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Even if one is generous and assumes this kind of behavior is typically well-intentioned, it's foolish to believe that it won't become a detriment as you grow yo

Even if one is generous and assumes this kind of behavior is typically well-intentioned, it's foolish to believe that it won't become a detriment as you grow your business. A lot of startup founders don't think much about management principles and the importance of perception in an organization, but these things matter. When founders are emailing around the clock, many employees will come away with the perception that they're expected to be available at all hours of the day and night too. Your employees are never going to be as invested as you, so this typically creates stress and dissatisfaction for employees more than it motivates and impresses them. As this Ask HN post demonstrates, a workaholic warrior complex is also a great way to convince your employees that you're an "i" word (insane, insensitive, imbalanced, incompetent, etc.).

volaski 11y ago
One of the biggest mistakes I made while working on a past startup was listening to an advice like this. What you say is totally valid if your company is a fortune 500 company, but the type of people who start companies shouldn't strive to become those types of managers covered in business case studies. I made this mistake after reading too many business books. It simply doesn't work. From my experience it fucks up the company culture when a founder tries to "tone it down", because that's not the quality required to make stuff happen when it's in the beginning stage. A competent founder should be able to adapt as the company grows, but shouldn't behave like a fortune 500 CEO from the beginning.
- 7Figures2Commas 11y ago
  Here's the biggest problem with your approach: in today's market, it's a lot harder for startups to recruit and retain good employees than it is for good employees to find new employers. Just look at the OP: he left an ostensibly good job to join a YC startup and he's already questioning the founder's behavior and competence. When he starts feeling pressured to work insane hours, or completely loses faith in the founder's sanity and competence, how long do you think it will take him to find a new employer that promises something better? At the risk of being overly harsh, if you feel you're incapable of making "stuff happen" without sending random emails at 3 am in the morning or acting like you don't have control over your schedule and business or terrorizing your employees into believing that they need to be online at all hours, you're probably out of your depth and should be honest with yourself about your readiness to run a business with employees. A lot of people in the startup community have deluded themselves into believing that "hard work" is the one and only key to success but by and large, successful businesses are built by doing the right things, not by running around for 18 hours a day like a chicken with its head cut off. Thanks to the funding boom, a lot of chickens with their heads cut off are running companies. Folks like the OP work for them at their own peril.
  - karissa 11y ago
    thank you
  - volaski 11y ago
    Who would you pick if you had following two candidates: 1. A rockstar developer who wants work-life balance 2. Not famous but passionate junior developer who has potential I would always pick 2 over 1. I know because I have made exactly that mistake of hiring #1. And the company culture went to shit. If I was the founder of that company and found out about this I would have a talk with OP and if there's disagreement I would rather let him go than trying to tone it down. Company culture is much more important than one or two rockstar developers. Also you don't attract great employees with a promise of work-life balance--you can only attract "good" employees that way. Great employees are attracted to passion. Go to Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and tons of other industry defining founders and ask them if they worked leisurely with work-life balance or ran around like a chicken with its head cut off.
    - nemothekid 11y ago
      I think the onus is on you to show that Bill Gates was a 9-5 man. AFAIK I've never seen anything claiming anything or the other.
      - volaski 11y ago
        Can't believe i have to google stuff to comment here. I don't know where you got that misinformation but here you go: http://www.quora.com/Did-Bill-Gates-really-work-16-hours-a-day-all-the-time-when-he-was-starting-a-company http://www.quora.com/Did-Bill-Gates-really-work-16-hours-a-d...
  - nugget 11y ago
    Not all, but almost all of the successful founders I know are obsessively focused on their startups and they don't put much time into other areas of their lives (family, social life, etc). Humans need sleep and whether they sleep 4 or 8 hours doesn't really matter. The work is just always on their minds, 24/7. They are always on call. They are always reachable. They never say no. The passion, focus, and obsession for the business oozes out of them, even when they are ''out of the office''. There is not even a question of work-life balance because work is their life. Personally I like to invest in and work with people like this because they tend to succeed, make disruption happen at scale, and make lots of money upon exits. A lot of recruits burn out and don't like it, but the ones who survive learn a ton and make a lot of money too.
- dasil003 11y ago
  I agree with you in the sense that for the first 50 employees or so you just plain can't afford to have clock-punchers. But on the other hand, if the founders are too obsessive and don't know their own limits, and they're not taking care of themselves, then mistakes will be made and productivity will have jumped the shark.
- rhizome 11y ago
  You don't know anybody who's worked for Apple.
- curiously 11y ago
  This. You couldn't have put it into better words.

volaski 11y ago

One of the biggest mistakes I made while working on a past startup was listening to an advice like this. What you say is totally valid if your company is a fortune 500 company, but the type of people who start companies shouldn't strive to become those types of managers covered in business case studies. I made this mistake after reading too many business books. It simply doesn't work. From my experience it fucks up the company culture when a founder tries to "tone it down", because that's not the quality required to make stuff happen when it's in the beginning stage. A competent founder should be able to adapt as the company grows, but shouldn't behave like a fortune 500 CEO from the beginning.

7Figures2Commas 11y ago
Here's the biggest problem with your approach: in today's market, it's a lot harder for startups to recruit and retain good employees than it is for good employees to find new employers. Just look at the OP: he left an ostensibly good job to join a YC startup and he's already questioning the founder's behavior and competence. When he starts feeling pressured to work insane hours, or completely loses faith in the founder's sanity and competence, how long do you think it will take him to find a new employer that promises something better? At the risk of being overly harsh, if you feel you're incapable of making "stuff happen" without sending random emails at 3 am in the morning or acting like you don't have control over your schedule and business or terrorizing your employees into believing that they need to be online at all hours, you're probably out of your depth and should be honest with yourself about your readiness to run a business with employees. A lot of people in the startup community have deluded themselves into believing that "hard work" is the one and only key to success but by and large, successful businesses are built by doing the right things, not by running around for 18 hours a day like a chicken with its head cut off. Thanks to the funding boom, a lot of chickens with their heads cut off are running companies. Folks like the OP work for them at their own peril.
- karissa 11y ago
  thank you
- volaski 11y ago
  Who would you pick if you had following two candidates: 1. A rockstar developer who wants work-life balance 2. Not famous but passionate junior developer who has potential I would always pick 2 over 1. I know because I have made exactly that mistake of hiring #1. And the company culture went to shit. If I was the founder of that company and found out about this I would have a talk with OP and if there's disagreement I would rather let him go than trying to tone it down. Company culture is much more important than one or two rockstar developers. Also you don't attract great employees with a promise of work-life balance--you can only attract "good" employees that way. Great employees are attracted to passion. Go to Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and tons of other industry defining founders and ask them if they worked leisurely with work-life balance or ran around like a chicken with its head cut off.
  - nemothekid 11y ago
    I think the onus is on you to show that Bill Gates was a 9-5 man. AFAIK I've never seen anything claiming anything or the other.
    - volaski 11y ago
      Can't believe i have to google stuff to comment here. I don't know where you got that misinformation but here you go: http://www.quora.com/Did-Bill-Gates-really-work-16-hours-a-day-all-the-time-when-he-was-starting-a-company http://www.quora.com/Did-Bill-Gates-really-work-16-hours-a-d...
- nugget 11y ago
  Not all, but almost all of the successful founders I know are obsessively focused on their startups and they don't put much time into other areas of their lives (family, social life, etc). Humans need sleep and whether they sleep 4 or 8 hours doesn't really matter. The work is just always on their minds, 24/7. They are always on call. They are always reachable. They never say no. The passion, focus, and obsession for the business oozes out of them, even when they are ''out of the office''. There is not even a question of work-life balance because work is their life. Personally I like to invest in and work with people like this because they tend to succeed, make disruption happen at scale, and make lots of money upon exits. A lot of recruits burn out and don't like it, but the ones who survive learn a ton and make a lot of money too.
dasil003 11y ago
I agree with you in the sense that for the first 50 employees or so you just plain can't afford to have clock-punchers. But on the other hand, if the founders are too obsessive and don't know their own limits, and they're not taking care of themselves, then mistakes will be made and productivity will have jumped the shark.
rhizome 11y ago
You don't know anybody who's worked for Apple.
curiously 11y ago
This. You couldn't have put it into better words.