Episode 144 51 min Leaving a dream job at the top
Hannah Brooks on walking away from a VP role to start over at 41, and how she made the decision with incomplete information.
Season 4 · Episode 141 Creators and the business of attention
Leaving a job to write full-time
Newsletter writer Lucas Meyer on the spreadsheet, the savings and the subscriber milestone that told him it was time to go independent.
GuestLucas Meyer — Newsletter writer
Episode 141 Leaving a job to write full-time
0:00 1:01:15
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Show notes
Lucas Meyer spent eight years as an urban planner and three years writing a newsletter about cities on the side. Then he did the maths and quit.
Jordan and Lucas talk about the specific numbers behind the decision, the routines that keep a one-person publication running, and the loneliness nobody warns you about.
What we cover
- Choosing a milestone before you resign
- Free, paid and sponsored newsletter models
- Structuring a writing week
- Staying connected when you work alone
Key takeaways
- Lucas set a paid-subscriber number in advance and only resigned when he hit it.
- He kept writing for free for two years before turning on payments.
- Sponsorships covered the gap between free and paid.
- Weekly cadence matters more than length.
Timestamps
About the guest
Lucas Meyer
Newsletter writer
Lucas Meyer writes a weekly newsletter about cities, design and urban life, read by 48,000 subscribers. He was previously an urban planner for a mid-sized city council.
Episode 144 51 min 
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