Y Combinator cofounder Jessica Livingston to take year-long sabbatical
venturebeat.com
venturebeat.com
You are grateful because he is setting an example for us to follow?
Wow. Someone who thinks like that just shouldn't have kids.
The crux of the issue is that you have two things require an inordinate amount of time and attention, and both of which are very schedule unforgiving.
When my infant son is hungry, he has to be fed. Similarly, when I had a very early stage startup, and an important customer demo first thing Monday AM, the work had to get done over the weekend.
What happens when you have a conflict between the two priorities?
That's when you find out what/who your real priorities are. Everything else is empty talk.
You can always not schedule meetings on Monday AM if doing so means neglecting your priorities. Unless weekends with the fam aren't really a priority?
Priorities are tricky like that. They're wholly up to you to make.
And yes, not having that meeting on Monday AM might mean losing a client. Is that more important or is weekend with fam more important? That part is up to you.
The harder choice occurs when you don't really have a choice. You are the only member[1] who can feed your infant, who requires food every 1-2 hours (if you're lucky you get 2 hours in between), AND your co-founder is counting on you to do your 1/2 of the work for the demo.
[1] In the US, pediatricians recommend only nursing for the first 6 months. That's not something all families can follow, but our family decided to adhere to that recommendation. Further for the first few weeks, pediatricians also recommend not using pacifiers and bottles, so the baby (and mother) can get a solid nursing routine going. This puts a massive constraint on mothers during the first few months of parenthood.
That's what maternity/paternity leave is supposed to be for. And yes I agree that's hard to do as a founder. Personally I have an incredibly bad track record at taking even a week off and I'm not even a founder per se.
That said, there is always a choice. You might not like the options, or the consequences, but there is always a choice.
The choice might just be to quit/sell your business and get a job job, if you want more time to spend with your baby. Or it might be to put up your baby for adoption so you can focus fully on the business. There are better choices/options somewhere between the extremes.
I have an interesting insight into this through my girlfriend. Soon after she was born, one of the parents essentially skipped town to focus on their business, the other quit their high paying fancy job to focus on the kid. Now one of them is rich, the other has a daughter that adores them.
This is an interesting read: https://www.quora.com/Was-Steve-Jobs-a-good-father-according...
That being said, the conundrum becomes whether one should give up one's passions and dreams for one's children. You end up with all sorts of sick (IMO) scenarios where parents impose their dreams and goals on their kids and vicariously live through them. That's why I know I will never have children - because if I did, it would mean giving up on my dreams.
It doesn't stop after the first 6 months. The first few years, they will get infected by most germs passed around among kids in daycare. If you are unlucky, you get infected too.
There are sometimes months (like our last month :p) where they get a cold or stomach flu three or four times in a month. Obviously, when they are sick, you can't bring them to daycare. Your own defences get weakened as well as a result sleep interruptions. So, we typically end up getting somewhat sick half of the time as well.
I am happy that we are in Europe, where there is decent sick leave and insurance. (My wife and I both work.)
> That's what maternity/paternity leave is supposed to be for.
And of course choosing to take that leave is choosing to abandon the startup. That's fine; as you note, one always has a choice. But one simply can't have two top priorities — and there are only 24 hours in each day.
You tapped your investor to get a meeting scheduled with Apple in order to convince them to use your data in their map application. Apple gives you a time, and lets you know Jobs will be in this meeting[1].
How bad do you want success?
[1] If this seems contrived situation, it actually happened. Former US VP Al Gore, a partner with one of our investors, was on the board of Apple and arranged the meeting. When the team went to present to Apple, they found out Steve Jobs wouldn't be able to attend the meeting. We later found out that he was in the hospital, and sadly, he eventually passed on.
"Fix health care" would be a good one. It's all kinds of broken in the US.
I'm glad for JL though, and also quite envious. There's never enough time for everything when kids are young.
{INSERT HIGH PERCENTAGE HERE}% of startups fail. What makes anyone think "fixing it for parents" is a more important goal than fixing those odds?
It baffles me, when I hear these sorts of lines. If you can fix startups so parents can do them, fixing them so that current founders can work less hard, with the same or greater chance of success seems as important.
When I phrase it like that, I think the problem with the question becomes self evident.
There are certain types of work that I don't have the mental energy to do when I get home from a full workday, or at least not to do well. And, honestly, if I try too hard, I risk lowering the quality of my work the next day and burning out completely at some point. And burnout is a fairly large reason that startups fail: "But I think the underlying cause is usually that they've become demoralized" (http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html).
There are other types of work (e.g., practicing piano or voice, two pursuits where the amount of time spent is pretty steadily and monotonically correlated with success) that I can do just fine. It seems more than likely that, if we get it to the point where you can do a successful startup on 5 or 6 hours a day, spending an additional 5 or 6 hours per day on the startup is unlikely to make you more successful, but those same 5 or 6 hours can be productively directed towards music practice, raising children, or whatever else you want to do.
(There's also a line of argument about parenthood being of intrinsic importance, above success at startups, success at music, etc., but I'll let someone else argue that point.)
nah, you're mis reading this. the issue is continuity. most people will never become successful because of hyper-competetion and the need for continuity (ie, being in the game). You don't see that many michael jordan career sabbaticals among the great athletes either. And obviously being a great athlete takes loads of work, but not each effort is the same contribution obviously either. But great athletes have a very short window to prove themselves as junior/early pro players, and 95%and fewer in the talen pool will never take a "sabbatical" from the NFL (or whatever league/sport) and get their job back with no questions asked...its cut throat enough as it is for a bench/roster seat.
Then, there are people who are so successful in terms of their brand and personal networks etc that they can dabble in and out of various projects at will. But that is not your typical junior partner or junior parent or early-career stage founder. At least not realistically.
The middle ground is to buy an existing business and/or invest. Yes booooooring! but lots of parents start businesses.
Flipping a house is a viable alternative to starting the next uber.
This is a fantastic middle ground as far as I'm concerned and I'll be very happy to take a stab at this myself after I feel that I've learned all I need to know from working for the man.
Totally agree. If you can't iterate, you're either in a niche like manufacturing (where your USP had better trump 2 weeks lead time, or your business plan is rotten anyway), or you're simply doing it wrong.
Right now parenthood is incompatible with startups - how can we change this and make startups better for young parents as well who for now will just always try to get corporate jobs?
I have a 2 year old and am a work at home dad. My wife and I share responsibilities and launching and relaunching some of our own businesses at our own pace. We find that this works a lot better than working for others. I just came back from a 1.5 hour mountain bike trip, had some homebaked sourdough (learned yesterday) and spent some time with my daughter. Now I am preparing to dig in to work for awhile. This afternoon I will take a break at 3PM to go play a new RPG, Blades in the Dark, for a few hours, in a local pub. Life is good. (Of course, we live in China and overheads aren't San Francisco or London, but that's by design. London also has no mountain biking, and the climate here is closer to high altitude LA.)
Life's too short to commute. See also, article in an Australian paper on this subject this morning: http://www.smh.com.au/money/tree-change-for-families-financi...
"Start-ups are these great enterprises where individuals make huge sacrifices in order to take a chance at achieving amazing things."
"Great parents make huge sacrifices in the best interest of their children".
The problem is that you can only make so many sacrifices in life. Maybe one day we'll live in a utopia, but not anytime soon. Sometimes you have to pick one.
I have 3 kids all below 6yo, and can't understand why people believe they have to make so many sacrifices for their kids. I go drink beers with friends every week-end, my wife and I watch movies, go hiking or camping with the kids, do normal stuff adult do. At home, with the kids, I do the stuff that I like and listen to the music I like, watch cartoons with them. I'll never force myself to listen to shitty kid music, or watch silly cartoons: I have found some cartoons that we all can enjoy (Miyasaki, Les Shadocks, Old Disneys, Pink Panther, ...)
I also consider that sacrificing yourself to your kids is not only bad for you, it is bad for them too: it is a burden on their shoulder they didn't ask for. Moreover, faking it do not work, they'll know before you that you are bored by shitty kid's music or cartoons. Oh, and we play Lego together too.
Granted, as a single child, it seems that being left to my own devices so often while growing up may have added to my introverted tendencies. However, having some siblings around should help my future little introverts find balance.
I don't think your parent's post is necessarily representative. It depends a lot on the child and the circumstances. E.g., we live relatively far away from family, so we cannot just bring our daughter to her grandparents for a sleepover.
Our life has definitely changed and where there used to be a lot of time to hack and tinker, it's far less now. Our daughter falls asleep easily and sleeps until 8 or 9 in the weekends, so we are still pretty lucky :).
The important thing is that you also get a lot back. Having a child is a lot of fun. They are cute and do funny things. And you can do nice things together, like going to a playground or hiking a bit.
I also think having a child put more balance in our lives. Work is really 8:00-17:00 (you have to pick them up ;)), but you also become more focused and efficient.
That said, I have a hard time to believe that you could get away without any sacrifices (not talking about neglect).
Those diapers don't clean themselves, and although small children themselves are rarely boring and in fact mostly hilarious, you still can't just go on with the same activities you had before and possibly would prefer at that moment.
Additionally, kids are very different when it comes to needed attention and and care. Some children wake up at 4am, others nicely at 8 or even 9. Some children are sick more than others, some children are more "low-maintenance" (ugly word for a human actually) than others.
The children's age is of course a huge factor. The younger they are, the more the balance between your needs and theirs tips more to the side of them, and I think rightly so.
I still want to reinforce you sentiment that children do not need to be one big sacrifice and constant burden. They can be a nuisance at times, but mostly they are just great human beings in a very special time of their life, and you have the privilege of keeping their company.
The older they get, the less they need your labour, and can hold their own. For that reason alone, you should not give them 100% pampering all the time.
And yes some kids are much more difficult, but still a big part is on the parents. If you're never afraid or worried about other people yourself, your kids are more likely to be sociable with other adults. Just one example, many other would come to mind.
Also I have moderate and adaptable needs when it comes to entertainments, so I can spend most of my time with the kids doing stuff I like. When kids are below 10 they enjoy mostly to be with their parents or siblings, regardless if it's watching cartoons or watching dad fixing stuff. But someone who would be found of extreme hiking would not be able to bring the kids on the Everest, obviously.
However I'm also picky and will not usually do the activities I dislike. E.g. I hate zoos and so we don't go there. (Farms are ok)
You can "opt out" of a lot of this, some of it is trial and error to find the right balance, and some of it is phases that come and go. But your kids will probably need and want things from you that will require a lot of your time. mostly you'll gladly do it, and that is the price of being parent.
Because different circumstances.
My first kid was an absolute angel, sleeping through the night pretty much well from the get-go. My wife and I did the same as you - kept life normal, and all was good.
My second child has had massive issues sleeping, starting anywhere from 8-9pm, and lasting until 3 or 4am.
We tried everything, some things that worked, some things that didn't - the main issue though, is that while you're trying stuff you're still not getting sleep, and that just - well, it destroys you.
If people can keep regular lives when this happens, I take my hat off to them. Personally, I struggled hugely - and that's where the "this is a sacrifice" bit only begins.
(and this is coming from someone who has it relatively easy: not being dirt-poor/having multiple jobs/being separated/a million other issues that make life that bit trickier)
On the other hand, maybe people should stop making so many sacrifices for work and simply be more efficient. With one newborn at home and another one in the making, I cofounded an early stage startup. Difference was, we got 6 seasoned industry veterans as founders and validated product-market fit before even starting out. That way, none of us really killed themselves (pretty normal 45-50h focused work weeks and weekends off), and we still have growth that's through the roof. I really like that I can have both.
I started coding in my spare time and me and my partners only quit the day jobs when the company was pretty much self-sustaining. 7 years later we are an established and fast growing company (and if you're Dutch: We're hiring! https://www.tilaa.com/en/jobs ;).
I'm not sure if things are much different in the US (I'm from the Netherlands), but I definitely think it's possible to have it both (a loving family and a flourishing business) without making big sacrifices.
Thanks for posting this. As a parent of small kids, this is pretty much well what I'm doing right now, and it's lovely and reassuring to see that your father's scheduling worked out for you.
Before kids, being able to define my own working hours was awesome; now with small children, it's working out really well, and "being there" is a noticeable quality-of-life thing, especially when you're not having to ask for a boss' permission to do so!
not being an entrepreneur likewise doesn't mean that it's happy family time, all the time.
Some folks want a relationship with their children, others don't.
So we did, and he took us swimming, ice skating, sledding, we had sock fights (with rolled up knee socks) and cooked breakfast together.
During the summers he did most of his business via the telephone from his home office. He was nearly always available for waterskiing or whatever other bit of kid-fun popped into our goofy little heads.
I think, if I asked him, he wouldn't be of the opinion that he gave up anything to spend time with his family. I think he'd tell me that "giving something up" is what you do when you replace it with something you want to do less.
From here it looks like he just went with the flow. It was simple, he lived by the rules he laid upon his children. We all did what we "had to do" (work, school) when it was the time to do it. And then, we were free to play the rest of the time.
Edit: to clarify Dad's employment status.
Be a grownup and assert that your work is at work, and work ends when you leave the office. Unless you are on call, turn off your email and work phone. Stop being conned into staying at the office for "free" dinner, ping pong, "teambuilding", or whatever bullshit is being peddled by your employer.
Or they can hire more people.
In some countries, it's extremely unusual to perform overtime. If a startup has 10 employees and they each do an hour of overtime a week - they're effectively denying another worker a job.
Yes, it's a bit "mythical man month" - but if there's too much work to go around, your employer needs to hire more people.
Reasonable, sure. But is it realistic when we have things like this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11430596 ?
Obviously, ideally none of this would be necessary. But alas...
Your sentiment is there, but I find this choice of words a bit bizarre. Livingston is a co-founder of Y Combinator.
pg already stepped back from the day-to-day, handing the reins over to Sam Altman.
That's why your comment comes across as strange. You've been here nearly 7 years, surprised you didn't know that.
My company allows unpaid sabbaticals.
Is available to all full time employees (unless that's changed in the last 3 years)
Although sometimes the importance of an important, successful person who many people look up to setting the tone is understated.
But yes...Jessica is very rich and has luxuries beyond any of our wildest imaginations so it's not really a fair comparison to "normal people" or our industry at large. Your point stands.
http://www.sfgate.com/news/us/article/San-Francisco-poised-t...
In Quebec, both parents get a combined total of 57 weeks, with some pay cut, paid through a provincial insurance program. As in, everybody gets it, and the employer isn't directly financially burdened by babies.
Six weeks paid leave is paltry compared to the vast majority of countries.
And of course, it makes life easy for large organisations like government and big business, while making things harder for small business (who have a higher variability due to lower number of employees).
hope there's plenty quality time in this sabbatical!
But note that she still intends to come back after the sabbatical year. So: Want to? Yes, she does.
Was hoping to find some sabbatical stories in the comments. I was working 12 hours a day with no weekends and felt trapped in a state of urgency and like I was missing out on things. Took a 3 month sabbatical and it changed everything!
Sometimes you don't notice that you could have done things better or differently until you take a step back. I'm about to pass out and wish I could've written more.
This always seems to be framed as a women's obligation. The children have two parents.
My family had lots of nannies by profession. Most of them worked for rich people who had all the time to spend with their kids but they choose not to. Most of them would spend about a hour or two per day with their kids total. And these people are not exceptions by any means from what I've seen. I always found this fascinating and contrary to what everyone say they want, rich people are fascinating.
Also, if she blames herself, doesn't that mean she sees herself as having agency to either work or not work, which means that she isn't obliged to do either?
There's no need to twist words – I'd interpret Jessica's words as expressing a normal, human, desire to spend time with and get to know her children.
She's been working at a very high level, and likely has seen much less of her children than someone working a regular 9-5 would.
Criticizing mothers for not spending enough time with the kids while not criticizing fathers is certainly sexist and problematic. But real parental involvement is generally understood to be good for the kids. So, let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater here.
The world is a bit stacked against those who aren't at home for their kids childhood. For example, in the first year, a kid will grow a tiny bit during each nap that they take. If you are at home, you get to see this. If you are at work away from home, you miss two or three tiny growth increments each day.
So it is both parent's obligation, but can be difficult to carry off if one works away from home.
Their contribution to the culture of startups, awareness of the importance of "nice people", creating the alumni network, fostering a supportive and intensely creative atmosphere within YC during the launch phase, diffusing good ideas and practices. Jessica, as part of the YC leadership (especially with PG's support and encouragement), has been central to that, both figuring it out and getting it all to actually work day-to-day.
Beyond the core YC team, this cultural progress has been possible because of a broad receptivity in the generation of potential founders that have flocked to YC. If Paul & Jessica had been alone in their attitude, they never would have developed momentum. It's been part of a generational shift in attitudes towards business, and I love that.
So thank you both Paul & Jessica for being so open about YC, and for having an attitude of service, and to everyone who has worked together with them! Here's to future generations of idealist entrepreneurs.
How about Jeff Bezos (AWS certainly powers more startups that YC)?
or
Steve Jobs (Mobile)?
or
Ryan Dahl (nodejs)?
> "...made as large an impact on the global economy in the 21st century" && "[opened] up the playing field for women."
A non zero-sum way of saying things might just be to thank JL for all the great work she's done, huge impact she's had, and so on. No arguments about 'the top person'.
Gwynne Shotwell would be a good example. She is the President & COO of SpaceX, that is actively significantly reducing the cost of launching satellites, and working on global internet access.
> She believes that a decade from now, she expects to see “tons of women-founded unicorns."
Tons? Remove the women-founded filter and it's still not believable. I don't think it's realistic to expects tons of unicorns in general. How many have there been (total) in the past 10 years?