How I came to work 65 hours a week and love it
July 9, 2008 – 12:32 amI got a new job which is why I haven’t been writing. Actually, I lied. About both. The job is a few weeks old, so it’s only sort of “new” and I haven’t been writing because I wasn’t feeling it. I had writers block. Then I talked to Penelope about having writers block and she said I was just whining. So I got over it. As to the new job- it’s amazing. I’m the Vice President of Web Development for a startup called National Speed.
I must say, startups are a blast to work for. National Speed is no exception, except maybe being even more of a blast to work for because our team is amazing and our plan is great and we’re going to succeed. No, I don’t think that’s what everyone who works at a startup says.
Part of what makes a startup such a blast is that you define the company, its culture, its brand, and ultimately its success. Being that you’re a startup, you’re also usually doing all this business stuff without the amount of resources you realisticaly need to do the job, so it’s hard as hell. It means you’re constantly building the company. Constantly. As it is now, I love every minute of it… but to be honest, I wasn’t sure I would.
I always knew believed told myself I was the entrepreneurial, startup type. After I graduated, however, I wasn’t so sure. Having put so many hours into college, the thought of a 9-5 job where the time after work was my own sounded appealing. OK, so I really didn’t put that many hours into college. I spent most of my time working on side projects. But I put in a lot of hours during those 4 years one way or another, and the visions I had of doing whatever I felt like after work looked nice.
The only thing about most 9-5 jobs is they tend to be dull. Or maybe I got unlucky and a lot of other people got unlucky, too. But all the 9-5’s I’ve worked at in the past left more bored, having finished everything I needed to do earlier that morning. This usually left waiting for an exciting moment at work like a school girl waiting for a boy to tell her he likes her (an odd circumstance since I have no idea what it’s like to be a school girl.). It’s there I told myself I would rather work 65 hours a week, having more to do than I could shake not just a stick at, but an entire tree at.
See, instead of wasting time attempting to prevent my inevitable insanity by figuring out how to stretch 20 hours of work into 40 hours of “something to do” for the week, I could just have 2 years of work to do in a week (I realize that’s not possible). A completely practical argument.
That, to me, meant it really came down to either becoming OK with being mediocre, or taking the step and manning up to the task of building a company. A much more practical and convincing argument.
I chose the latter, as the title so kindly indicates, and I have yet to regret it. Except for maybe that one night a week where I wake up in a cold sweat after dreaming about how the company failed and it’s all my fault. But really, I dared to follow my passion for a startup life, and I will never regret it even if it means working 65+ hours. That doesn’t mean it’s for everyone, but if at the very least you’re debating taking the dive into a job with long hours but that you know you’ll love- I’ll tell you the plunge is worth it.
2 Responses to “How I came to work 65 hours a week and love it”
I love ur articles!
By Emmy on Jul 23, 2008
Thanks, Emmy :)
By Nathan Snell on Jul 23, 2008