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Well, 12-14 hours a day is pretty much the norm for a startup right? I am, too, living thru prelaunch of my startup. But think of looking back at yourself 10

Well, 12-14 hours a day is pretty much the norm for a startup right? I am, too, living thru prelaunch of my startup. But think of looking back at yourself 10 years later... you will be proud that you live through this. If you have the passion, this is the time to be.

steve 19y ago
But for everyone no matter how little of the rewards they are entitled to? No.
nostrademons 19y ago
Not necessarily - 12-14 hours is what the startup mythology says, but there's a wide variance depending upon lines of business, business models, growth strategies, capital structures, etc. Working 12-14 hours/day for sustained periods of time is more likely to indicate that management sucks than that you're actually getting stuff done. A few data points: Before college, I worked at a VC-backed startup selling remote-access software to large corporations (well...planning to sell...they never launched). The core engineers typically worked 12-14 hours/day to put out a very buggy product. Same startup, I knew an engineer who was employee #35 and later VP of Engineering at Stratus Computers. She said that yeah, if you have to hit a deadline, 10-12 hour days may be normal, but if you're doing it regularly you're doing something wrong. You should not have to work more than 8 hours/day to put out a decent product. I'm currently working at a bootstrapped financial software startup, selling direct to hedge funds. The founder works about 10 hours/day; the rest of us work about 8 hours/day. The company is profitable. My other job offer was for a VC-funded financial software startup, selling to smaller brokerages. Founders typically worked 12ish hour days, most of the rest of the employees worked 9-10 hour days. The company was not profitable at the time I applied, though they've been growing well since and may be by now. According to Founders at Work, del.icio.us and Bloglines were both founded by single founders who kept their day jobs, and Steve Wozniak spent the first year of Apple Computer's lifetime employed by Hewlett-Packard. I'm assuming that means 3-4 hours/day on weekdays, plus full weekends. I'm in a similar position: 3-4 hours/day of work, keeping my day job, about to launch after 5 months or so (including a month hiatus when we worked on a side project).

steve 19y ago

But for everyone no matter how little of the rewards they are entitled to? No.

nostrademons 19y ago

Not necessarily - 12-14 hours is what the startup mythology says, but there's a wide variance depending upon lines of business, business models, growth strategies, capital structures, etc. Working 12-14 hours/day for sustained periods of time is more likely to indicate that management sucks than that you're actually getting stuff done. A few data points: Before college, I worked at a VC-backed startup selling remote-access software to large corporations (well...planning to sell...they never launched). The core engineers typically worked 12-14 hours/day to put out a very buggy product. Same startup, I knew an engineer who was employee #35 and later VP of Engineering at Stratus Computers. She said that yeah, if you have to hit a deadline, 10-12 hour days may be normal, but if you're doing it regularly you're doing something wrong. You should not have to work more than 8 hours/day to put out a decent product. I'm currently working at a bootstrapped financial software startup, selling direct to hedge funds. The founder works about 10 hours/day; the rest of us work about 8 hours/day. The company is profitable. My other job offer was for a VC-funded financial software startup, selling to smaller brokerages. Founders typically worked 12ish hour days, most of the rest of the employees worked 9-10 hour days. The company was not profitable at the time I applied, though they've been growing well since and may be by now. According to Founders at Work, del.icio.us and Bloglines were both founded by single founders who kept their day jobs, and Steve Wozniak spent the first year of Apple Computer's lifetime employed by Hewlett-Packard. I'm assuming that means 3-4 hours/day on weekdays, plus full weekends. I'm in a similar position: 3-4 hours/day of work, keeping my day job, about to launch after 5 months or so (including a month hiatus when we worked on a side project).