I left Google to pursue an MBA. I think higher education is still worth the investment in the age of AI.

In 2021, a London associate product marketing manager role at Google was pursued through extensive interviewing. After three years, the decision to leave led to an MBA in artificial intelligence at Wharton with the aim of creating a portfolio career. Concerns included fitting into a finance-focused environment and learning unfamiliar modeling and valuation topics such as cap payrolls and discounted cash flows. Social tradeoffs occurred due to the need to focus on the program. AI skills were not widely shared among peers, so the unconventional background became an advantage. A key drawback was emphasis on studying product building rather than shipping, which was addressed by starting Moonlight Club, a newsletter and community.

"I started working at Google in 2021 as an associate product marketing manager in its London office. It was my dream role, and I landed it after interviewing 10 times. Three years later, I left to pursue an MBA in artificial intelligence from Wharton with the goal of creating a portfolio career. I had no idea what that would look like at the time: only that I wanted to create more career options going forward."

"I wasn't afraid to leave Google, but there were moments I questioned my decision I didn't have any fears about leaving Google; however, I wondered how I'd fit in at a finance-focused business school. Initially, I questioned if this was the right choice. I figured everyone would be doing types of modeling I hadn't really heard of before, and I'd have to spend a lot of time ramping up."

"I had some analytical skills from my early career in growth marketing, but I realized the financial metrics were very different. I had to learn cap payrolls, discounted cash flows, and all these things that I'd heard about but never built on my own. At times, I could've been more social with friends, but I felt like I had to focus and really nail the program."

"The biggest drawback about grad school was that the focus is on studying how to build products, not actually building them. I wanted to actually ship something with real users. I addressed these challenges by starting to build Moonlight Club a newsletter and eventual community fo"

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