Of all the things that might happen, much as we'd like it to be different, I can guarantee that this is one which won't happen.
However upsetting it may be now (or looking back in the future), time isn't going to wait for you and all those firsts, all those events and experiences you miss, won't wait and won't happen again.
We tell ourselves it isn't a choice but for many of us it is. Most of us could earn enough money to support our family comfortably in a relatively regular 9 - 5 job. We might not be personally as satisfied and we might not be as financially well off, but we can choose one possible version of our life over another.
It's absolutely fair to say that you have to balance the needs of being a "good" father (which let's remember is a subjective term in many ways), against your own personal needs (and indeed the needs of your partner, the rest of your family and so on), but most people reading this board are fortunate enough that there genuinely is an element of choice.
No-one should tell you that working long hours so your child need never go without (or so you're personally happy and the time you spend with them you do so without resentment) is better or worse than coaching their sports team and being there every bath time, but whatever you decide to do, I think the most important thing is to accept that you're doing it because you made a conscious decision - ultimately that's going to be the only way you'll be at peace with it.
And if you haven't made a conscious decision, the for heavens' sake sit down with your other half and do so. Of all the outcomes, doing what you're doing without thinking about what you want and what works best for your family maybe the only truly bad one.
Couldn't agree more. The post is very well written and reads like a poem, but the message is terrible on all counts. It sounds like a soldier being forced to go to battle crying for the family he leaves behind, where in fact it's entirely his own choices. And if it's some sort of an internal torment, being torn between two passions that conflict with one another, then I would suggest he gets a grip and decide which sacrifices he wants to make and which he doesn't and find the right balance.
It's probably my first negative comment on HN, but as a new father of a 6 months son, and a co-founder of a startup, this just irritates me. I spend 2-3 days per week working from home, being able to take a lunch break with my wife, or change nappies for my son or feed him in the morning before hacking away. I catch up later at night when he sleeps, but generally manage my time well between those two. I'm not a perfect father and not the most successful entrepreneur, but these are the choices I made and the challenges I face. I think it's important for my son that I'm going to be around, but also that he has a father that is proud of his work and enjoys what he does.
I share this sentiment. The author needs to consider which thing will cause him more regret in the long term--working a more normal schedule and potentially missing out on whatever rewards living the startup life may give him, or definitely missing out on his daughter's childhood.
For me it would be (and is--I have two sons) a no-brainer. I actually am working at a start-up, but it's one that places a high value on work-life balance so I never feel that I have to work outside of 9-5. I have cracked open the laptop on the occasional evening just because I enjoy what I'm working on, but I definitely wouldn't want to miss this period of my kids' lives for anything. They're only this young once.
> The author needs to consider which thing will cause him more regret in the long term--working a more normal schedule and potentially missing out on whatever rewards living the startup life may give him, or definitely missing out on his daughter's childhood.
Given the psychology studies on creativity and productivity given the mythical man hour, it's not much of a choice.
Beyond that, missing his daughter's life and working many hours, sleeping less will ultimately lead to a shorter life due to the physiological effects.
Absolutely agreed -- I actually find this poem entirely nauseating, probably because it reminds me of my own father: he repeatedly made absolutely terrible choices and then would try to make up for it with occasional blubbering displays of emotion in which he would beg for forgiveness. Again, I'm surely projecting, but I can just clearly see his older daughter's reaction to this: "Dad, get a grip -- and please just choose to show up to my volleyball game next time."
Like many here, I have aspirations of starting a company one day. At one point about 5 years ago, I tried and failed to start a company with a colleague, then tried and failed to start consulting. I hope to try again on one or both of those in the future.
But in the meantime, I have a daughter due in a few months and I know that the most important things for her are that I have a steady income and that I be around for her and my wife as much as I can. Being a (new) entrepreneur allows neither of those things. Maybe when she's a bit older I can think about striking out on my own, but for now it would be selfish to do so.
It's self-serving to set up a schedule like the OP did, then complain that you don't have enough time to spend with your family. You have no one to blame but yourself; we in the tech industry have the luxury right now to have a large demand for our labour for wages well above the median. Most people in the world can't say that and have to make compromises. We don't. To make compromises anyway is to play the martyr card.
If, as a technologist, you don't get a chance to see your daughter, it's because you prioritized something else over her.
You're reading the poem too literally if you think it endorses the idea of sacrificing parenting for your startup. The power of the piece is how viscerally it captures the price of that sacrifice without being preachy or whiny like so many blog posts on the subject.
Agreed. Sometimes it gets away from people that when you decide to get married and then later have children, those get ascribed the highest priorities ahead of anything else.
I would agree with this. People have a way of heavily discounting the present in favor of the uncertain future. It becomes a habit, almost an addiction, to medicate feelings in the present (FUD - perhaps their anxiety over being a parent, even). A friend of mine uses the term "future tripping" - I like it.
I will give this guy a lot of credit for honesty. It's tempting to pretend that starting a company is something you are doing solely to provide a better life for others, when the truth is it is just as often, if not more so, for the self-actualization need of the founder.
From the wife/kid's perspective - they want you to be happy, but they also want you to be present and engaged. From that perspective, what you do to make the money isn't so important as the fact that you can provide, and be part of the fun.
"believing that this is the great sacrifice I must make, the choice I took upon myself for the betterment of the family, for you, but I know that’s not entirely true A little or a lot, it’s for me This addiction or obsession I seem to have with work"
"I want to say, in all seriousness, that a great deal of harm is being done in the modern world by belief in the virtuousness of work, and that the road to happiness and prosperity lies in an organized diminution of work."
I don't know if the OP is still contracting but if he is, something like Brennan Dunn's "Double Your Freelancing Rate" could help with working less on more interesting / higher paid projects - http://doubleyourfreelancingrate.com
Wow. I just read the first link "In Praise of Idleness" and I have to say it completely turned my thoughts on work around. I had no idea how fundamentally the work culture has influenced me.
From the wife/kid's perspective - they want you to be happy, but they also want you to be present and engaged.
From my own experiences - obviously your mileage may vary - but your family (and especially your wife if you have young kids!) needs you to be present and engaged.
Yes, as others have said, PG has said that you could compress your working life into a few years but what if you're holding a losing lotto ticket at the end of the day? Because you are gambling with your time.
We all make compromises and sacrifices with our lives - and we all have to live with those choices. Whether these are "right" or "wrong" is really for the individual to decide.
> We tell ourselves it isn't a choice but for many of us it is. Most of us could earn enough money to support our family comfortably in a relatively regular 9 - 5 job. We might not be personally as satisfied and we might not be as financially well off, but we can choose one possible version of our life over another.
I'm currently in the 9-5 job and maybe I'm just a whiner, but I feel the same as this guy. I hate the commute through rush hour traffic that I am required by the time window to make. I hate that once I get to the office I sit in a 8'x8' cube, with two 8'x4' desks taking up 50% of the space. I hate that I've just been reassigned to a new cube, same size, same desks, but now with a structural 4x4 pillar taking up another 25% and my back to the "door".
I hate that I spend all day patching the same kinds of holes again and again without the authority to fix the root problems. I hate that I have no real ability to influence the direction of my organization. Without agency it become very difficult to keep caring about the product. I hate that nobody else cares either. I work purely to support my family. That is the only reason. I used to love writing software, and I still do, but I hate my job. I hate that I feel like everything that makes me who I am is being slowly ground away into nothing.
I get home with time for the kids but I have nothing left. My mental tank is completely empty. I almost can't get up in the mornings, I don't want to get up. If it wasn't for my wife and kids I wouldn't get up. Somehow this wonderful, exciting process of solving problems and finding solutions to people's needs has turned into torture. I'm on a sinking ship and am too burdened with responsibility to jump off. So I'm frantically trying in my spare time to build a raft so I can find my own island. I feel like I'm racing against time. I have to finish the raft before I have a mental break and land my family on welfare and me on a psychologist's couch.
There are great things about my job, those benefits that you mention: 40 hours a week (well, 50 including the commute), an above-average salary (my wife can spend her quality time teaching and raising our kids), job security (we've been planning to end-of-life the product for longer than I've been here), a reasonable boss (who is just as powerless to change things as I am).
I guess I'm not really disagreeing with you, just sharing an admittedly depressed view from the other side. We do have a choice, and right now my choice is to pull late nights after the kids go to bed. I'm scrambling to create my own software that I can sell so I don't have to go to this 9-5 which you advocate for OP.
Maybe that's something that could actually help. You sound like you're suffering from depression and it's a difficult cycle to get out of (for those that are blessed to be able to).
Maybe this is superficial but here's a few suggestions that improved my outlook on life when I was in a similar situation:
- I chose to drive an alternate route to work that was longer, but involved a more scenic trip. I began to appreciate it more.
- I started podcasting extensively (I use Downcast on IOS and listen at 1.5x speed). Story-based podcasts were helpful - The Moth, This American Life, Planet Money, Freakonomics, The Truth, etc.
- Audiobooks can be very distracting for commutes. My local library had a good selection and Audible/Audiobooks.com aren't that expensive.
- I went to the local thrift store and bought some desk lamps. They were gaudy but fun. I put two in my cube.
- I hung Christmas lights in my cube.
- I went to Big Box Hardware store and bought a small area run and put it at the cube entrance.
- I bought a round convex mirror on Amazon and hung it behind my monitors so I could see the cube door.
Those simple things made my work environment much better ( I still wanted to leave, true, but it helped). Maybe that can make your life slightly better too.
Having a job you hate is not beneficial to you or your family in the long run, other than keeping food on the table. You don't want to look around the day your kids leave the house and feel like you have lost yourself completely, and no one in your family wants to see that either.
Have you started to look for other work? It's not easy to throw a job search on top of everything else on your plate, but if it gives you some of your own life back, it could be well worthwhile.
I have a 3-year-old son, and it's been an interesting ride. This year was supposed to be more relaxing because we got into a better living situation, but then my wife was getting bored staying at home every day. So she got a really interesting job, but the job ended up being way more involved than either of us expected. So our schedules are pretty hectic, but it's worth it to see her mentally stimulated and avoiding the professional detachment that can come from stay-at-home-parenting.
I have some really interesting personal projects going, which have been affected by family stuff. I have responded by stretching out the timeframe on these projects. That is better than giving up these projects entirely, and it is way better than ignoring my family in order to finish the projects.
If you limit yourself to one or two kids, your kids will be grown up and out of the house in no time, and you'll never get that time back with them. "Out of the house" doesn't mean 18 and living somewhere else, it can mean 6 and in school most of the day, or 12 and in all kinds of activities all the time. Those early years are prime family time; I hope everyone is able to let themselves enjoy that period of life.
I agree, and I've done that. In the last 5 years I have been at 4 different jobs. Life-work balance, technical competence, and competitive compensation, choose two. That about sums up my experience in that timeframe. I've only been in my current position for 8 months, so on the one hand I feel like I shouldn't bail this quickly. On the other hand, man have things changed from the impression I had when I started.
I have looked at other jobs, and I'm thinking about picking up the search again, especially given the volume of mail I get from recruiters. Basically though I have given up on finding a job that matches what I want out of life. I feel a bit ungrateful because there is so much opportunity out there. People with our skills are in high demand. But after the last few years I have decided that the only reliable way to find a company that values what I value is to create it myself.
I don't think you're a whiner - my position is not that dissimilar.
Both sides of the decision likely involve compromise. The idea that being a more involved parent is without downside is sadly not true for most people.
The only thing I would say is that there are jobs that allow a work life balance which aren't totally soul destroying - something between your current hell and the 12 hour a day start up culture. Maybe it's time to start looking for something which may not be your perfect job, but might be a little better.
Thanks, you actually reminded me why I am doing this. I'm working harder than I've ever worked, but the influence and autonomy that I have over my side of the business and the rapid changes I am a part of beats a 9-5 in many ways. I have also just worked out I might be working more hours in this startup, but I spend the same amount of time away from home as I did in my 9-5.
There is a spectra of 9-5 jobs. Some suck a lot, some suck a lot less. You don't have to pick between only the job you have right now or startups; there are more choices than that.
Essentially what I am saying is, it might be time for you to look for a different 9-5 job.
easy solution. just keep jumping from company to company every few years and you'll never settle into something that you hate, be placed in progressively more senior roles, get paid more and still be able to do the 9-5.
I work in a rapid growing startup that requires more than 8 hours a day and I have two young children. My priorities are
1 - Children 2 - Marriage 3 - Living arrangements / lifestyle (sans work) 4 - Career (but I take my career VERY seriously, I've been an executive for 9 years and I'm 33)
My routine
1 - Alarm goes off at 4:30 am 2 - I pickup around the house, toss in laundry as needed 3 - Catch the 5:45 am train to be into the office roughly @ 6:15 am 4 - I leave the office @ 5:30 pm to catch the 5:50 pm train to be home roughly @ 6:15 pm 5 - I play with the kids 6 - We then eat dinner together as a family 7 - I bathe and put both kids to bed around 7:30 - 8:00 pm 8 - I help pick up the rest of my house with my wife, it usually ends @ 8:30 pm (we talk a lot while doing this) 9 - My wife and I sit down on the couch/porch/etc and hang out for a few hours while I also work 10 - I'm usually in bed by 11 - 11:30 pm
If I have more work to do that evening I might have my laptop out while hanging out with my wife or stay up later. This is usually 4 nights out of the week.
Things that shift to "once in a while" given my priorities
1 - A full 8 hours of sleep 2 - Seeing that television show 3 - Seeing that movie 4 - Random nights out with friends 5 - Etc
These simply just take a back seat.
Things I never miss, and spend as much time with as someone working a standard 9-5 (although I do head into the office earlier than most)
1 - My kids (first and foremost) 2 - My wife 3 - My house 4 - My career and type of company I appreciate being involved with
To me, I keep the things that matter most and give up things that I found out I didn't really need (for context, I never really watched a lot of television).
This schedule works for me and I end up working 10 hours a day and never miss a beat with my kids.
PS. I also about twice a day, for 5 minutes, FaceTime with my wife/kids while at work. It's a nice break and a chance for me to see them during the day given I miss them in the morning.
I made a poor choice when my kids were young. I got so used to not being there, working full time while going to school, that, when school ended, I didn't stop "not being there". Whether it was working late hours or traveling a lot, I missed a lot, and I do regret it.
My kids are all teens moving into 20s now. I work a job whose primary feature is working at home (the job is fine, but I do it to be home) so I can soak up some last time with them before they are out of the house. I now get to hear about crushes and new-found independence.
But, if I could do it again, I wouldn't make the mistake. There is time for all the things after your kids are older. If you are in a situation where you have to be gone to provide a roof, and there is no other way, have no guilt; but if you have the option, your future self and your kids will thank you for being there.
There is no amount of money that can make up for missing dinner times, bed times, play times and even bad times that you experience with your kids.
Don't fool yourself into thinking "once I get this right, I'll have all the time in the world to spend with my kids". This will never happen, and if it does it will be too late to form that close bond, and share your life with your kids.
I'm in to work (my own business) at 7:30, leave by 5 at the latest and make sure to drop all my stress/anxieties at the door. I have weekends off, and rarely miss events or chances to ditch work and support my two girls.
Agreed 100%. My little girl is almost 2 and I while I can't say I've been there for every moment, she has been my priority #1. There are too many precious moments and missing just one of them is an awful feeling.
To each their own, but I would never sacrifice a moment with my daughter unless is was absolutely necessary. As contrary as it might seem to people in the startup bubble, the importance placed on most day-to-day work is an illusion.
Pop the bubble and hug your kids. In the long run, that relationship will mean much, much more to you.
If you can drop the stress at the office after 5PM, I think you should be feel blessed and I'm very happy for you.
I generally try to not miss dinner, but I have a rule that I go by, which is I never ask my colleagues to do what I was not willing to do myself.
Even if I spend all the time with my daughter, I never think it's enough. This was written when I made a decision to do both: be the best father I could and be the best professional at my job; when I did that, the only solution was to cut down on my sleeping time.
It was taxing on my body and one night on the way back on the train, I wrote this piece thinking about my daughter. I shared it because I didn't think I was the only one riding that home-bound train. I've been receiving personal messages telling me how much they appreciated me putting their feelings into words. That's when I knew I was definitely not riding that train by myself.
By the way, I left work early yesterday to take my daughter to the park yesterday. She was quite happy :)
Do you feel like your colleagues secretly look down on you because of this? I work with all single, younger folks, and while they're always supportive, I can't help but feel like I'm seen as not pulling my wait. Almost certainly a projection on my part, but I'm curious if others with strong family priorities feel the same.
When I had a kid, I worried what the other individuals at my level would think when I started taking vacation regularly, and paired my work day down to 8-5. I know that one, who I used to work incredibly closely with, looks down on my hours now, and believes that there is no way that I can still be productive in 8 hours instead of the 12 he pulls every day.
After a bit, though, I realized that co-workers' opinions only matters as long as I'm at my current job, and that I can replace them at a moments notice, whereas it's harder (and costlier) to replace my partner and kids.
Priorities realigned, I know my work output, my superiors know my work output, the rest be damned.
Very well said. Realizing you can't please everyone has been very freeing. You have to decide who's opinions matter to you and who's, frankly, just don't. If your co-workers are going to be bitter that you don't constantly put in absurd hours, maybe their opinion shouldn't be important to you.
I think it depends on where you work. I work for a large corporation and don't find it troubling even to leave around 4:30, although I'm known to be the first in the office usually around 7.
I do sometimes feel the pressure to get stuff done so I work from home after the kids are asleep, but it's difficult (and hard on a marital relationship) to get in more than an hour of extra time for this every evening.
I've come to the conclusion that:
a) When I go home, I go home. I try very hard to drop everything at work and not worry about it until the morning.
b) I love having the time with my family. I want more of it, and want to eliminate my commute. I'm looking into freelancing and remote work as a possible route, although competition is fierce and I need to put food on the table. My research is telling me that I need to bolster my resume with skills (from what I've seen, bigco work doesn't align well with freelancing & remote work teams, although I would be ecstatic to be wrong), and I don't know if I have the time to do this. It's a chicken & egg problem, and I may not solve this without herculean effort.
I own my own business, and work with my wife who also shares the same feelings about work/life balance. I work for other business owners and while many boast/brag about the hours they work, the wise ones who have kids tend to agree with me (even if they don't practice it themselves).
I rarely have a client demand my time in the evening/night or weekend. If I do I usually try to accommodate (the life of client work!) but don't make it a habit.
I do think you are projecting, although if you co-workers have issues with you clocking out "early" it's completely on their end. If you spend the day chit-chatting and clock out early, you may not be leaving the right impression. But if you clock in, kick ass and go home at a reasonable time I can't see anyone having issues. It's also good to explain to people why you have to leave at 5 or earlier, so they know you're not just looking to skip out, but rather you value your home life enough that you don't want it compromised by your work.
Not being at work is understandable and mentally filtered out. Nobody really cares if you're sick or your kid is sick, or you're on vacation, either way you're not there.
When you're present, people DO notice who spends two hours a day talking about golf or football or facebook or talking on the phone. Don't be that guy. Work at work, play at home, and you'll appear (and be) much more productive for 8 hours than the guy who works 6 hours and plays 6 hours while physically in the office for 12 each day.
Abstractly, someone home with a sick kid is probably sitting in the same room with the kid and occasionally nursing the kid while spending most of the time playing minecraft or Eve or posting on HN or whatever. But what people actually remember is the guy who spent his entire afternoon birthday party shopping on amazon, or the guy who spent 2 hours talking about the superbowl or game of thrones, because they saw that with their own eyes.
A secret "hack" I've done over a decade is when the kids are playing at the playground by themselves and most of the parents are looking at twitter on their phones or reading romance novels, I have some pragprog or oreilly book either dead tree or ebook form. From the kids point of view "Dad took us to chuck e cheese" or whatever, but out of an hours time I get 15 or more minutes of serious study. I'm taking off and going to a little league game on friday afternoon/evening, and I'll pay attention while he's in the field or at bat, but when he's merely sitting on the bench waiting, rather than checking out some of the moms or staring off into space or whatever, I'll read or study something "useful". There's a lot of downtime during "family time". If we're driving somewhere to do something as a family, and my wife is driving, I'll read something.
It seems the parents that don't spend time with their kids, end up HAVING to spend time with their kids later in life with many issues that could have been corrected easier when they were younger.
A ham-fisted example: stealing a pack of gum vs. stealing a car.
I guess the workaholics I see, end up having this happen with themselves.
Thanks for sharing. I don't think you need a wife and kids to have this outlook on work. If you have a family (mom, dad, uncles, aunts etc.), or friends or even a hobby, balancing those with work is key, and unlike your job/startup those "people" in your life will be around a lot longer and will enrich your life more.
There is no rule that people working at startups need to work more hours than anybody else for the startup to 'be real'. Do yourself a favor and close up shop at 6 and have dinner with your family. Your weekly productivity will go up as your 'restless soul' finds the peace it needs. Your happiness levels will go up and your effective productivity will follow suit.
I've worked in two early stage start-ups since I became a dad a few years ago, as employee 1 and 2. I do a few things to help me stay involved as a father:
1. Unless there's a real emergency, which is rare, I leave the office around 6-7, even if I still have work planned for today. It's not really early but it leaves me a couple of hours with my kids (I live really close to work, like a 10 minute motorcycle ride).
2. If I still have urgent work to complete, I just continue work from home after they are in bed and I've spent some time with my wife. If you have to work late, this makes for more productive midnight-crunching, because you're at home with your family, you've eaten a proper dinner and not some pizza, had a shower, etc.
3. Once a week I leave work early (around 4pm) and pick my kids up from day care, and I dedicate my entire afternoon to having fun with them. Of course not every early stage start-up would agree to that, but luckily both my last employers were start-ups founded by young dads as well, and they were understanding, and do this themselves as well.
6-7pm seems very late to me, but I guess it depends what time you start at, and what time your kids go to sleep at. That wouldn't leave me much time with my kids. I usually stop work around 4:30 in order to have enough time with the kids before bedtime.
I'm the same way (leave around 4:30). For awhile in my career I was coming home around 7, and my wife still reminds me about it from time to time, and is thankful I come home earlier now.
I'll be a father in a couple of weeks but I've been working on a "life/work balance" for quite a while now. If it ever comes up with a client I remind them that we're running a marathon, not a sprint, and that putting in a solid 8 (or 9), consistently, week in and week out can get a tremendous amount of work done. It's really easy to work too much and burn out, even if you have a lot of experience -- and 40 hours per week is a huge amount of time if you're making every hour count.
Kudos for making extra time for your kids. I plan on doing the same.
On down side though, time is one thing, what you make of it is another. It's hard to make an instant switch from thinking about that annoying bug or tough to crack algorithm, to playing with a toddler. I often find myself staring into thin air while they are talking to me, caught in a hard problem bothering me.
Tho mine wasn't a "startup", I started a web design and hosting business when my son was 2, I worked ALL the time for a good year or 2. I had the luxury of working from home so I didn't really miss big moments, but I did put a serious strain on the relationships between myself and my family. I was even glued to hosting issues when we were on vacations, sitting at my laptop a couple hours a day.
If I could go back, I would definitely give myself 8-10 hours a day max, be home and present with my family by 6. On days where I needed more time, I should have woken up at 5.
I added probably 6 hours a day, 5 days a week, to be more productive back then, but knowing I had those hours, I probably slowed down 2 extra hours a day, and those extra six hours were tired hours, so I was probably only productive for about 3 of them.
The way I look at it, I probably maybe gained an extra week of work time a month back then, and every project I was working on I could have EASILY asked for 1 more week to finish.
Anyway, regret sucks, and looking back, I should have worked smarter and not harder.
As a parent (of now a teenager who is barreling towards college) - I would advise to work a lot, but work will always be there. Your kids will not. Your life should be what you do when you are not working - not the other way around.
Many years ago, I was working 80+ hour weeks, week after week, and my daughter was very young. Consistently, I would not even SEE her from Thursday morning until Saturday afternoon.
I burned out on that job. I felt shell-shocked. I went to dinner with my wife and realized that we had grown apart. I hated that. I hated missing my daughter growing up.
I hated that my daily thoughts were about work, what was happening with work, and that my interactions with my coworkers had overridden my interaction with my family.
So I decided that my life would revolve around my family, and who I was outside of work, not the other way around. Over the years I have changed jobs, started companies, had wild success, had some failures, but through it all I felt even-keel because it all felt like my LIFE was the same. The cubicles, the coworkers, the employees, those all change but my wife and daughter, the life we share, that has been constant. I actually don't feel like I've changed jobs at all even though in reality I've worked at about 6 different places and started 2 companies.
Don't think that work and success will make it alright in the end. It won't. Don't believe people who think you are slacking because you aren't working 100 hours a week. Those people aren't executing efficiently. I can promise you this is true because I have left a trail of Type A 'go-go-go' personalities in my wake because they couldn't match my output and drive, even though they were burning midnight oil and I was at home watching Jeopardy! with the fam.
I guess what I'm trying to say is don't listen to all of those people who are making horrible mistakes. Work hard, but read 'The Power of Full Engagement' by Tony Shwartz and realize that you can work like mad and relax and you will beat the crap out of everyone around you.
No one's tombstone says "Devoted Employee". I realized when my daughter was born that I don't have to achieve anything in this world other than to make her life wonderful. Me being there is part of that. I have also realized as I've grown older that we are all just going to die. I had focused for a long time on establishing myself, on building something, on achieving some financial or personal goal, and then it all hit me that it really won't matter. The thing I really need to focus on is enjoying every moment of my life before it is over. And being with my family is the most enjoyment I ever feel. Now, obviously everyone doesn't feel the same way or have the same priorities and I'm not telling anyone how they need to feel, but personally this realization has lifted a weight off of my shoulders and caused me to enjoy life more and more every day.
Edit: That being said...I usually make sure to leave work at 5, and if I still feel like I need to do some more, I wait until I put my daughter to bed to fire up the laptop.
As a contractor who's interested in startups and who has a 6 month daughter, I can certainly empathize. Throughout all of my crazy ideas, side projects, contracts in different timezones, bits of overtime, all of it, I've constantly kept a check on myself that I don't spend too much time away from my family. I decided not to pursue a potential CTO position at a promising startup because it might have required me to work abroad for months at a time.
One of the things that has influenced me here was an article that did the rounds a few years ago. I think it was this one, "Top five regrets of the dying" [1]:
"2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship."
Do not miss your kids growing up, you might regret it forever.
Your situation is mine exactly. I founded 2 startups, one died - one is going strong, but I left to create a better balance. The "regrets of the dying" was the exact article that made me re-shape everything. I've even turned down some VPE/CTO roles to avoid the endless barrage of work.
I think Paul Graham summed up the situation fairly well when he wrote:
"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. This pays especially well in technology, where you earn a premium for working fast."
and this:
"Combine all these multipliers, and I'm claiming you could be 36 times more productive than you're expected to be in a random corporate job."
and the reasons why we might want to do a startup:
"For example, one way to make a million dollars would be to work for the Post Office your whole life, and save every penny of your salary. Imagine the stress of working for the Post Office for fifty years. In a startup you compress all this stress into three or four years. You do tend to get a certain bulk discount if you buy the economy-size pain, but you can't evade the fundamental conservation law. If starting a startup were easy, everyone would do it."
That essay can be read both as an inspiration and as a warning. On the positive side, it is good to realize how much you can achieve in a few short years. On the negative side, you must be wholly focused on one thing during those few short years. The rest of your life needs to put on hold.
A personal anecdote: I am a bit of a news junkie, and I typically spend an hour or two a day reading the news, but when I had my own startup, I gave up reading the news. For the years 2003 to 2004, and for most of 2006, I rarely read the news. That was a huge change of personal habits for me. But avoiding the news was important for me to stay focused. I would write code for 12 hours a day, sometimes 14 hours a day. I think one has to have a very narrow focus during the first year or two of a startup.
Most startups fail. Throwing some of the best years of your life away and shirking parental responsibilities for a remote chance of a payoff is simply a dangerous form of gambling.
Paul Graham is basically just talking his own book. His model is to fund a heap of cheap companies that overwork work young, naive people. Most of these companies fail. The occasional one succeeds enormously which more than covers the costs of the failures. Meanwhile, the starry-eyed young employees often don't notice the system is rotten until their thirties.
I was once in the SF startup world, and it's a pretty disgusting place. It's sexist, extremely ageist, intolerant of actual diversity, and anti-family. The sooner that particular culture dies (and make no mistake, it's dying), the better.
It's also lazy capitalism; it loads as much risk as possible onto the employees instead of those providing the capital, and many of the twenty-somethings love it. Machismo (look at how hard I work) and confirmation bias abound.
This. I couldn't but agree with every single sentence you've written (though I haven't worked at SF)!
I almost fell into this trap while I was inspired to work for a super cool team within a bigger company; a la start-up within a giant. I, unfortunately, got inspired enough that I ignored my new born, didn't see him grow up. I realized that I was being played just in the nick of time (after an year).
Irony is that now I'm in a real start up for almost two years and these two years have been best years of my life, both professionally and personally. I get to work on something that's really challenging and rewarding and at the same time I get to spend a few hours of high-energy time with my son, wife and family (I also am very active reader).
All this just because I figured out how to balance by spending sane hours at work and work at home late night once in a while when everyone is asleep!
My take away from this experience is; after your needs are taken care of to a comfortable extent never trade time for anything. Not for money, not for equity not for anything. Especially if you have a young family. Watch your child grow spend time with her; children develop emotional attachment by the time they are 5 and it only comes with spending time.
Even if you don't have family don't trade your time; go see the world, read something new, learn something interesting. But don't give away your time.
These startups aren't just targeting 20-somethings anymore, either. It's either that, or else the people who contact me (mid-30s) haven't thought about what my college (graduate and undergraduate) graduation dates imply about my age, or they have an edited version of my resume and can't see these things.
The small number of times I've been interested enough to take the discussion to matters of compensation and effort have been an effective deterrent for me. I earn more base salary and get better equity by my investments, and have much more time to spend with my family and working on income-producing side projects, working my 9-5 as a full-time contractor.
It's telling that these comments rarely solicit many replies on HN, even though they apply directly to what HN is all about. I have no sympathy for willful ignorance.
You have to remember that PG is a startup investor, and has a vested interest in making you feel as though you need to code for 14 hours a day when he's given you a seed-round investment.
The overwhelming odds state that your startup will fail, no matter whether you spent six hours or fourteen hours every day working at it.
I saw that you got some flack for this comment, but I think your comment is very insightful. If it were possible to construct a regression on start-up inputs vs success, I suspect average hours worked past 6 hours every single day would not account for much in explaining success. (The occasional crunch time is a necessity, of course.)
Working hard is definitely a must, but I think market timing, number of competitors, and other features have more of an impact on success than whether you put in another 4-5 hours a day. In some new markets, there are so few competitors or such a huge distance between the leader and the laggard that hours worked doesn't even matter.
In some cases, capturing mind-share does enough to get you further resources and that alone buys you luxuries that free you from 14 hour days.
I think you're reading too deeply into what I said.
Spending fourteen hours a day might well give you a greater chance of success than working six. But the chances of success are still so remote that it isn't worth ruining your life over. That's the part that PG is invested in - the idea that startup success is within the reach of anyone who works hard enough. It isn't.
if we amend your second sentence to read, "while it changes the probability of success, the probability is still low", it no longer really makes sense -- if you have a 30% chance of survival with medicine, should you not take your medicine if it is 3% chance of survival without it?
Because the alternative to working at a startup isn't death. It's, y'know, taking a different job.
Studies show that if you work 14 hours a day, your productivity falls below 8 hours a day output after six weeks or so. Basically, you get tired and sleep deprived. So, while 6 hour a day may be too low, 14 hours a day is probably waste of time in the long term.
This is one of the areas where I think PG has it completely wrong. Sure if you're a 20-something with no kids/life and only care about your startup, you can code 24/7. But many of us don't fit into this stereotypical startup-founder box that PG and others have created.
Some of us have kids, some have partners, some have ... a life!
Does PG really want a bunch of code obsessed, single minded founders with no hobbies or life outside of their startup? I can't imagine he does, and as a result he should revise some of his advice.
If PG is looking to make a quick buck, churn and burn founders than it all makes sense. But if PG is looking to help founders build sustainable businesses, he should be telling them to clock out, and open your eyes to the world (and people) around you.
I didn't say it was the "right" thing to do, only that 20-somethigns can do it because of their current lifestyle. The post referenced in your comment is basically a guy who realized that while he can operate in this way, he shouldn't.
Even if you're fresh out of school and have no kids, job, or friends that you care to spend time with, you probably shouldn't be coding 80 hours a week, even if your body and lifestyle permits it.
"Enjoy youself, enjoy yourself, it's later than you think."
Live each day as if its your last; do the things you won't regret. If you die tomorrow, was all your hard work at the 24-7 startup worth it? Or did you get to spend as much time with your family as you could?
That's predicated on things working out. In the real world the chances are very large that you will simply lose the years and get nothing back for it. And even if things work out, nothing will give you back the first four years of your childs life. Been there, done that.
The !POTENTIAL! return is correlated with the amount of "focussing on one thing during those short few years".
You may end up loosing your kids childhood while still working normal hours the rest of your/his/her life. That is provided not to much of your own money is in your startup, if that is the case you loose even more.
but when I had my own startup, I gave up reading the news
And my question would be: did you miss something important, that could be life-changing if only you had seen it on the news?
Being off the news myself (except tech news) for more than a year now, I'm yet to experience such an "event".
But of course some non-technical news "sip through" - get posted on HN, you hear from family etc. So there is no way to really miss something important, and no way to completely stay away from news.
You're right that the news is rarely actionable or locally 'useful'. But I do read the news and go to events where foreign journalists speak to shape my perception of the world, its diversity and scope, it helps me engage with people from considerably more varied backgrounds (and futures), it reveals new ways to approach or conceptualize unrelated events in my own life. Dont restrict yourself to the SF myopia (which is so easy and attractive).
Useful? Nah. Necessary? Absolutely.
Skip techcrunch, network tv, and USA today. Look for groups like commonwealthclub.org and find out who smart folk pay attention to (Ezra klein's following list on twitter is pretty golden).
It's absolutely true. I work less now and get far more done (I would say more than 3x) of what I did when I was pulling 7-days-a-week work marathons.
People waste lifetimes thinking they are working hard but are really just puttering around.
It's been stated by authors (I mentioned Tony Shwartz in another comment and I highly recommend his book) but I offer this analogy:
Consider you are standing next to a roaring river. It is treacherous. It is dangerous. On the other side, it looks like it's a lot nicer (more grass, nicer setting, maybe a picnic table all set up) than the side you are standing on.
Sure would be nice to get over there. But man, to swim that current...dangerous. So maybe you could build a raft? You start looking for wood, something to put it together. Can't find anything. You try looking at the river to see if there's an easier way to cross. Maybe some shallows? Not sure.
Then, behind you, suddenly there is a pack of lions. They look hungry. They ARE hungry. And they see you. And they start loping your way, drool dripping from their teeth. This ain't Hobbs. This is real. These lions are going to literally rip you apart and it's going to happen in a few seconds.
How long does it take you to get across that river now? Are you still going to try and build a raft? Still going to look for a shallow end?
Still going to worry about getting wet?
Focus is a curious thing. We think are 100% committed to something, but we are really not. We achieve what we are truly focused on.
I mean, it sure FELT like you were working 100% on getting across the river when you were trying to lash together a raft and when you were scouting the river for an easy way across. But when it meant getting across or being eaten, THAT'S when you focused truly 100%.
The secret is learn how to FOCUS, truly focus, put your entire mind intensely on the most important task...then take a break, recover. Then do it again. And wow...does it ever work.
I'm not saying that focus isn't a key to improved productivity. My question is, what does it have to do with being at a startup? His argument is that focusing AT A STARTUP can make you 3x more productive...it makes no sense. Focus alone can make you more productive, I don't see why the setting of a startup changes that multiplier.
You are conflating focus with fear and risk/reward evaluation. Those are not at all related, though, when focused you might be able to see another way out that was not apparent when you were just afraid and not focused.
A panicked jump into a roaring river can kill you just a surely as a well reasoned one.
But that smoldering fire to your left contains a branch long enough that waving it around a couple of times creates a flame an lions are scared of fire.
(If you can conjure up Lions, rivers and green grass to make your point I don't see why my imaginary fire is an illegal device. It could have been a machine gun for the same money, you'd dine on lion steak and congratulate yourself for not trying to swim to the other side of the river).
I think over the longer term, it's true, although not for individual hours. Knock some of pg's essays if you want (they deserve it), but "Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule" hits the nail on the head about productivity. http://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html
What it says is fundamentally true but I'm curious about the allocation of "maker" and "manager". As someone who has worked as a manager and a developer, I value uninterupted time in both roles. It doesn't matter whether I'm planning, or writing a proposal, or coding - large chunks of uninterrupted time are good, a broken up day is bad and less unproductive.
Certainly managers might more often have to respond to changing situations (though if you're a developer with any involvement in support you might question that) but if they opt to plan around frequent task changes when they don't have to that's just odd.
To me it just feels like a difference between people who manage time well and those who don't, rather than a maker / manager distinction.
Yeah, I am constantly surprised at the apparent lack of mathematical thinking about returns on effort in start-ups.
The risks of the startup going down without IPO or buyout are extremely high, long hours, equity will be diluted, founders will lose control of the decision making, short term objectives will be prioritized.
Returns on efforts in bootstrapping seem to be much much better.
What's missing here is a simple fact: your life is different in every period. No matter if you can retire when you're 35: you won't be able to relive your 20s. I am not saying that all in all you won't be better off, but would keep this in mind.
My son is a few months old and I work for an early-stage start-up. Man, stop coding at 2am - what you're hacking will need re-hacking in the morning. Go home to your daughter. There will always be tasks on your board. The only sure thing is your daughter will grow up - quicker than your start-up will fail.
It's a bit of a disturbing read for a couple of reasons:
- Going to an early stage start up as a young father is not a sacrifice, it's a selfish act. You are thinking more about yourself and what you want to do (and not do) rather than what's best for your family. Hate the idea of a 9-to-5 job? Well, suck it: the regular hours and clockwork and guaranteed paycheck will go a long way toward making your family more stable and stress free. Maybe it's a good time to also ask yourself if there are no hidden reasons behind choosing this line of work. I know I've seen fathers do this because they didn't realize they were not interested in the chores involved in raising a young age infant.
- I'm guessing the infant is less than two years old (the text mentions diapers) so I'm shocked that this text is not giving credit to who really, really deserves it: the Mom. At that age, the infant doesn't really care much whether Daddy is around at night time or to play with toys, but this father really needs to realize how much stress his work situation is putting on his wife.
I have a two year old son and I quit the start up I was working at before his birth. I felt it just wouldn't be fair to my wife to stay there. There will always be start ups to join should I ever want to try this again, but a child growing up is an opportunity that doesn't occur often in one's life.
I wrote this during a very tough run at the startup. Perhaps let me share a little bit more so that is it in context.
First and foremost, most credits, indeed go to my wife and family. The reason why I didn't mention my wife in this piece other than "You’re the only cool shade in the hottest of days/For a weary soul/that your Mother saved many years ago" is because this was a letter to my daughter. This piece was part of a collection of my thoughts from last year (when I was thirty) and I did thank my wife and family when I publish it: http://vuongnguyen.com/thirty-ba-muoi.html.
I'm 31 last month and I've been with my wife for 11 years now. We're best friends in many way and we support each other in our own dreams. Before my daughter was born, I was mostly doing consulting. I made sure I spent time walking and taking care of my wife. I made it a point to never miss a doctor appointment or any pregnancy/childbirth classes we have together. I really appreciated every step of the way.
Then my daughter was born, I stopped accepting new clients (as mentioned in the piece). Spent time with my wife and newborn. Then I stayed home for another three months with my daughter so my wife could return to work.
When I joined the startup, after much discussion and encouragement from my wife, I also made a promise to never miss any doctor appointment. That is still true. I feel blessed that I was able to afford much flexibility with my family and I never take it for granted. I know many other folks who go through a much more difficult time.
I think there is much more I could do and of course I'll continue to do my very best to be a good person every day. This was written as a personal thought and shared because I wanted to feel for myself and others, that we are not sitting alone on that home-bound train, if that makes any sense.
You raise some valid points for sure, obviously, we make choices: whether we go to college or not, put in that extra hour at work or not, go out with friends, hang out with a spouse/child, watch a sunset, etc. and ultimately, we have to accept our actions, consider the consequences/risks and respond as necessary.
" Hate the idea of a 9-to-5 job? Well, suck it: the regular hours and clockwork and guaranteed paycheck will go a long way toward making your family more stable and stress free. "
See, it's not that simple. What if hating that 9-5 job means he is angry and depressed and takes it out on his family or decides to give in to some sort of escape (alcoholism, extra-marital affairs, etc.)? Is it worth it then?
Don't convince yourself that a 9-5 is stable, it isn't. They are typically more stable than startups but far from rock solid. You can be laid off tomorrow due to a sudden market change, or nasty office politics. Then what? Was it worth it not to give yourself (and by extension, those that depend on you) leverage? Maybe, maybe not.
It is a complicated matter; for some, the risk of sacrificing some time now in hopes of a better future is worth it, for others, it isn't. Some would much rather have a dead-end job, barely make ends meet but spend 8 hours a day with their kids/family/friends. Others would sacrifice some relationships in order to achieve a greater goal - be it in pursuit of self-actualization or better living conditions, etc.
Author clearly thinks about his daughter and from the responses, am convinced he wants her to know that he cares for her. There's no clear cut answer and there will always be a sacrifice involved when we want something.
For some, the return of investing in relationships far outweighs the financial return of working above-average hours (I am learning this more and more). I personally think it is often worth sacrificing work/money for relationships; but at the same time, let's not forget the people who sacrificed their lives for their work. It is claimed that Nikola Tesla - at the latter end of his life - expressed regret at not getting married and sacrificing so much for his work. But without that sacrifice, where would we be as a society today? Of course, not everyone's result is as noble or far-reaching, but the truth about life is that there will always be a sacrifice to achieve something greater, the ultimate question is: Is it worth it? For that, there is no universal answer.
This is a good reminder, to me, of why I have chosen to delay any ambitions of my own startup until after my kids are grown and no longer want to spend (as much) time with me.
However, I think it's important to remember that we can just as easily get caught in the trap of being present with our family, but not "present", because we're stuck in a 9-5 job that is sucking the soul out of us.
I'm currently in a position that consists about 80% meetings and 20% reading/responding to email, when I would so much rather be coding. I come home feeling unfulfilled, and am irritated way too easily.
Some people can still cope with a job like this and separate themselves from it as to not affect their home life. I wish I was one of those, but I'm not. And since I recognize that I'm not, I have chosen to find -- and have found -- another job that without a doubt will not have this impact on me.
If you're in the same boat, and are not able to cope and separate yourself from the drudgery of your 9-5 job, find one that you enjoy better. And I personally think it's worth even taking a cut in pay, if you can and if you have to.
Oh for fucks sake, go home. This is your kid we're talking about. If getting a 9 to 5 job means spending more time with your kid, I promise you won't regret it. Better yet, keep your start up, just work a regular day. You only think you need to work long hours. You don't. You'll be more productive just working a regular schedule.
I can't believe we're even debating this. Reality check people: Your kids should come before your job.
It's a beautiful piece. I well remember that same feeling. I've been meaning for some time to write a piece about what my "startup dedication" (more accurately, my workaholism) cost me: friends, divorce (and a lot of money with that one), self respect, peace of mind... Always seem to have a difficult time finding the words. It's good that you found your own words, but know when to say when. It doesn't have to be this hard.
Vuong, you're welcome :P I helped with structure. But the piece, like the decision, is yours. The fact you're thinking about decisions, and were moved to compose the piece, bodes well. Keep the fact we're allotted only so much Time in the World in mind and, for you, it'll work out. Time, again, Time. You'll have the day in the meadow, daisies and all.
It certainly resonates with me. Co founder of a bootstrapped startup with a 7 month old son, and office far away from friends or family. I'm working many more hours per week than I've worked anywhere else over my 20 year career, because I want to have it all: to live close to friends and family and have more free time for both.
Good luck! I think we all share a dream of having the ability to control Time to satisfy our thirst for creativity and at the same time take care of our love ones. Here's to dreaming, right?! :)
Seriously! How are people giving "advice" to this guy? It's not a F#$%ing blog post, it's a work of art... Do you guys write in to HBO after every episode of Silicon Valley?
It's an great piece (IMHO) & if it helps you reflect, then it's done its job. It's not a problem do be solved (yes, I know... that's what we do... but really though....)
i think the reaction people are having is that it's more of a navel-gazing, wallowing piece - the focus is still on the "artistry" of the father's poetic ability, as opposed to the subject, who seems to be there to adorn as a backdrop.
Settle down guy, people are just discussing their feelings about the situation. People do get on forums and discuss episodes of silicon valley after they have aired, and they discuss it with their friends/coworkers in real life.
Are these comments not the appropriate place to voice our feelings/insights/experiences with the subject of the post??
feelings/insights/experiences are fine. Comments were condemning the author for staying at work till 2am.... that's just plain crazy to me. I wouldn't be surprised if he took some creative licenses and that's totally OK to do in a poem. I'm just glad that he shared a work of art which is relevant to our community. If it evokes emotions, reflections, that's fine... If we look at it as a blog post asking us to solve his problem for him, that's something else. We don't need to solve the author's problem (i.e. by giving him advice on finding work life balance).
Quite frankly, this piece made me think of the illusions we create for ourselves. In some ways, we're happy to always be busy. I for one, wouldn't really know what to do with "free" time (probably start another side project).
I agree that this is the place to discuss this matter. I guess I typically hold HN to a higher standard and generally the comments are very insightful.
I wrote this on the home-bound train one night during a tough time with the startup. I assured you, no creative license here. The hours were pretty brutal on a couple of occasions. I made sure that everything is well supported at home first though.
I wrote this because I honestly was missing my daughter a lot and hope that capture that feeling and put it into words. I do my best to take care of my family and express my care to my love ones.
I think at the end of the day, we're all engineers, hackers, lovers etc. and it's our nature to solve anything that seems like a problem coming our way. This is why I decided to share it with everyone. Because I know that home-bound train, I wasn't by myself and there were others who were on it with me.
Thank you for your kind words to me. I am flattered and somewhat embarrassed when you call it "arts" though. I'm shy! I don't even call it poem because I didn't want to offend those who truly dedicate themselves to the craft. I'm simply a convert who wanted to share a feeling I captured.
So, I am the child of a startup founder. Roughly a year before I was born my dad founded a startup. Throughout most of my early childhood he would routinely be working for 10+ hours at the office and then work after me and my sibling were put to sleep. Plus, he was usually travelling 4-5 days a month trying to pitch his idea (we didn't live in a big center for startups). Basically, he wasn't there.
I love my dad. A lot. He is still one of my favorite people, and when I come home it's always a joy to talk to him. But, he just wasn't around all that often as a kid, and I know he really tried, but you just can't be in two places at once. Honestly, I think it was a lot harder on my mom, what with the financial difficulties (especially when the startup eventually went belly up for a bit) raising me and my sibling on her own, all that stuff. I'm not angry at my dad, he did something he really wanted to do, and worked really hard at it, but you know you can't stop growing when you're five.
The only piece of 'advice' I have is try to carve out a regular time for being with your kids. Every Friday night, my dad would take me and my sibling down to the lake, and we'd get food, and talk, and play at an arcade (I still can totally beat him at Space Invaders, by the way), and that w as a really meaningful time for me and my sister, especially on the weekends he was working, or when we found him passed out in his chair after working all night.
I too am a young father, my daughter is almost 10 months old. Last week I just recently left the startup I was a part of. I was getting paid an alright salary for it being an early startup who had raised funding or launched yet. I made it a point to make sure I didn't stay late at the office unless it was an absolutely necessity. So I didn't have the extreme hours to deal with, but rather the uncertainty... Not knowing if your next paycheck is going to be one of your lasts or not is not a way I want to live. Having a family to provide for is a bigger and much more important job than grinding out code for a startup that has the potential to be big.
Because of the uncertainty and risks that come with working in a startup, I pursued other options. I ended up talking with a smaller software development agency here that has the startup atmosphere in the office (doesnt feel like some corporate job). They are very well off and there is very little chance of them failing or running out of work. The increased salary and full benefits were easily enough for me to leave the startup where I had a slightly less salary, but 20% equity. The 20% equity definitely had the potential to have some huge payoffs, but I wouldn't see those for atleast 5 years, and I much rather have guaranteed stability now rather than hoping for it to come later.
"Being the “professional” in a startup world,
pushing last hopes of entrepreneurial youth"
If you feel that "being professional" includes the need to push yourself and miss events you can't recapture, it's not being "professional" -- especially if you are an employee. Startups that push the "we are a family -- we work hard, play hard, stay late together" are in a sense delusional -- yes the thrill of building a company is compelling, but unless it is your own company - you are sacrificing yourself unnecessarily for someone else's benefit. There will always be another startup, but early months of a child's life where changes are there daily, hourly.
Bill Foster: How'd that happen? I did everything they told me to. Did you know I build missiles? I helped to protect America. You should be rewarded for that. But instead they give it to the plastic surgeons, you know they lied to me.
Sergeant Prendergast: Is that what this is about? You're angry because you got lied to? Is that why my chicken dinner is drying out in the oven? Hey, they lie to everyone. They lie to the fish. But that doesn't give you any special right to do what you did today. The only that makes you special is that little girl. Now let's go. Lets go!
I think you have to pick one. Startup or kids. You can work at a burnout pace for 5 years in the hope of getting rich, or you can be there for your young children. In my opinion, if you're going to try the startup thing, there's nothing stopping you from having kids afterwards. Except that if your startup(s) didn't succeed, your skills might translate perfectly into a career that can sustain a family. And having gone that route, you might have missed out on opportunities to bond with a good partner.
Or you can work at your startup at a sustainable pace.
From a lean startup perspective, the more burnout pace you work at, the less likely you are to close the feedback loop and actually produce the right feature. From a Mythical Man hour perspective, you're more likely to be less productive the more burnout pace that you try to maintain.
I don't think VCs are interested in anyone who wants to work at a sustainable pace. Also, the piece we're discussing doesn't make it sound like the author works at a sustainable pace.
When I moved to New York to join 80/20, I left my then girlfriend and our son who was 3 back in Denmark for almost a year.
A lot of my (now) wifes friends told her that I was crazy to do that, that their husbands would never do that to them or their kids and that I chose career instead of family.
The thought of disrupting ones life for something uncertain is to many the #1 fear and is the reason why many say "we would love to live and work abroad" but when it comes down to it they don't.
My thinking one the choice I made was tactially problematic, it is never a good idea move away from certainty in the short run. But strategically I feel like I made the right decision and for a very simple reason.
Your kids grow up and while they might adore you when they are young they will also grow up and become their own individual.
And while I definitely want to see them grow up I also want to be there with them when they are older and perhaps even be something other than a dad.
Lifes complicated and there are no right or wrong choices. All we can do is trust our intution and that might sometimes be trusting what seems counter intuitive.
We all now live together in NY and had another son. And while I certainly understand the difficulty of finding the balance between you and your family but never forget that there will be a point where you are not that type of father anymore and by that time if you are not careful you loose whats just as important as seeing your kids grow up, you loost your ability to define you as more than a dad.
I really appreciate this poem. I have a two year old and a six month old, and I had no conception of how I committed I would feel to my children until I had them.
I actually took some risks and worked super hard in my mid-20s to mid-30s, prior to having kids. I am so glad I did it then.
Another way to read this post, if you are young, is as a warning - you may think it is scary or hard to take risks now, but go for it. When you have children, it will be much, much harder. Every minute you are working, you will feel torn that you aren't with your kids, and every minute you are with your kids, you will feel torn that you aren't working (to provide for them). If you can use your twenties to gain some financial freedom and control of your time, it is really worth it.
I went through a period of thinking that I had 'wasted' my 20s on hard work, while everyone else was partying/backpacking/skiing/whatever. I now realize that my 20s (and early 30s) were an investment for a vastly better reward - the time and financial freedom to be with my family in my late 30s/early 40s when my children are young. I couldn't be happier with the outcome of those choices, and I didn't really see it coming, because I did not understand the depth of feeling I would have for my children.
But for the young people out there in their 20s - your opportunity cost will never be lower. Go for it. Invest in yourself. Working until 10pm on something you care about won't always be without painful tradeoffs. Forgoing income to try to start something won't always be so easy.
I like the sentiment. When I started my first true startup, after being an executive in a high profile one, we put our own capital in and then literally 6 months later, we conceived triplets spontaneously while having a 2 year old son.
While I was terrified of what would happen with the startup and the family, there was no question to me that we had to stay on the path. That startup ultimately was sold in a good outcome and I am now two startups past that. My kids are now 11 and 9*3. They know that I work in startups and many times they visit the office and hangout.
While I have some regrets, like flying to Europe every 2-3 weeks post acquisition for over a year, I want my kids to know that I do what I do because I love it and it is how I put bread on the table. While I don't wish my life choices on them, I want them to know that being the master of their own destiny is a choice their dad has fully embraced whatever they decide.
All of that said, even when I was flying to Europe, I made it a point to move heaven and earth to be home with them every single weekend during that period of time and was actively and highly engaged while at home. While you can choose to work hard, you also have to choose to be a great father and role model IMO.
Having been recently married and with no kids yet, I am fortunate enough to have a supportive wife who is letting me pursue a partially selfish dream of founding a startup. The glamor of the pursuit has long since faded. Execution is my hammer for every type of hurdle while Time lurks in the shadows conspiring with Denial and Self Doubt. I hope that I'll have the perfect lifestyle that will allow me to spend quality time with the ones I have chosen to be with and have brought into this world. Quality time can only exist if they are provided for with more than just love, but also a roof over their head, money to pay bills, and food on their plates. What we all seek is security and founding a startup puts the burden on you more often than a corporate job. There is no get rich quick scheme here but I have to try to see if I can achieve immortality by killing myself through hard work. If I am a mere mortal, I will succumb to the daily grind having a bit more certainty of my capabilities and a steady paycheck.
Two weeks ago, my daughter asked me if she could give up on college for a while and come work with me on my startup instead. She's 20 now. I couldn't be more pleased or proud.
For years, I worked in "safe" enterprise jobs, rather than the risk of startups, for the financial security of my children. They're adults now, and I'm starting over in many ways. I'm twice the age of the "startup founder" trope. It feels very natural to me now.
As for my daughter... she has the entrepreneurial spirit. She wants to be challenged, to learn and grow in ways she won't get to do in college. Working for me, she'll get to do things she wouldn't get to do in a slower, safer business. And she has a strong self-interest, too - if it succeeds, I'll become very wealthy, almost as a side effect. As my heir, she eventually benefits from that as well. So from the point of view of both her learning and her long-term financial security, helping me is the best thing she can do for herself. Smart kid.
I've read everyone's comment thus far. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and for allowing me the honor to be part of your discussion.
I figured that we're not trying to find a correct answer here. But knowing our community of engineers, hackers, lovers etc. we'd always trying to solve any problems coming our way :)
My humble opinion is: feelings are honesty trying to express themselves. Even if we can't solve the problem of "feelings", I'm quite happy we can search for it together as a group.
I wrote this piece during a tough part of the startup last year. I recently looked at it again and realized it wasn't just about me but rather about all my friends, I actually do refer to you folks on here as "friends", with the common dream.
I think at some point on one train-ride home or another, we've searched for some sort of understanding and hope to know that we're not the only one. Today, I'm happy to know that my "friends" do share the same feeling at one point or another. And we are not alone.
Nope. Nope. Nope. She won't wait for you, mate. Time doesn't wait. If you want to be with your family, they have to be your priority before any fame, glory, and wealth from your ability to churn out ideas or sling some code.
Don't live a life of regret. Make do with less. Maybe get there slower, but be a happier person.
I'm in a similar situation in that I have two young children (under 5) and I am the co-founder of a small-ish startup in healthcare. I make sure to leave every day at 5pm so I can be with my kids for a few hours. If I have a busy week, I'll get up earlier (5 or 6am) and get my work done earlier in the day.
If additional work needs to get done, it gets done after they go to bed.
Importantly, my co-founders also have families and value them as I do. If that were not the case, I would not be involved in this company.
For me, it's been a revolution at RescueTime. I had a 5 year old and new born when I started.
You structure your day right, you should be able to get done what is useful in a day's work in around 5-6 hours for most days. Otherwise, you need to restructure your day. You're doing something wrong-- excess communications, excess task-switching, excess research, over-engineering or something.
By consistently paying attention to getting the most out of the hours between 0830/0900 and 1530/1600, I am able to get at least 3-4 hours a day with my kids. There's the odd day where I get back on the computer after they are in bed.
The simple truth is you can restructure your work to match your life with kids, you cannot restructure your kids to match your life with work.
this is a feeling that every father have: the contradiction between beeing with our family and trying to make a better future for them, just find a balance soon
I work in a rapid growing startup that requires more than 8 hours a day and I have two young children. My priorities are
1 - Children
2 - Marriage
3 - Living arrangements / lifestyle (sans work)
4 - Career (but I take my career VERY seriously, I've been an executive for 9 years and I'm 33)
My routine
1 - Alarm goes off at 4:30 am
2 - I pickup around the house, toss in laundry as needed
3 - Catch the 5:45 am train to be into the office roughly @ 6:15 am
4 - I leave the office @ 5:30 pm to catch the 5:50 pm train to be home roughly @ 6:15 pm
5 - I play with the kids
6 - We then eat dinner together as a family
7 - I bathe and put both kids to bed around 7:30 - 8:00 pm
8 - I help pick up the rest of my house with my wife, it usually ends @ 8:30 pm (we talk a lot while doing this)
9 - My wife and I sit down on the couch/porch/etc and hang out for a few hours while I also work
10 - I'm usually in bed by 11 - 11:30 pm
If I have more work to do that evening I might have my laptop out while hanging out with my wife or stay up later. This is usually 4 nights out of the week.
Things that shift to "once in a while" given my priorities
1 - A full 8 hours of sleep
2 - Seeing that television show
3 - Seeing that movie
4 - Random nights out with friends
5 - Etc
These simply just take a back seat.
Things I never miss, and spend as much time with as someone working a standard 9-5 (although I do head into the office earlier than most)
1 - My kids (first and foremost)
2 - My wife
3 - My house
4 - My career and type of company I appreciate being involved with
To me, I keep the things that matter most and give up things that I found out I didn't really need (for context, I never really watched a lot of television).
This schedule works for me and I end up working 10 hours a day and never miss a beat with my kids.
PS. I also about twice a day, for 5 minutes, FaceTime with my wife/kids while at work. It's a nice break and a chance for me to see them during the day given I miss them in the morning.
I have a 9 months old daughter. I've been trying productivity techniques for years but I must say she has been the best motivator ever.
Knowing that I have to collect her from nursery, help with the bedtime routine, I need to finish as much work as possible during the day, no time to waste. At the beginning, it was just impossible for me to think finishing working at 6pm but in fact, I just feel better in my mind and my productivity skyrocketed since then.
Not to mention that I also stopped wasting time with bad projects and client.
What if, instead of "My dear daughter, Wait for me.", why not "My dear daughter, join me.". It's the journey. Take your daughter with you on your journey to build your experiences together. When she is ready, she will branch off to continue with her journey. She will then learn from you and take your grand children on her journey and so on...
Not so long ago I posted a message I then reposted and managed a -4 Karma somehow.
I was going to take a big leap in to a post with salaries far beyond what I would pay myself. Many here told me to take the risk, go for it etc etc. But I chose my family over a fat pay-check. No regrets!
Intense, and newly sharpened, focus on earnings is a common trait of new fathers. Its a beneficial trait, but one that has to be appropriately governed.
A nice bit of prose about that struggle and the ways we coddle ourselves as we get too far out of line.
Frankly, startup or no startup. You can only do so much work within a day. With a bit of planning and discipline you can manage to stay effective and be a part of the family while building your startup.
My rule is that I spend enough time with the kids if I rather go working than be with them. That said I never work more than 45 hours a week and sometimes only 30.
Might not work if you do 60 or 80
This has always been my quandary. What in an ideal life should a human do? Dedicate his time to his professional dreams or to his family. Doing excess of any induces a longing for the other.
My wife and I have a pact: we'll live for our children and family but we'll always continue to develop ourselves. This way, there is never a resentment toward the people you love. I, too, work and go home for my family.
The only people who care about excellence are the excellent, and we almost never get to call the shots (we're bad at politics). Since the people evaluating our work are in no way qualified to assess excellence or even slightly-better-than-mediocre-goodness, most of our work is just a commodity, and the price is set by the winner's curse: schmucks who haven't learned (either by raising children, or by having people close to them get sick and die) how finite time is.
It's better to compete to excel than to compete to suffer, but the software/startup world is run by people who don't value excellence in the least, and who wouldn't be qualified to evaluate it even if they did. So that steers us toward "compete to suffer" dynamics, also known as "fish frying" (http://www.strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/).
Of all the things that might happen, much as we'd like it to be different, I can guarantee that this is one which won't happen.
However upsetting it may be now (or looking back in the future), time isn't going to wait for you and all those firsts, all those events and experiences you miss, won't wait and won't happen again.
We tell ourselves it isn't a choice but for many of us it is. Most of us could earn enough money to support our family comfortably in a relatively regular 9 - 5 job. We might not be personally as satisfied and we might not be as financially well off, but we can choose one possible version of our life over another.
It's absolutely fair to say that you have to balance the needs of being a "good" father (which let's remember is a subjective term in many ways), against your own personal needs (and indeed the needs of your partner, the rest of your family and so on), but most people reading this board are fortunate enough that there genuinely is an element of choice.
No-one should tell you that working long hours so your child need never go without (or so you're personally happy and the time you spend with them you do so without resentment) is better or worse than coaching their sports team and being there every bath time, but whatever you decide to do, I think the most important thing is to accept that you're doing it because you made a conscious decision - ultimately that's going to be the only way you'll be at peace with it.
And if you haven't made a conscious decision, the for heavens' sake sit down with your other half and do so. Of all the outcomes, doing what you're doing without thinking about what you want and what works best for your family maybe the only truly bad one.