Need to Make a Big Career Decision? Use This 3-Step Checklist. Gixo and Evite co-founder Selina Tobaccowala swears by it.
By Nina Zipkin
If you're at a career crossroads, according to Selina Tobaccowala, all you need to do is consider three things: the people you are going to work with, the product and mission of the company and what you will learn from the experience. If all those three check out, give yourself permission to take the leap.
It's the checklist she used before leaving a major role at Ticketmaster to join SurveyMonkey, and then again after the unexpected passing of her boss, SurveyMonkey CEO Dave Goldberg, in 2015. It was then that she launched her second startup, Gixo.
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She hadn't worked for herself since she launched Evite as a Stanford college student in 1997. But after her losing her mentor, Tobaccowala said that it was important to her to create something that would help people focus on their health and wellbeing.
Even though it was a risk to leave a solid job behind at a company that she believed in to start something from scratch, the prospect of what would become Gixo hit on all of her three requirements, and she knew that she wanted to try to stretch herself.
"I was at the point where I had never been the CEO. I'd never been responsible for fundraising. And these were all new things that I knew I could learn," Tobaccowala said. "I couldn't figure out another opportunity that was going to be greater and more fulfilling."
Since its launch in May of 2017, the company, a fitness class service for smartphones, has raised $3.7 million. It offers more than 180 live workout classes per week with 24/7 access on demand.
