My career has taken place entirely in startups, some of which I started, all of which were extremely demanding. I'm married and we have two kids.
I'm somewhere between this guy and 37signals on this issue. You can work 100 hour weeks. You can work 4-day weeks. You can travel all the time. You can not travel at all. I know people who've been successful on both paths.
I look back at what I've done so far, and the biggest success I was involved with (Secure Networks, probably) wasn't amazing because everyone killed themselves working for it. It was amazing because (1) everyone loved what they were working on, (2) there was an esprit de corps and extremely talented leadership, and (3) we managed to be aimed at the right market. I worked late nights --- but from home, and not all the time. 100 hour work weeks wouldn't have improved our outcome.
Another success I was involved with was an ISP (EnterAct) in Chicago (I was the first technical employee). Again, we worked hard, there were long nights, but it wasn't a 100-hour commitment. The big thing I remember about EnterAct was that the founders had families, and the families were regulars in the office. I knew their names. They had dinners and parties. You can address the absentee spouse problem by creating a culture that is inclusive of families. That's something we've lost in our transactional build-to-flip company culture, but it's not hard to recover.
Finally, in my current company, I've hit on my favorite answer to this question yet. Erin is a full-time employee of the company. We took the time to bring her up to speed with the actual hardcore technical work that we do. We've done billable projects together, she's worked on product dev, and she can switch hit for a lot of the work I'd do. Meanwhile, we share (mostly) the child care and household stuff. It's been a huge win for the company as well, for obvious reasons; it's like having another person who's as committed as a founder.
I think when you're 22, you can tell yourself a lot of horseshit about whether work or life is more important to you. I know I did. Thankfully, my wife forgave me (hey, I was young(er) and stupid(er)) and I came to my senses. I think this article's author thinks the same thing, and I'm betting he'll say something similar in his next argument.
"100 hour work weeks wouldn't have improved our outcome."
Thanks for pointing this out. I don't see any problem with those who want to work 100 hour weeks but do get tired of the false reasons people have for doing it. It isn't because you HAVE to, it's because you WANT to.
I'm somewhere between this guy and 37signals on this issue. You can work 100 hour weeks. You can work 4-day weeks. You can travel all the time. You can not travel at all. I know people who've been successful on both paths.
I look back at what I've done so far, and the biggest success I was involved with (Secure Networks, probably) wasn't amazing because everyone killed themselves working for it. It was amazing because (1) everyone loved what they were working on, (2) there was an esprit de corps and extremely talented leadership, and (3) we managed to be aimed at the right market. I worked late nights --- but from home, and not all the time. 100 hour work weeks wouldn't have improved our outcome.
Another success I was involved with was an ISP (EnterAct) in Chicago (I was the first technical employee). Again, we worked hard, there were long nights, but it wasn't a 100-hour commitment. The big thing I remember about EnterAct was that the founders had families, and the families were regulars in the office. I knew their names. They had dinners and parties. You can address the absentee spouse problem by creating a culture that is inclusive of families. That's something we've lost in our transactional build-to-flip company culture, but it's not hard to recover.
Finally, in my current company, I've hit on my favorite answer to this question yet. Erin is a full-time employee of the company. We took the time to bring her up to speed with the actual hardcore technical work that we do. We've done billable projects together, she's worked on product dev, and she can switch hit for a lot of the work I'd do. Meanwhile, we share (mostly) the child care and household stuff. It's been a huge win for the company as well, for obvious reasons; it's like having another person who's as committed as a founder.
I think when you're 22, you can tell yourself a lot of horseshit about whether work or life is more important to you. I know I did. Thankfully, my wife forgave me (hey, I was young(er) and stupid(er)) and I came to my senses. I think this article's author thinks the same thing, and I'm betting he'll say something similar in his next argument.
Just some random thoughts.