I just went through this process with my last employer 3 weeks ago. I just finished week one at the new employer and it is great. Here is what I did.
Gave 2 weeks notice, I told my boss this opportunity was too good to pass up. It was something I really wanted to do.
Offered to do whatever was needed over the next two weeks to help with the transition. (Mostly documentation for the new guy and closing outstanding projects.)
Recommended that they expand a current contract they have with a service provider to help fill some of my roles while they look for a new employee.
I kept the exit interview and discussions with other employees professional and did not complain about the problems of the current job. Really no reason at this point to make a big stink on the way out, I don't like to burn brides un-necessarily.
I will be the first one to admit that I don't know everything. It never occurred to me, in part, because I had misconceptions about the barriers to entry. Those misconceptions have been corrected because of this post.
Simply put, I thought it would be more expensive to publish on Amazon. :)
Thank you everyone, I think I have a rough draft of my plan now.
1. Sell my book via either payloadz or ejunkie. I want to investigate the reputation of each service, but I like the free account to start on payloadz.
2. If sales can cover my costs so far, and can pay for the cost of moving to Amazon, sell on Amazon.
3. If sales on Amazon cover my costs, add paperback print on demand.
Would there be a way to set up Paypal to auto email the book to the customer? If I were a paying customer, I'm not sure I would want to wait to get my book. I think the expectation of buying an e-book is to get it instantly...
Excellent idea, it never occurred to me to try and sell this on Amazon. I think in the spirit of "bootstrapping" this would be step 2 or 3 on the list due to the start up costs.
I have not done testing to gauge interest yet. I was looking at what else is out there and the sites I have seen look like they are just there to make money. The material I looked at doesn't cover what I go over in class, so I think I can offer something new.
Yes we do have casual employees, the term is "part time" in America. They generally work less than 20 hours a week, no benefits like time off or holidays, but they usually don't make more money than full time employees though.
You have to get out of the the city a little bit. The last hitchhiker I picked up was on Rt 422 north of Pittsburgh. It was cold, dark and raining so I stopped to pick him up. We got to talking and he told me his story on why he was hitching. Seems his buddy was having a bachelor party and he wanted to go. His wife hid the keys and said he couldn't go so he hitchhiked to the party and back. I dropped him off at his house and I can only imagine the hell he got from his wife when he got home...
I've had a very similar experience, its uncanny. I was in my 20s at the time and I was trying to fix a charging problem on this old truck I had. I decided to take it for a test ride to see if the problem is fixed. Of course it isn't and the battery dies while I am in the middle of an intersection. I have jumper cables so I pop the hood and I am standing there holding the cables trying to get someone to stop. I got people flipping me off, honking their horns, etc, no one stops.
A Mexican guy stops, family in the car, pops his hood and gives me a jump. I didn't get a chance to talk to him because I had to get the truck out of the road, but I did say thanks.
Ever since that incident I have been paying it forward. I've probably helped dozens of people since then who were broke down because that guy chose to help me. It's nice to see there are others out there paying it forward as well.
There are forum plugins for Wordpress. That might give you some of the features you are looking for. I have not used them myself, but I know they exist. If you know CSS and PHP, you should be able to mod something to get the feature set you need.
If you want something that goes up quick so you can generate content, Wordpress is the way to go.
Gave 2 weeks notice, I told my boss this opportunity was too good to pass up. It was something I really wanted to do.
Offered to do whatever was needed over the next two weeks to help with the transition. (Mostly documentation for the new guy and closing outstanding projects.)
Recommended that they expand a current contract they have with a service provider to help fill some of my roles while they look for a new employee.
I kept the exit interview and discussions with other employees professional and did not complain about the problems of the current job. Really no reason at this point to make a big stink on the way out, I don't like to burn brides un-necessarily.
I hope this helps.
Good luck with the new job!