Noah Kagan, president of software development company Kickflip, will tell you what he does for a living, but don’t make that your lead if approaching him at a cocktail party. “I hate that question,” says the 25 year old Berkeley grad, who has worked for at least four separate companies that should have made him rich, if he had stayed around long enough. Although money is a final result, this self-proclaimed “results oriented guy” is more concerned with making decisions in the moment, not building his 401k. He quickly brushes over stories about Intel, Microsoft and Facebook to name a few, working his way toward current and future projects with far smaller companies.

Noah has a voracious appetite for action, something that is underappreciated in the world of large corporations. No bother. Noah finds places that fit his tastes, not the other way around. Money, to the Cupertino, CA native, has never been a driving force. Rather, Noah looks at jobs like relationships, investing emotionally, working hard, yet keeping in mind that it may just not be the perfect fit. It is an outlook that has made Noah a desired mind in just about any company, and has led him to start his own.

Nathan Kaiser, founder of npost.com, was not sure what to do with his degree in microbiology from the University of Washington. Working for a large medical manufacturer, he began, in his free time, to interview interesting people about their jobs and their career paths. From this sprang nPost, a resource for people looking into the world of technology start-ups. The site is a collection of interviews, and also job listing specific to the tech start-up world.

Nathan has denied listing jobs from Fortune-500 companies, simply because, in Nathan’s view, it would hurt the overall character of his website. Many people thought he was crazy for leaving a well-paid position to start nPost.

“I’d rather be crazy than working unhappily,” Nathan says, “People don’t realize what they’re missing.”

Nathan may not be fully maximizing the profits of his business, but if he is concerned with that, he hides it well. “When you’re doing your own thing and supporting yourself,” says Nathan, “there’s nothing better in life. Plus, he adds wryly, “I’m wired, so I do a lot of work from friends’ sailboats.”

Brad Feld, managing director at Foundry Group and Mobius Venture Capitol, has been in the technology business for a long time. He started his first company out of his fraternity at MIT, and hasn’t looked back. Since selling his initial company, after 8 years of growth and management, in 1993, Brad now serves to support other entrepreneurs.

Brad has been around for some time, and his advice comes from success, failure and a whole lot of effort. “Passion,” Brad says, “Is critical, but not sufficient,” especially in the way that passion may cloud the process of discussion, or argument.

From starting his own company, to now helping others do the same, Brad has gained an invaluable perspective. “The entrepreneurs I love to work with,” Brad says, “Are guys who have had a success and a failure, and not necessarily in that order.” Brad recognizes that what he has learned from failure, has been infinitely more valuable that what has learned from success. His advice for those looking to enter the world of entrepreneurship? “Try different things.” Don’t set yourself down a single path, when ultimately, many paths could lead to equal success.

Dave Mathews is an extrovert inventor that has been taking things apart and finding innovative ways to put them back together since kindergarten. One look at Dave’s kitchen table will tell a life story shaped by gadgets, tinkering, and an innate curiosity to find out how things work.

With the Golden Gate bridge in the horizon, Dave and I discussed how he’s made a career out of inventing, and how it translates to anyone making a career out of a hobby.

Dave’s advice:

“First, figure out what your hobby is. What are you passionate about? What do you love to do? Is it arts & crafts? Programming? Tinkering? Whatever it is, try to figure out a way to make that your career.”

So just how can you take a crazy hobby like taking things apart and putting them back together a career?

“Well, the hard part is making money, right? I was lucky coming out of school because there was a computer revolution and all these offices needed computers set up. There was opportunity everywhere. But there is opportunity everywhere today too. The video game industry is larger than Hollywood and the film industry these days. Literally, if you love playing video games, you can find a way to play video games as a career. Whether it’s coding, developing them, whatever, there’s no excuse for you to find a job you want because there’s so many different career paths that you can take based on your hobbies.”

More info on what Dave is up to can be found on his website - www.davemathews.com

I don’t know much about software and technology, but I do know that it has made Andrew Hyde’s offline world a bit more interesting, and it has the capability to make yours a lot more interesting too.

Coming out of college Andrew expected a 9-5 job in software design working for, and hating, “the man.” But as he carted his belongings around Boulder, Andrew was turned down for a job nine times before finding a freelance gig for five hundred bucks.

The freedom of freelancing turned into a love for entrepreneurship, and Andrew began to enjoy playing the “make enough to pay the rent” game.

Now twenty three years old, Andrew Hyde has already started two businesses and is onto something with Startup Weekend. The weekend event relies on Andrew’s online connections to attract top talent to build a business in a weekend.

Check out Andrew and Startup Weekend at www.andrewhyde.net.

Rachel wanted to do something entrepreneurial when she decided to get her MBA at the University of Chicago. That something she was looking for turned out to be Econfidant.com, an online service that provides personalized, confidential dating & relationship advice. She created the site with a friend after identifying the lack of relevant dating & relationship advice on the Internet. And it’s true! If you type in dating advice into google, there are endless links leading you to sites, such as eHarmony or Match.com. None of theswe sites allow users to ask direct questions 24 hours a day, with real-time responses.

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Lucas went to school at the University of Missouri and obtained a bachelor of computer science degree. Microsoft was his first interview out of college. When he visited Redmond that February, it was cold and rainy. To anyone else it might have been unattractive, but seeing as he was from Missouri, the fresh, new Microsoft campus environment appealed to Lucas. He accepted the job in June of 1999 and has not looked back since.

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