As a person who turned back from academia and chose “the other road”, I can relate, but from the other side. I remember disliking the way the field (in this case, English lit) became increasingly meta the farther you pursued it, so that you were no longer engaging with core texts any longer, but instead writing criticism of someone else’s criticism of a text. And above all else, I wanted to be productive — to put some “product” of my own out into the world to succeed or falter. But I’m sure many people can tell you stories about how life isn’t always rosy in the world of tech and business. (For example, I enjoyed this recent article about the banalities and absurdities of startup culture: https://torontolife.com/tech/truth-tech-insider-got/)