had strong beliefs about certain ideas and didn’t want to look back and wish I had taken the shot at a better time.
In May, I left Google to focus full-time on building our AI startup Bounty with my podcast co-host. It is an outcome-based AI marketplace where companies can post specific tasks such as sourcing candidates, conducting outreach, or generating leads, and pay only for verified results.
The podcast gave me the confidence to take the leap. We live in a world where media and distribution are everything for startups, and having a podcast with a built-in audience targeted at founders and operators – the very people our businesses are built on – is the perfect distribution channel for what we’re building.
Read more about people at corporate crossroads
Leaving Google is a financial risk that I’m willing to take.
While leaving Google made sense both personally and business-wise, giving up my Google salary was not an easy decision. We are still pre-launch and are not generating any revenue yet. I’m on a founder’s salary, but it’s definitely a fraction of what I was making at Google. The podcast isn’t generating any income yet, but we hope to do so soon through sponsorships.
Leaving Google was a risk, but I’ve always believed that if you’re really drawn to something, you need to step away from what’s good and pursue what has the potential to be great. Financial security is comforting, but it can also be a trap.
An even scarier version of this decision was not to leave Google. It stayed and I always wondered what could have been.
Do you have a story to share about how you’re navigating a crossroads in your career? If so, please contact our reporter via email. jzikula@businessinsider.comor via Signal at jzikula.29.