She Left a Six-Figure Google Job: 'Life Is Too Short to Wait for Permission'

Taylor LaSane spent nearly 10 years building a career at Google. Last October, she left it behind for good, trading a six-figure salary for a coaching business that, at the time, brought in a tenth of what she used to earn.

The 32-year-old, who lives in Atlanta with her husband and twin toddlers, told Business Insider she had weighed the move for some time. What settled it came last summer, when Google offered a voluntary exit package and, within weeks, her uncle died suddenly at 62.

A Promotion That Made Things Worse

In February 2022, while still working full time in Google's finance organisation, LaSane began posting career advice videos on TikTok. Around the same time, she started questioning whether the role was still the right fit, after earning a promotion she had worked hard for and finding it left her feeling worse, not better.

'I was taking meetings at 2 o'clock in the morning, my hair was falling out, it was not a great time,' she told Business Insider. 'And then I got the promotion, and I felt worse than I did before.'

That May, she launched her coaching company, SHYNE, and by October 2022 had earned a leadership and performance coaching certification from Brown University. Growth stalled soon after. A pregnancy with twins in 2023 pulled her away from the business entirely. The break stretched from May of that year to around September 2024, and included eight months of maternity leave through Google, plus two further months of annual and medical leave.

The Buyout and the Uncle Who Never Got to Retire

Early in 2025, LaSane returned to building SHYNE. A growing internal focus on artificial intelligence at Google had left her uncertain about where her role was headed.

'Big Tech layoffs are happening everywhere, so it wasn't like staying there was necessarily any more stable than leaving,' she said.

Last June, Google opened a voluntary exit programme to employees across several divisions, including the finance team where LaSane worked. The company framed it as a route out for staff who were not fully committed to its direction. Her package included just under six months of severance pay, and her coaching income was still only about a tenth of her Google salary.

The scheme was part of a wider pattern at the company. Through 2025 and 2026, Google ran voluntary buyouts across multiple US divisions, pitching them to staff who did not feel 'all in' on its direction. That framing came from internal memos by senior executives Jen Fitzpatrick and Philipp Schindler. Google confirmed the exit programmes and tied them to a faster, more AI-focused way of working. The last mass layoff the company announced was 12,000 roles in January 2023.

Then her uncle died. He was 62, newly retired, and had been looking forward to what LaSane described as finally having time to 'relax and actually live.' His death arrived within weeks of the buyout offer landing in her inbox.

'It was a reminder that life is too short to wait for permission,' she said.

Betting on Faith and a Story for Her Kids

LaSane applied for the buyout, was accepted, and left Google for good in October 2025. On LinkedIn, she later summed up the arc of the decision in five short lines: 'The buyout. The burnout. The babies. The business. The grief.'

SHYNE, the coaching company LaSane now runs full-time, describes its method on its website as helping women lead without losing their faith, identity, or wellbeing. The site lists the belief that God wants clients to keep to the status quo as one of the mental blocks it aims to challenge.

Since leaving, LaSane has shifted SHYNE from one-on-one coaching towards workshops and group programmes, though she is not yet drawing a personal salary from the business. A live event last year, Dream Day, brought in about $3,000 (£2,220) in revenue.

LaSane has said she plans to spend at least a year focused on the business before deciding whether to return to a corporate role.

'I thought about the story I wanted to tell my kids,' she said. 'That she took this kind of risk and was willing to bet on herself in this way, that's the story I want them to know.'

Her advice to others weighing the same leap is less about the numbers than about knowing why they are jumping in the first place.

'If you get clear about that, everything else will fall in place,' she said. 'That's what happened for me.'