Comment by lacker | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lacker | Hacker News Reader

Many companies start like this. All of them have to dial it back at some point if they expand and are successful. The question is just when to dial it back.

If the founders are working 7 days a week, the first employees are excited about working 7 days a week, then it's kind of weird to hire a new person who isn't. Most likely, everyone will just quickly be thinking, hey the new guy sucks. Just gets everything done slower than everyone else.

At some point you have to, though. Anecdotally it seems like at some point the founding team gets tired and the CEO makes a call, okay it's time to go down to 6 days. And then later 5 days.

Different companies work different ways. I personally wouldn't want to work 7 days a week at this stage in my life. Or 6 days a week. Weekends with my kids are too important to me. But when I was younger and just breaking into the tech industry I would have done it. So, find a company that fits what you want. It's okay if not every company is a fit for you.

> the first employees are excited about working 7 days a week

> the new guy sucks. Just gets everything done slower

You made 2 mistakes here.

1. The first employees were not excited, they were all on paid trial periods and have no equity.

2. The other developer who quit and myself by far did all the work. Staying all night does not mean you get the most work done. Actually, the founders played basketball most of the time and got no work done. Over the years I've learned to become increasingly productive during the day (with the help of coffee, eating right/being active) and I effectively built most of their product even though I would "sneak out" at 7 at times. Staying late at night or going in on weekends never advanced the product. Most nights would end in the VP Eng. and founders drinking wine and whiskey (this is a YC startup mind you). They didn't do anything despite being there all the time.

That was a lesson learned in the 90s - people would show up to put in face time, but they weren't getting productive work done. It was all about politics and appearances, not good engineering.

My advice? Don't work for a startup without Eff-You money.

There's a reason they want young, inexperienced engineers - and it isn't because they know the "latest and greatest" tools and technologies.

When I started at my first job, at a small startup, I was definitely excited to work 7days a week. For me there was nothing better than doing what I loved every day. It lasted for about 6 months until I learned that it's not really healthy to do it, but I was enjoying it while it lasted.

I agree completely about the founders doing less work. That's also what I experienced. For them, it's less like a job. They are free to come and leave whenever they want, play hoops or whatever... it's less stressful than having a specific task that needs to be finished by some deadline.

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