When does an entrepreneur take a regular job?

Easy.

When your personal bank account is tapped out and you have
serious trouble meeting cost-of-living expenses.

Otherwise you end up depending on credit cards and that often means you are digging a deeper hole.

Ideally you would actually take on a job BEFORE it gets so hairy but maybe something promising was in the works that kept you in and it fell through at the last minute.

A job at least allows you to not to dig a deeper hole. Yes, your venture will become an evening and weekend one, but, at least it will be alive and you won't be as stressed out worrying about your personal expenses (and dodging collectors' 1.800 numbers - trust me, I speak from experience).

Taking a position - part-time or full-time has a number of benefits:

• Allows you to plow more of your venture revenues into growing the business
  
• Learn new skills and beef up current ones that can help your venture
  
• Network with people
  
• You work more efficiently on your venture
  

Eventually you will be able to walk away from your job and into a more mature
venture that can cover your costs and with all your efforts now focused on your venture, revenue should be easier to grow.

Every time our capital base ran low, we took on positions to shore up our personal financial profile - jobs, consulting work, real estate investing and even a separate venture that brought in additional cash.

Taking a position isn't a sign of failure, it is a sign of someone who doesn't let pride prevent them from doing what is necessary to ensure their survival and the survival of their venture.

Would you rather stick to being a self-employed entrepreneur and go bankrupt or take on a job and build up your venture more slowly?

There is only one right answer to that question.

p.s. Someone is bound to ask why you would have even left a job in the first place to start your own venture if it couldn't support you financially. Remember that some ventures start while in school but also, you often have enough capital for a set number of months and you are willing to take the calculated risk that you will be generating enough cash before you run out of capital or be able to land an investor.

Take it from me, it NEVER goes exactly according to plan.