
The False Choice Between Babies And Startups - jemeshsu
http://blogs.forbes.com/85broads/2011/05/16/the-false-choice-between-babies-and-startups/
======
Vivtek
It's important to realize, all you non-child-having people out there, that
before you actually have a child, there is _no freaking way_ you can estimate
the amount of time and dedication an infant will require of you.

Honestly, I would hesitate to start a startup with _anyone_ about to have
their first child, man or woman, because they cannot possibly know what a
cratering impact it is going to have on every aspect of their lives.

Now, a woman who is already at home with her children and has a couple of
years of experience with it, her I'd trust to juggle. But starting a startup
is already a gigantic change in lifestyle, and so is child care. Starting both
at once is probably not a good idea. My own two bits as work-at-home father of
two.

~~~
martinkallstrom
I started my first company, a web consultancy firm, seven years ago. I also
have a daughter who is seven years old, Linn. I started out of my home office,
which allowed me to spend time with my family while being at work. It was
great but became stressful after 6-12 months because I felt I was at work all
the time except when I left my home. I then moved into a proper office.

I started my second company five years ago. I also have a second daughter who
is five years old, Julia. This company was a much more serious venture. I was
appointed CEO, we were four founders and raised 1M€. We all worked long hours
and had a great time from the start. Now we are ten employees and I'm still
the CEO.

Here are the immediate effects I have seen from starting a new company
simultaneously with getting a kid, twice:

\- You focus on the business model and sales, sales, sales rather than just
cool tech, which is beneficial for everybody involved. However, there is
always room for cool tech as well.

\- You have to push yourself to get to work, and do good stuff everyday.
Because your family depends on it. You don't settle for mediocrity.

\- You get a counter-balance that keeps you in check. Especially when you are
successful with doing something fun it is very easy to burn out. Out of four
founders, two of us have kids while the other two didn't at the time. I'm
sorry to say that those two burned out and left the company, while me and my
other child-bearing co-founder remained.

\- You raise kids that get an entrepreneurial outlook on life. They think it
is natural to have your own company, to be the boss of your own life.

\- If you are blessed with healthy kids, having them is hardest work in the
beginning. Everything gets easier and easier from day one. At least so far.

All in all, I don't regret for a second my choices the past years. Because
what are the alternatives? Not having these awesome kids that now rock my
world? Not having started these awesome companies that have defined a lot of
who I am today? No way.

If you get the opportunity to start a family with someone you love and who
supports you, don't hesitate for a second. If you get the opportunity to start
a company with people you'd love to work with, don't hesitate for a second.

If those two happen to you at the same time? Wow, you are truly blessed with
good fortune! Go kick some major ass!

~~~
junklight
We started our company just after the birth of my second child and then my
daughter was born as we were in the early days. We are pretty much self funded
(we've had some seed funding but not a lot) and it's been a long hard slog but
all that work is now paying off.

I have to agree strongly with:

"You have to push yourself to get to work, and do good stuff everyday. Because
your family depends on it. You don't settle for mediocrity.

\- You get a counter-balance that keeps you in check. Especially when you are
successful with doing something fun it is very easy to burn out. "

and

"You raise kids that get an entrepreneurial outlook on life. They think it is
natural to have your own company, to be the boss of your own life"

made me smile. My daughter, now 5, was trying to sell me her drawings the
other day.

My children are my counterbalance and my drive - there is nothing better than
kicking back and talking nonsense with them or getting involved in their
stuff. There is nothing more important than making sure they are fed and have
a secure future (in which to make their own choices)

I noticed in a recent interview that when Tony Blair was the british PM his
wife expected him to get up in the night to feed the baby still.

One of my girlfriends relatives says "if you want something doing ask a busy
person." and I reckon that is spot on

------
webwright
I don't think anyone ever suggested it was a choice... PG just said he'd be
reluctant to start a startup with a woman who had an infant or was planning to
have a baby soon. That doesn't mean he NEVER would.

But if a potential co-founder said, "I have a hobby I can't give up. It can
cause me to lose sleep for days or weeks on end
([http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sleep-t.htm...](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sleep-t.html)),
cause marital stress, costs a ton of money (about a million bucks over 21
years), is intermittently really loud, and will likely require frequent trips
to the doctor", would you be at all reluctant to team up with that person? I
would. There are all sorts of things that could cause me to want to pair up
with them anyways (lots of money, stay-at-home spouse or in-law, etc), but the
bar would be higher.

A baby isn't startup insta-death-- there are plenty of examples of where it
has worked out just fine. But it's heaping difficulty, stress, and expense on
an already difficult, stressful and expensive exercise.

~~~
mrj
People having babies is kinda important. Strange how difficult modern life is
with children.

------
ivankirigin
As someone who has started a company (one in YC at that) with a 9 month old, I
do think it is a false choice. But the real choice is pretty clear:

    
    
      - don't spend time with your kids
      - don't spend as much time as you could at your company
    

I did the latter, or tried at least. So the time you take out from your
company is serious, but manageable. Kids are very focusing; the time to spend
with them came from other things most people do: tv, video games, socializing,
etc.

My biggest concern with having kids (now a 4 year old and 1 year old) is the
impression I'll leave on employees when I'll be home for dinner but still
probably working later where they can't see. Setting the right tone will be
harder than balancing my schedule for sure. I hope at my next company I'll be
able to create a healthy, family-friendly environment full of people that are
smart and get things done.

What I didn't do was milk being a parent to get press for my startup. I
thought that would be cheap. It would have been trivial considering my
cofounder was also my wife. The story writes itself, but I'm happy I didn't
pursue it.

~~~
jacquesgt
I don't understand your biggest concern. How is it a bad thing that you're
setting the example of making sure you have quality time at dinner with your
family? Especially if you're doing work after you put the kids to bed to make
sure that stuff gets done that needs to get done.

~~~
ivankirigin
Perhaps you've never been at a startup with recent college grads. 10 to
midnight is a common schedule. That kind of work ethic isn't healthy, but
recent college grads don't notice and even seem to enjoy it. What is does
yield? A hell of a lot of code and an obvious boost in absolute productivity.

I would like engineers to work those hours with enthusiasm. My concern is that
this wouldn't happen with a founder that is absent in the middle of their work
day. The solution is to have a cofounder that works those hours, I suppose :)

------
switch
My dad started a company when I was pretty young and I used to see him one
week a month. It's quite naive to think that less time with your kids doesn't
in some way prevent you from being the best possible parent.

Anyone who thinks kids getting less time with their parents is as good or can
somehow be made as good as kids getting a lot of time with their parents is
delusional.

Its a very real choice.

Nowhere in the post do we see any statistics or hard facts on how many
entrepreneurs succeeded in launching a company and making it successful while
being pregnant or while having young kids.

Given that there are fewer women entrepreneurs than men entrepreneurs it would
be a safe assumption that the number of pregnant women entrepreneurs or women
entrepreneurs with young kids would be pretty low.

Besides you can get into evolutionary psychology and then it becomes pretty
obvious that men have a much higher impetus to take big risks than women.

This whole movement towards political correctness has become ridiculous.

How come men don't get to bitch about not being able to have kids? Are we
supposed to pretend that being biologically built to bear kids doesn't in some
way make women predisposed to favor kids over startups?

The choice is very real and it's between raising great kids who get enough
attention from their parents and raising a great company that gets enough
attention from its founders.

Without hard data pointing out how many women started great companies while
also raising kids who didn't turn out to be nutcases the girl's argument is
just wishful thinking.

~~~
HedgeMage
I don't accept your premise -- that work time is, by definition, time away
from one's children.

My son is 8.

His playroom and my office are really one big room, with some furniture
dividing it into separate spaces.

He comes home from school and does his homework at a small table next to my
desk. I help him with it and he "checks up on" my work.

He sometimes tests websites I'm designing to make sure the UI is easy to
understand.

He's done data entry for extra allowance.

He sometimes goes with me to tech conferences, and has even spoken at one.

I work while he's at school, during homework time, and after he's asleep. We
play after homework is done and/or after dinner.

Sometimes he just visits with me while I work, or sets his laptop down next to
mine and we have a mother-son hackfest.

Chores are easier and faster because we do them as a team.

I _do_ enjoy the occasional break when he is at his grandparents' place for a
while, but for the most part we do things together. I'm a single mother, so
there's no one to pick up the slack when I'm "too busy". Also, I've noticed
that I'm _more_ productive when I make time for what's important -- being a
mom.

I can be having an awful day full of interruptions and some seemingly
unfixable bug, then I walk my son home from school and it all changes. For
twenty minutes I turn off my phone, get outside, and walk. By the time I reach
his school I've calmed down. Then we walk home and talk about his day, or the
squirrels, or my neighbor's new flower bed. By the time we get back home I am
surprisingly refreshed. I usually fix the bug in a flash, and have more
patience with nagging clients.

You can talk about evolutionary psychology and your desire for hard data all
you want -- but neither will predict the behavior of an _individual_ , and
most entrepreneurs are outliers in some way or another already. I'd never
suggest that _anybody_ can juggle building a business and child-rearing
without dropping either ball, but clearly _I_ can, so it's not out of the
realm of possibility that someone else can, too.

------
da5e
"To further my ambition, my mother “hacked” the system by using her co-
workers’ address in a more affluent neighborhood to ensure that I received the
best public education possible."

Oops now she would be a criminal for doing that.

------
rimantas
Comments there were interesting but somewhat depressing read. Seems like
startup is still perceived as something where you eat ramen and sleep at work.
Is that really so? Will one really do much better spending 18hours a day on
startup instead of spending 6? Is it completely impossible that switching
tasks and taking care of the baby will provide an opportunity for some insight
(kind of "thinking in the shower")? Pure speculation there, but I'd love to
know what you think.

~~~
userulluipeste
Like Tyrannosaurs said ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2555785> ), it
depends on the nature of the start-up. "thinking in the shower" might work
when it is about finding solutions to problems (although kids are rarely that
demanding as the shower is)! ...but for the technical part, where those
solutions have to be implemented, well, 6 hours per day would be either
"employee thinking" or just a "lucky"/"very well designed" model of
entrepreneurship.

------
dts
I wouldn't hire anybody who put working at a start up ahead of raising a
newborn baby solely on the basis that their bigger sense of priorities is
completely skewed and that they have no sense of accurately judging future
time constraints. Outside of Hacker News you dont have to be mired in a
startup to be happy and you can take time to enjoy the rich experience that is
raising a child even at _gasp_ a less than optimal income.

------
Tyrannosaurs
I think the choice between family (because it's not just children who aren't
compatible with a 18 hour a day 6 day a week work life, partners are likely to
get pretty hacked off with it too) and start ups relies on a particular model
/ vision of what a start up is.

The reality is that it is possible to start a company based on a 5 day a week
40 hour work week and I've seen people do it. Yes, they're probably not the
largest and most aggressive companies but I've seen people build good teams,
good products and go on to make good money while still having plenty of time
with their family.

I don't know anyone who founded a Google or Facebook following this model but
frankly that's not where 99.9999% of start ups are heading regardless of the
founders commitment to them.

I can understand why an investor might be wary about putting money into a
company being founded by someone for whom it wasn't their number one priority
and as an investor you're concern is primarily around getting a return on your
investment but that doesn't start ups can't be done and done well by people
taking a more balanced approach.

------
vnchr
The article is a bunch of conjecture. I don't see the direct correlation
between her mom working her butt off and raising a child not being a conflict
when starting a company.

I generally agree that women can be overachievers to the point that it would
overcome the necessary commitment of birthing and raising a very young child.
But that's not a very relevant argument. And it's not backed up by the
article. One data point? C'mon.

I think the author is actually taking issue with the potential "handicap" of
pregnancy as something uniquely ascribed to women. "Don't call me weak because
I'm a woman and I can get pregnant!"

As a young married man in a startup, I'm scared of my wife becoming
pregnant... I really do want to be a father, but I don't think she and I could
remain fully committed to our current career arcs should we become parents at
this time.

The problem isn't women getting pregnant. The problem is a newborn takes over
part of your life. And that part might be too big for you to also maintain a
commitment to your startup.

------
prodigal_erik
Weird that she repeatedly asserted a lot of determination after reading
Graham's positions, but didn't even try to argue against

> Economically, you can think of a startup as a way to compress your whole
> working life into a few years. Instead of working at a low intensity for
> forty years, you work as hard as you possibly can for four. -
> <http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html>

------
Aloisius
The fact is that I want my co-founders number one priority to be the startup
and the cold hard facts are that that isn't possible for most new/expecting
parents.

If we need to fly to New York or spend a week prepping a deck or taking care
of some emergency, I need to know they can do it on a moment's notice.

Now, maybe this isn't true for some startups, especially if you have a lot of
co-founders, but certainly in 1-3 person startups, there is more work than
there is time in the day and I just don't see how someone who is getting
little to no sleep every night can possibly keep up with it.

------
pitdesi
Totally a false choice... Both FeeFighters founders have had babies in the
past year (with working wives) - but there are certainly compromises to be
made, and it's especially tough at the super-early stage.

There are some issues though - not every startup founder has the ability to
pay for the costs of having a baby and watching it grow up. Nanny's aren't
cheap.

------
bloggergirl
Few enlightened, modern couples believe that the responsibility to care for a
baby falls primarily on the woman. That's because men and women have babies
together.

Women carry babies for a 9-month term, during which time they are - in most
cases - 100% able to work and 'contribute'. Labor takes ~36 hours; it can take
just a few hours for scheduled c-sections. After labor, the baby comes home to
Mom AND Dad.

For the average couple, there's a window of about 2 days in which the woman is
out of commission. (Yes, that's simplifying things.)

A woman is only out of commission if her partner is not able or willing to
help her with the responsibilities of being a parent. That's the only scenario
in which she'd have to choose to be a mom before being a 'career woman'. So
simply help your wives/girlfriends with the baby duties, and no choice will be
required. :)

~~~
zmmmmm
Unfortunately there is a mountain of evidence that suggests that breast
feeding is extremely important for optimizing your baby's chances in life.
It's even been quantified, I think, to about 7 IQ points.

So - sorry, once labor is over the mother's role can not just end and in many
ways it increases dramatically as she will for many weeks be getting extremely
broken sleep (up several times during the night to feed for 30 mins at a time
each at least).

Having said that, I hate it when anybody tells anyone else they can't do
something. As a startup you're going up against huge odds in the first place
and doing something nearly impossible almost by definition. If you're the kind
of person who just gives up when someone tells you something is a bad idea
then you probably ARE the wrong person to do a startup, but it's got nothing
to do with babies.

~~~
HedgeMage
Who says breastfeeding time is unproductive time?

I used to sleep while breastfeeding at night -- plunk the baby on the bed,
stick a nipple in their mouth and doze. When baby grabs at the other one,
switch sides.

During the day, I coded while breastfeeding, or read, or whatever. Hmm... I
wonder if that's why my little guy is such a geek? :P

------
thedufer
Its completely reasonable to rule someone out for funding because they have a
child (although the "woman" thing isn't completely fair). Anything that will
take time from the startup will negatively impact the startup's chance, and
when you don't have a lot to make decisions on, whether there are obvious
distractions is a fair way to make the call.

~~~
alain94040
Reasonable I don't know, illegal I sure hope (but since it's not employment, I
won't hold my breath).

~~~
thedufer
Illegal? Starting a startup is demanding beyond any normal job. If
discriminating based on things that will take time from work becomes illegal,
the industry is done in the US and will move somewhere else. Investors have
little enough information as is. Take any of that away, and they start to
wonder whether investing under those conditions is worth it anymore.

