
How To Do A Startup On The Side And Not Lose Your Family - speric
http://ericfarkas.com/posts/how-to-do-a-startup-on-the-side-and-not-lose-your-family/
======
aculver
Make that N=2. This post is very, very similar to my own experience after
launching my "startup on the side" last year (<http://www.limelightapp.com/>)
and the advice closely parallels what I'd give to others as well.

>> Get your spouse or SO's buy-in. Until that happens, I'd suggest not going
forward.

Agree completely. I think one key to gaining my wife's incredible support was
the understanding we both had that Limelight came after her and the kids. Once
we had that discussion, she _made_ time for me to work on it once the kids
were in bed.

>> Something has to give, and it's usually your hobbies.

I miss Japanese. :-(

~~~
justindz
Do either you or the poster have advice regarding single parenting + full time
job + nights/weekends-style startup? Possible? Was unclear if you were saying
that spouse + support = okay, or just if spouse, then support = okay. Do you
rely on the presence of a spouse who happens to be supporting to be able to
even get the part time priority on the list below the rung to family?

~~~
mattdeboard
I'm a single parent (full & sole custody). You said "single parenting + full
time job + nights/weekends-style startup"... I mean I'm really, really not a
helicopter parent; I have a life apart from raising my kid. That being said I
think a single parent who's working full-time AND doing a "nights/weekends
startup" would wind up short-changing SOMETHING.

I can't imagine there would be any satisfaction to be had in that kind of
stretching.

------
mountaineer
I've been doing side-projects while supporting a family for over 8 years now
and I share a lot of your experiences. One of them led to being acquihired at
a funded startup in the same area. It was a lot easier when there was one kid.
Now with 3, like yourself, I find it's near impossible to get any kind of
consistent focus. However, I know the hours are usually there, so that's my
problem more than anything.

However, I will say this. If you're thinking about starting a startup on the
side, don't. That's my advice, don't do it. If you're a young hacker without
kids, make a full-time go at it. If you've already got kids, save until you
can. While I admire the poster's ability to juggle so many things, this cannot
be maintained for more than a year, maybe two before you will come to resent
one or more of your job, your family, your partners.

If you do go ahead, make office hours and stick to them. That's the only thing
I've ever found to be effective in terms of relieving the need to work on it.

Of course will I take my own advice? Probably not, once you start, it's hard
to stop, the allure is too tempting to scratch an itch, solve a problem, or
learn a new technology. But, don't say I didn't warn you.

~~~
speric
Everyone's different, but I've been doing this particular startup for 2 1/2
years and don't resent anyone yet. I've had times where I felt like burnout
was coming, and when that happens I just take a few days "off" from working on
the startup.

------
elliottcarlson
The most important lesson I learned the hard way was not prioritizing things
correctly. At one point in my relationship I was working obscene hours to get
a project done by a certain deadline. The timeline was completely unreasonable
- and my employer just as much. Sadly, I take my work seriously and will do
anything I can to get things launched on time and this sadly involved plenty
of late nights in the office just to come home and continue to work after
dinner and even pulling an all nighter. This had serious repercussions on my
health, my literal sanity and worst of all on my relationship. I have since
left that job and have learned that prioritizing your life like this article
states is extremely important, and you will be happier staying organized.

------
DigitalSea
I've been doing the same thing for about 5 years now. I think I've somewhat
nailed splitting time between family, friends, employment obligations and
having a life. I get by on 6 hours sleep a night (my body is used to that
amount now, any more and I feel like crap). I stay up late working on my
ideas, get up early working on my ideas, use my laptop on the train commute to
work (35 minutes), use any spare time I can during my lunch break to work on
my projects.

Support of your spouse is a must, no doubt about that. If your spouse see's
all of your time spent on the computer as just that, "being on the computer"
forget about having a startup the support isn't there. I'm fortunate enough to
have a supportive spouse who understands I want to succeed not only for us,
but because I'm tired of making other people money and have untamed
entrepreneurial spirit.

Great article.

------
SABmore
Eric: Thanks for sharing, and great tips. As someone who is in the same boat,
I'm always curious as to how others handle the situation. I'm assuming your
goal is to leverage the success of your startup so that you can leave your day
job? If so, how do you keep focused on your day job, when the excitement of
your startup keeps pulling more at you, especially if you are as you start to
see success? I'm in a day job that I hate (its soul crushing), but that gives
me the flexibility to work on my startup. The allure of my startup is always
calling, but its going to be a while before we see profit, and I've got a wife
and bills waiting for me at home so I do what I can to stay sane. All the
best.

~~~
speric
Growing the startup to the point where I can do it full-time is my ultimate
goal. I'll admit, it's not easy to stay focused at my day-job. It's not easy
to stay focused anywhere for that matter. But I've had to learn to ignore the
voice in my head when it's work/family time. Again, not easy, just one of
those things you have to do. Learn to live with the excitement eating away at
you. My situation is probably similar to yours; my day job, while not in
software development, which I'd prefer, nevertheless gives me a lot of time to
work on my startup, since I work close to home and have basically no commute,
meaning I get home around 5pm everyday.

------
talentchef
As Eric's co-founder, I'm encouraged he put this out there. We have regular
conversations about staying focused and not letting the "what if" scenarios
rule the tasks at hand. I think there is huge value in constrained resources
early in the life of your startup and certainly one of the most scarce is
time. This external time constraint has to focus our efforts for maximum ROI.
Of course this constraint also keeps us agile as we don't have the luxury of
excess anything.

An old, wise chicken restaurant founder (Truett Cathy) said in his book, Eat
More Chicken, Inspire More People, (paraphrasing terribly) "Growing slowly
allows you to grow into your success and your mistakes.". We still dream about
success, about trend lines that go up (and they are), but focusing on the
resources at hand to make that dream a reality has been our key to date. I'd
love for everything to move faster from a growth perspective of course but
keeping priorities straight means speed is exchanged for quality of life,
agile and lean growth, and the unsung hero in the startup world, sanity.

------
Dewitters79
Good to see I'm not alone! I'm 33 with 2 kids, working on
<http://www.koonsolo.com> in my spare time. I have the advantage that my hobby
is my startup: creating games. It's still hard to find the time though. My
advice: get plenty of sleep to stay productive. But with a small baby, even
this is sometimes hard to get.

Best of success to every spare time entrepreneur daddy! :)

~~~
clbrook
...and mommies too!

------
pigs
Nice writeup, but I would think watching Chelsea win the Champions League is
the exact opposite of "an emotionally traumatic experience".

~~~
speric
I was on the edge of my seat for the entire 2nd leg vs. Barcelona, and the
final was draining. It's "how" they won it that was traumatic.

------
emmelaich
Great post. Here's the bit I'd like to emphasise:

> When you're with your family or friends, "be there" mentally

You know those ads for laptops with the perfect family plus dog on the beach
or at the park, with one of the parents using a laptop? What a horrible lie.
Never do that.

It says to your kids/spouse that even when you're _there_ you're _not_ there.

------
acconrad
Talk about hitting home. This was me a year ago, except my girlfriend (who I
then planned to marry) broke up with me.

> "By far the biggest win in my situation is the support of my wife. She not
> only tolerates my involvement in a startup, she actively supports me and
> roots for me. She wants to see us succeed."

Truer words have never been spoken. You don't lose your family by equal parts
self-discipline but ALSO having a spouse that supports and tolerates that kind
of craziness. It makes sense why doctors marry doctors, lawyers marry lawyers,
PhDs marry PhDs...cause someone working the 9 to 5 cannot appreciate, nor
empathize, with the other person's extended (and often erratic) working
schedule. They'll feel neglected since they have more free time, and it will
be tough to relate and feel appreciated. This I know first hand.

------
ahmadss
The one thing you mentioned in your post but, in my opinion, didn't emphasize
enough, is the fact that you have a co-founder helping you with this.

I've found that it's a much easier sell a side project to the family when you
have a team mate believing in this idea and willing to work at it with you.
That early "validation" goes a long way in justifying time away from the
family to spend hacking/coding/selling.

~~~
speric
Fair point.

------
AznHisoka
Where do friends fit in? You seem to think that they are expendable since you
don't see those Saturday soccer mornings as particularly important.

~~~
speric
Friends are certainly not expendable but the reality is, there's just not a
lot of time for them during the week. But I don't think this is a "startup on
the side" thing; most of my friends who are married with kids don't hang out
much anyway. In my particular situation, Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons
and evenings are usually when we'll hang out with other families. But again, I
think that's more a function of having young kids than of doing a startup.

~~~
AznHisoka
Yeah I hear ya.

Funny thing is as I get older and most my friends start having families, I end
up losing friends. Being single sucks because they rather also hang out with
other families too.

------
ams6110
_Get your spouse or SO's buy-in._

The challenge here is does SO really understand a priori what [s]he is buying
into.

~~~
a5seo
I agree-- the ways it affects your SO's life is impossible to understand.

I started a bootstrap startup on the side while married (but before kids)
which I eventually sold. Not a huge exit, but we don't have to worry about
money anymore.

Here's what I can tell a spouse:

\- Prepare for your startup spouse (SS) to be mentally distracted pretty much
all the time (even when they're just hanging out with the kids).

\- Expect your SS to be really tired. They'll probably try to steal time for
their startup by sacrificing sleep. They'll need understanding and kindness
when they drag their ass out of bed on under 5 hrs of sleep.

\- Expect your SS to be more excited about taking a stay-cation to code than
traveling thousands of miles to go on vacation with the in-laws.

\- Once your SS has customers or employees, you probably will not have a true
"no devices" vacation for 7-10 years.

\- Don't pressure SS to get a partner; if they don't already have a partner,
recruiting one likely will NOT relieve their workload and allow them to focus
on you more. Also, don't expect SS to see value in partnering, since the other
person may or may not be good, and could very well create more stress and
pressure (not to mention dilute your upside and introduce conflicts over
vision/direction).

\- Expect NOT to go bed at the same time as your SS.

\- Expect NOT to watch the same TV shows (if any) as your SS; once the kids
are down, SS will be coding.

\- Expect your SS to be really bad remembering details about what's going on
with the kids, house, pets, etc. Just remember, they aren't that way because
they don't care, they just can't keep those details in their head. You'll need
to be the czar of that stuff (or have VERY clear delineation of
responsibility).

\- Expect to need to plan date nights. I'd recommend buying a bottle of wine
and not feeling bad about have a few glasses if that's what it takes to get SS
to relax and forget about their project. In general, plan activities that
don't let SS get bored-- otherwise you'll be hanging out with someone whose
mind has drifted off in thought.

\- If all goes well, SS may be able to quit their job, be master of his/her
own destiny, and maybe even sell the business and walk away finally
independent.

\- Understand the upside will most likely be some payout between $1 and $10M
which really won't change your lifestyle, but will make you very wealthy with
time and options, which honestly, f---ing rocks.

------
flojito
My 2 cents: I just spend 7 hours working each day (5 off 7). The remaining
time I just live! Having fun with my 2 kids: reading, playing, practising
martial arts. To sum up: enjoying the life, it's too wonderful to spend it
working :-)

------
gawker
Thanks for sharing. I appreciate the part about providing for family. It's
never easy when you have other people who depend on you and so it's comforting
to hear of others who are in a similar situation.

------
tevih
These are things everybody here knows. It just helps to read, and reread it,
to keep us focused, and get the support from the community, knowing we all
have to squeeze 37 hour days into a measly 24.

------
andreer
It seems amazing what you can find time for, I'm inspired. I'd be very curious
to see it quantified in a schedule of your typical (or any) week, to see how
it all fits together.

~~~
speric
There's no typical week; I try to be as flexible as possible. Maybe in a
future post I can just detail the last week. Great idea.

------
hilti
Great Post!

To me, the toughest part is to focus on an idea, because the internet is full
of inspiration.

------
mxu
It feels good to know my situation is not unique. Thanks for sharing!

------
j45
Thanks for sharing. There is more than one path.

------
abcd_f
What's an "elder?"

~~~
pnathan
In the context he used it in, an lay office of a Protestant church. They
typically serve as advisors/leaders/mentors.

Usually they seem to be middle-aged or older, IME.

~~~
jsprinkles
Elder has different meanings in different denominations, and isn't unique to
Protestants (it is, however, mostly Christian). Specifically, in the Mormon
church, it's quite different.

------
elchief
Up-vote, purely for not misspelling "Lose".

------
ogd
someone on HN believes in God? No judgments, I just thought hacker and atheist
were deeply intertwined. Perhaps I just picked up the wrong impression from
Reddit.

~~~
SimHacker
Usually hackers are very good at logic, which precludes believing the self-
contradictory bible and religious dogma, but some people are very good at
compartmentalizing their brains and avoiding applying logic to some parts of
their lives, apparently.

~~~
dpiers
Belief in a higher power is not completely illogical. I build/design things,
and take apart and analyze other people's designs. Looking at the universe,
from the smallest particles to the largest galaxies, I see a beautifully
complex system of interdependent cogs that mesh together perfectly to enable
life to exist.

I have yet to come across an intricate system that did not have a designer,
and it would be illogical for me to believe the universe _just exists_.

~~~
SimHacker
There's a huge difference between a tentative belief in a vaguely defined
"higher power", and a confident belief in a well defined organized religious
dogma or bible full of self-contradictions and logical impossibilities. Faith
in beliefs that are provably wrong is illogical (but EXTREMELY common), and
that's the basis of organized religion, which presumes to provide you with all
the answers to questions that don't even make sense to ask. Organized
religions are afraid to say "I don't know" and simply lie instead.

Most programmers should be smart and logical enough to reject that kind of
bullshit, but my point is that some have their minds so compartmentalized that
they fall for it hook line and sinker.

Everyone was shocked that Brendan Eich turned out to be a religiously
motivated homophobe. He may be able to think logically about algorithms and
programming language design, but his thought process about ethics and human
rights is so illogical, severely flawed and compartmentalized that he's afraid
to discuss it in public. That kind of religiously motivated irrationality is
detrimental to a start-up, high tech company or open source project that needs
to attract the best people regardless of their sexual preference, race, sex,
etc.

~~~
crusso
As an atheist, I just don't see the point in picking a religious fight and
insulting people for their religious beliefs in a thread about managing a
personal life while also creating a startup.

~~~
j45
Well said crusso, I'm not sure of the point of militant secularism either. How
the hell does it have to do with startups?

Bringing it back to discussion and finding relevance..

It's fine and wonderful to have different points of view to be able to discuss
and learn from... but when one brings a "you are a _____ so i think everything
you say is ____", it seems as presumptuous and blind as the blindness being
pointed out.

It just reeks of the kind of closemindedness no one likes to see or put anyone
through, and is frankly kind of embarrassing to have to read through. Respect
as a currency gets so much further, no matter what the subject is.

~~~
tevih
Militant secularism is it's own belief system. They're as pushy about their
beliefs as the well-dressed folks who knock on my door with "information"
pamphlets...

