Working on a SaaS while also working full-time at Clearbit

This week I'm interviewing Jack Knight, who has a pretty busy job at Clearbit. In his spare time, he works at CallBlitz, which is a SaaS that allows people to train their sales reps remotely.

What's your name and what are you working on?

My name is Jack Knight, my cofounder Markus Pint and I built a remote sales floor on top of Zoom so that remote reps never have to cold call alone again.

During the day, I'm a BDR Manager at Clearbit where I lead a team of 9 savage BDRs.

How much time do you devote to CalLBlitz, while you're still employed?

I wake up at 5AM, workout, then focus on CallBlitz until my day job starts, typically around 9AM.

My day job wraps up at around 5PM daily and that's when I jump back into CallBlitz for another few hours.

Some days are different from others in terms of intensity, but this has been relatively sustainable so far!

How do you manage to find the time/energy to work on X while having a full-time job?

I believe you should end every day physically drained but emotionally full (with exceptions, life is crazy!).

Working this schedule on top of volunteering, being a husband, working out, taking care of the home and all of life's other demands is definitely physically exhausting.

But, the things I do in life (work, family, hobbies) all bring me deep joy and fulfillment.

So, although I can hardly keep my eyes open at the end of each day, I am always excited to get back on the grind the next day because I truly enjoy my life and am blessed to have the opportunities I do!

On the physical side though...I love coffee, sleep is a must, and my wife is an angel and brings me food when I forget to eat .

How did you manage the motivation to keep going, knowing that your full-time job brings you predictable/stable revenue?

The motivation for me is wanting to help sales reps. I was the SDR sitting alone in my apartment making cold calls, it sucked.

Remembering that feeling and knowing that there are hundreds of SDRs still cold calling alone and getting burnt out and frustrated fires me up.

We have something that can genuinely help them, not just not feel alone, but also get better at cold calling through live coaching and feedback loops.

I love my day job and I LOVE my team. Nothing is more fulfilling to me than helping people WIN and fulfill their potential - it's a blessing that I get to do that in both my day job and with CallBlitz!

At what point would you consider abandoning your job to focus full-time on CallBlitz ?

To the comment above, I love what Clearbit is doing, and where we are headed. I'm excited to tackle the next set of challenges we face as we scale and grow.

I have no intention of leaving Clearbit if I can continue to invest in both my Clearbit team and CallBlitz simultaneously.

Fortunately, my awesome cofounder Markus is in a more flexible situation where he is able to manage the day-to-day of CallBlitz with me, so we are able to get a lot done when we combine our efforts.

We are getting our first customer next week, wrapping up pilots/trials and will have ~5 customers by end of September.