Play Time is Over

I have written previously about the disparate reasons that I began an evening MBA program back in January of 2004. While I often imagined the various ways that this type of training could be useful professionally, in general those thoughts were confined to some nebulous time in the future after finishing the degree (projected to be May 2006) or after my NIH grant expired (2009) if I did not win further funding. Even when things would happen that demonstrated that I might just have some aptitude for business, in large part these experiences for me were for fun, a learning experience.

Today the four founders of the biotech start-up company that I have been using for all of my school projects voted to make me a full partner in the company. I’m still a bit stunned, even though I knew they were planning to discuss this topic today. I am not expected to quit my day job or MBA program. Indeed, the skills I have learned thus far have been an asset to the company. However, I will no longer be dabbling or making suggestions from the outside looking in. Having spent so many hours working on projects for this company it had become difficult to not consider it partly “mine” and I kept having to remind myself to step back, that it was “theirs”. “Ours” has a nice sound. I obviously need to move those corporate governance books higher on my reading queue. Play time is over.