Do I leave my current job to go it alone?

There was a time when the great Australian dream involved owning a Californian bungalow on aquarter-acre blockbounded by a white picket fence. Now more Australians dream about being a swashbuckling risk taker such as entrepreneurial favourites Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar or Rupert Murdoch.

But is leaving the safety of a paid job your best option for launching the next Atlassian or News Ltd? For many people the answer might be a resounding “no” if you consider some of the facts.

The Bureau of Statistics reports that annual small business failure rates are running at 12.5%. In 2012, a report from Treasury found that more than 30% of nascent firms were terminated within three years of launching.

Given these sobering numbers, perhaps staying in a steady nine-to-five