The Earning-or-Learning Career Test
Leave roles that provide neither better pay nor valuable growth
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 96%
The Earning-or-Learning Career Test reduces a complicated stay-or-leave decision to two sources of value. First ask whether the role is increasing compensation appropriately. Then ask whether it is producing new skills, opportunities, or intellectual stimulation. If at least one dimension is strong, staying may still serve a purpose. If neither is present, comfort, loyalty, or fear may be keeping the person trapped rather than helping them progress. The test is a diagnostic trigger, not a demand for an impulsive resignation: someone who fails both sides should investigate internal changes, negotiate, build options, or plan a responsible exit. Its value is that it forces the status quo to justify itself in concrete terms instead of being protected by inertia.
Origin
Kim Perell offered earning and learning as the two questions people should use when evaluating whether comfort, loyalty, or fear has kept them in a situation too long.
Core principles
- 01Comfort and loyalty can conceal stagnation
- 02A role should create financial or capability value
- 03Learning includes skills, opportunities, and stimulation
- 04Neither value means the status quo needs a challenge
How to run it
- 1
Score earning
Review compensation, progression, and whether pay reflects the value and responsibility of the role. Use relevant comparisons rather than emotion alone.
Pro tip Look at the direction of compensation over time, not only the current number.
Watch out A temporary pay plateau does not automatically mean a role has no value.
- 2
Score learning
List recent skills, opportunities, responsibilities, relationships, and intellectual challenges. Identify whether they remain useful for the direction you want.
Pro tip Use concrete examples from the last quarter or half-year.
Watch out Busyness is not the same as learning.
- 3
Name the trap
If both dimensions are weak, identify whether comfort, loyalty, or fear explains the delay. Naming the force makes it easier to challenge.
Pro tip Ask what advice you would give a friend with the same evidence.
Watch out Do not confuse loyalty with an obligation to remain indefinitely.
- 4
Create the next move
Seek a pay change, a learning opportunity, a different role, or a responsible exit plan. Choose an action that restores at least one source of value.
Pro tip Build financial and practical options before resigning where possible.
Watch out Do not leave impulsively without considering health, dependants, and runway.
- 5
Reassess on a deadline
Set a date to review whether the chosen change restored earning or learning. If not, execute the next planned option.
Pro tip Put the reassessment date in the calendar with the evidence you expect to see.
In the wild
An employee has stayed in the same role because the team feels familiar. Pay has not progressed, recent projects repeat old work, and no new responsibility is available. She identifies comfort as the trap, builds a three-month financial buffer, and begins a focused search for roles that add both responsibility and skills.
→ The employee turns vague dissatisfaction into a responsible transition plan.
A junior operator earns less than peers but is gaining rare hands-on experience under an excellent manager. He sets a six-month review date and defines the skills and promotion evidence that would justify staying until then.
→ The role remains a deliberate learning investment rather than an indefinite default.
Common mistakes
Treating one weak month as stagnation
The test should reflect a meaningful period and trajectory rather than a short temporary disruption.
Counting repetition as learning
Doing more work is not growth if capability, opportunity, and judgement are no longer expanding.
Leaving without a safe plan
Failing both tests creates a reason to change the situation, not permission to ignore financial and personal constraints.
Is it for you?
Best for
It is best for people deciding whether to remain in a job or professional situation that feels stuck.
Not ideal for
It is not ideal as an automatic instruction to leave during short-term hardship, caregiving constraints, or a deliberately chosen stable period.
From the transcript
“ask yourself if you're earning or learning these two things.”
“these traps of comfort, loyalty, fear.”
“And if you're not learning new skills, new opportunities, if you're not actually getting intellectual stimulation, you should go too. Else you're just trapped.”
From the episode
Episode 499: Kim Perell: Building a $235M Company from the Kitchen Table + Why Perfectionism Kills Success
Kim Perell