I can easily do 60-70 hour weeks as long as I use the weekend too, but 16 hour days are ridiculous. I can't believe that the guy is able to give his 100% every day for 5 days a week at both companies. The most a normal person would be able to do is a half-assed job, but perhaps Jack is just an ubermensch.
Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
111–120 of 139 posts
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#112I am not surprised or in awe that he is putting in 16 hours a day. Every passionate founder would likely be doing it. I am sure most of us have heard Steve Job's on how building a company is usually a 18x7 work-week. What I am in awe and admiration is that he is managing two companies and in this case two completely different ones by nature! A rule generally accepted in the startup land is that you don't work on mult…
A rule generally accepted in the startup land is that you don't work on multiple ideas Interesting. I have not heard this before. As it stands, I have always worked on multiple projects for as long as I can remember. My current main company started out as a side project, for example. Is there a canonical reference or blog post that the startup community refers to, to elucidate the reasons for one-project focus?
The reference I can quote here is from a recent essay PG wrote: http://paulgraham.com/stypi.html. Watch the definition of startup #10 (Avoid Distractions) - http://www.stypi.com/hacks/13sentences
The other source again from PG, that I can infer as not doing too many things/working on too many ideas is: http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html Read the #18 (A Half-hearted attempt)
I am sure there are folks who have juggled more than one Idea and succeeded in all of them. Also, I think the relevance of these posts also probably make sense to someone starting out early (like say during building the product/company) and probably not for someone who already is working on established companies (like in Jack's case). IF you see Jack in fact moved out of twitter to completely focus on Square and only when it had hit the road running, did he embark back on twitter.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
No number is made explicit -- they can't really be demanding more than 40 hours / week for exempt employees in California. You're expected to "find your own work/life balance", but there is strong social pressure to stay in the office nights and weekends. I would expect to work 70 - 80+ weeks there if you're really into it (and checking in / working at home in the evenings and mornings).
US employment law is nuts, here in NZ you'd have an amazingly hard time firing people who don't work the 80hr weeks you wish they did.
I'm not sure what you mean about "US employment law is nuts". If you are an hourly employee, you get paid so many dollars/hours, for the number of hours you work, and after you work so many hours a day, you get paid overtime.
If you are exempt (Salaried) - you basically work when your manager tells you to. I've been at (several) companies where we had 3-4 month death marches with _everyone_ working late and on weekends in the office to push the ball over the line.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#114Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square, 0 hours at life, daily. In other words Jack is free to do whatever he likes, but it is not a good example for most of us. I'll cite a very short poetry by a Sicilian poet called Salvatore Quasimodo: "Everyone stands alone on the heart of the earth / transfixed by a ray of sunshine / and it is suddenly night"
I would have to disagree. If he is doing what he love, he is not spending any time at work.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#115Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square, 0 hours at life, daily. In other words Jack is free to do whatever he likes, but it is not a good example for most of us. I'll cite a very short poetry by a Sicilian poet called Salvatore Quasimodo: "Everyone stands alone on the heart of the earth / transfixed by a ray of sunshine / and it is suddenly night"
Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square, 0 hours at life, daily.
Sorry to say, but considering the amount of work we do daily. Its difficult to separate work from life.
Work and life aren't two different things. Work is life, and life to a great extent is some kind of a work.
To make your life awesome, you have to do awesome work.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
US employment law is nuts, here in NZ you'd have an amazingly hard time firing people who don't work the 80hr weeks you wish they did.
I'm not sure what you mean about "US employment law is nuts". If you are an hourly employee, you get paid so many dollars/hours, for the number of hours you work, and after you work so many hours a day, you get paid overtime. If you are exempt (Salaried) - you basically work when your manager tells you to. I've been at (several) companies where we had 3-4 month death marches with _everyone_ working late and on weeken…
I think he means exactly what you just described. That if you're paid hourly you'll get overtime so don't complain lest you be fired. That simply deciding you don't want to work those hours regardless of the overtime pay is not on the table. That if you're a salaried employee and a white collar worker, somehow any and all abuse is justified in the name of making you really earn that 85K a year plus some options we're probably going to screw you out of anyway. That you can be fired for trying to organize. That you can be fired for being sick, subsequently lose access to health care, and die. That you get two, maybe three weeks vacation a year, if you're lucky. And we'll shit on you for taking it, btw.
I guess what he's getting at is that the US is a pretty terrible place to work and live, gilded though the cage may often be, and it is hard to disagree.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can anyone from Square or Twitter confirm this work schedule?
I'm pretty familiar with Jack's situation. Yes, this is indeed true, now. For a time he was splitting one day on / one day off at each company. Frankly, Jack has very little time outside of his work, but I wouldn't say that he doesn't have a life. His work is his life and they are closely intertwined. This is great, since it means he's quite passionate about both product sets and the quality of his companies' net out…
Square sounds like a terrible place to work, then. We should stop giving startups free passes for demanding ridiculous hours out of employees in the name of equity, when they usually end up screwing their employees out of it anyway.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
No number is made explicit -- they can't really be demanding more than 40 hours / week for exempt employees in California. You're expected to "find your own work/life balance", but there is strong social pressure to stay in the office nights and weekends. I would expect to work 70 - 80+ weeks there if you're really into it (and checking in / working at home in the evenings and mornings).
US employment law is nuts, here in NZ you'd have an amazingly hard time firing people who don't work the 80hr weeks you wish they did.
How many startups come from NZ? The point here isn't "employment law", it's the fact that in the USA (generally, in the private sector) employment is considered a contract, not an entitlement.
If people at Square don't like the environment, they are free to find another job. Similarly, if Dorsey doesn't like an employee's output for any reason, or "the cut of his jib" for that matter, he pays him up to the day and fires him. If it can't be shown to be due to discrimination (race, gender etc), and there was no employment contract, that's that.
Without this culture, starting a company would be nearly impossible. You can see evidence of this in the number of innovative startups out of more heavily regulated countries vs. the US.
[edit: I would add that there is a perverse incentive here: I believe US startups under-hire women and people of color _precisely_ because it is not that difficult to make a case for discrimination in promotion, compensation, and treatment of employees here. Hiring white, upper-middle-class males greatly reduces that risk. I think it's an unfortunate unintended consequence of the desire to redress discrimination.]
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
I simply do not want that type of lifestyle What kind of lifestyle do you want? When given the chance, most entrepreneurs will work 16 hours on their company. If you only had 8 hours, you may be more likely to do a better job at managing your time/tasks.
>What kind of lifestyle do you want? A balanced one. I already spend a vast majority of my waking hours focused on "work". I also have my kids, my wife and other leisure activities that I find make my life worth living. Given these pieces of life, which most entrepreneurs have - most entrepreneurs will not want to work 16 hours a day on their companies.
I hear you, but you can talk about that with a guz in his early twenties who has no responsibilities in terms of family. I dont work 16 hours a day, but i work alot and putting my friends down again and again when they ask me to go out etc is sometimes frustrating and does not work very well for a long time. Same goes for family of course.
Re: Jack Dorsey does 8 hours at Twitter, 8 hours at Square daily
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
US employment law is nuts, here in NZ you'd have an amazingly hard time firing people who don't work the 80hr weeks you wish they did.
How many startups come from NZ? The point here isn't "employment law", it's the fact that in the USA (generally, in the private sector) employment is considered a contract, not an entitlement. If people at Square don't like the environment, they are free to find another job. Similarly, if Dorsey doesn't like an employee's output for any reason, or "the cut of his jib" for that matter, he pays him up to the day and fi…
Personally, as I said in another thread, I think the US anti-discrimination laws are fundamentally flawed. Hiring is an art, not a science. But that is another topic.