Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success • Hacker News Board

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#151

Post by koonsolo » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:29 PM UTC

pastor_elm wrote: post #21

simonw wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Study after study has shown that working 80 hours dramatically reduces your productivity during those hours. I loved what Tobi said in this tweet: https://twitter.com/simonw/status/1210622908143415297 "For creative work, you can't cheat. My believe is that there are 5 creative hours in everyone's day. All I ask of people at Shopify is that 4 of those are channeled into the company." 5 creative hours in a day absolute…

If he's asking for 4 hours of work, then why ask for a 40 hour work week and not a 20 hour one? 40 hours (9-6) is rough enough!

You cannot work at 100% in 4 uninterrupted hours. You need to take some breaks in between, and also do some mundane things.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#152

Post by Permit » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:34 PM UTC

bwb wrote: post #28

I don't believe anyone really does 80 hours. I just don't think it is possible and I don't think you can call sitting at a desk doing nothing "work". I've done 60 hours during intense periods just fine... but it was only effective because of the nature of the work I was doing at the time. And, I usually took a break down the road to compensate. In no way was it even 50% creative work. 4 to 6 creative hours seems righ…

I think it's possible but probably not sustainable. Nick Winters did a 120-hour programming/game-dev workweek and filmed it so you could see if he was cheating: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0qlr22cF14

HN discussion at the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6760685

I'm also open to the possibility that might be a very small percentage of people who could do it and that I might just not be one of them.

I'm also open to the possibility that I've been conditioned to expect 40 hour work weeks and that's why I may not be able to do much more. Apparently it's common for students in China to attend school for 12 hours a day. Perhaps if I'd been raised in a similar environment it would be easier to focus for longer?

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#153

Post by andruby » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:34 PM UTC

nathanvanfleet wrote: post #146

I remember when I applied to work there as an iOS engineer and they didn't even phone screen me because I didn't have a strong enough social media profile.

Did they communicate this reason to you? That seems like a ridiculous requirement. Especially for engineers.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#154

Post by zentiggr » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:37 PM UTC

toufka wrote: post #65

bwb wrote: post #28

I don't believe anyone really does 80 hours. I just don't think it is possible and I don't think you can call sitting at a desk doing nothing "work". I've done 60 hours during intense periods just fine... but it was only effective because of the nature of the work I was doing at the time. And, I usually took a break down the road to compensate. In no way was it even 50% creative work. 4 to 6 creative hours seems righ…

It does happen, but generally in environments that are different from the 'normal' workplace - environments that contain a sense of community, where breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and sometimes evenings and sleeping are part of the job: grad school, hospitals, fieldwork, law/consulting/IB firms, etc. It seems like the mid-decade tech ideal was to import that kind of workplace style. And you're right, that those hours…

I can say I've done a few 72 - 96 hour stretches of near total wakefulness (power naps of 20-40 minutes as possible, food and caffeine available nearly any time) but there's definitely a feeling of disconnect, being separate from the senses and just floating inside my own head toward the end of those.

We're talking full up tactical exercises in the military, and a couple of critical repair scenarios here and there since.

A couple of days of near total downtime is a minimum to reset from that kind of effort, and 'normal' work for at least a week or two if possible.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#155

Post by nif2ee » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:39 PM UTC

GVIrish wrote: post #150

nif2ee wrote: post #128

let's see what happens if he starts today all over again. He forgot to mention the most important thing, that he was at the right place and right time. No matter how you come up with a 1000x better Shopify today, you most probably won't go anywhere. Many clunky business projects that were started with the rise of social media (around 2004-2013) made their owners kings ONLY because they were at the right place and tim…

I don't think that argument holds at all. The low hanging fruit from 10 years ago has been picked. But in a lot of ways we only see it as low hanging fruit in hindsight. Today there are new business opportunities that in 10 years will seem like they were low hanging fruit. There are new technologies today that will enable new businesses that wouldn't have been feasible before. Even then, there are only going to be bu…

I get your argument and I appreciate it. But the nature of those low hanging fruit are more complicated today. For example, you can't just recreate Twitter, Facebook, Reddit today in your home with a couple of friends with no solid experience. You similarly can't start most successful SaaS ideas that were started in 2010-2014. Most successful YouTubers started their channels around 2008-2011. This was a time when you could make a very successful venture relying on the viral marketing by social media and Google search. Nowadays, this is over. You can go and try this same hippie way for starting a small business today but your chances of success are 1000x lower. The internet is much bigger, and it's much more centralized and concentrated and the competition is much more harsher.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#156

Post by thor24 » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:40 PM UTC

richardlblair wrote: post #89

misterman0 wrote: post #79

I think it's wrong to celebrate a company that claims 80% of what it is to be you, even when other companies claim even more. I question the reason behind us devoting ourselves to these undemocratic structures.

I worked at Shopify for 4 1/2 years. I was happy to devote those creative hours because I believe in the mission. It's where I wanted my energy to be spent, and this was the general sentiment. You have to remember most of the people who work there can work almost anywhere. They have specifically chosen to dedicate 80% of their creative energy at Shopify.

Why did you leave? (I am just curious) I am considering applying for the company in the coming months.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#157

Post by AndrewKemendo » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:46 PM UTC

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #144

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't count dinner as work, that was just my whole schedule.

Do you feel as a society that we should condone working beyond dinner like like? As I read your schedule, I think, “if this couldn’t be handled between 9-5, with a no-work break for lunch, then something is wrong here and effective decisions aren’t being made.” I say this as someone with a similar job, the machine learning manager with several teams reporting to me, budgets in the tens of millions per year, staffing…

In fact there's plenty of saying no and choosing what to let sit idle happening in my portfolio, so I concur that's just part of being a mature manager. In fact I could point to at least two places in my organization that are somewhat "idle" at the moment where I could actually put additional attention. However creating that bandwidth would break other things.

FWIW, I'm the only one on my team working these kind of hours because we're still establishing our whole organization and my roles are sundry. I also recognize it as an outlier position, so I don't expect anyone to work anything more than the 40 hour week they are being paid for.

I guess rather than talking though specifics though, it's better to ask - when is it reasonable to expect a work schedule like I describe to exist and for how long?

There's no single answer to this, but it's probably a solution to the inputs of product/business maturity, funding and number of personnel with the right skills. If any of those three are "out of balance" people will need to be putting in more work than their pay and job descriptions provide for.

I'm sure being an engineering manager at a FAANG is probably pretty reasonable from a lifestyle perspective.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#158

Post by patrickdavey » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:52 PM UTC

In my opinion there's absolutely nothing to be proud about in working long hours for long stretches. All you're doing is setting up or maintaining a completely unmaintainable situation. If you're finding you have to work > 40 hours regularly, someone is making and signing off on bad estimates.

If you're salaried, and you're working extra hours regularly, all you're doing is reducing your effective hourly rate.

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#159

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:55 PM UTC

slumdev wrote: post #138

dvt wrote: post #26

What's unfortunate is that on the other side of the coin, "rockstar CEOs" like Elon Musk claim they sleep 4 hours a night and work 90 hour weeks. I think Musk does this mostly for publicity/image reasons and not that it's actually true, but you've got plenty of wantapreneurs parroting this (imo) unhealthy lifestyle.

> sleep 4 hours a night This is not healthy or impressive, and it may be the first sign of dementia for many people.

[deleted]

Re: Shopify CEO says long hours aren't necessary for success

#160

Post by losvedir » Fri, Dec 27, 2019, 8:57 PM UTC

bwb wrote: post #28

I don't believe anyone really does 80 hours. I just don't think it is possible and I don't think you can call sitting at a desk doing nothing "work". I've done 60 hours during intense periods just fine... but it was only effective because of the nature of the work I was doing at the time. And, I usually took a break down the road to compensate. In no way was it even 50% creative work. 4 to 6 creative hours seems righ…

> I don't believe anyone really does 80 hours. I just don't think it is possible

That's a weird thing to believe. I saw it all the time when I worked in finance (but I was capped at 60 hrs, which I did routinely), and it seems pretty par-for-the-course for my friends who are doctors and lawyers.

I don't think it's healthy, but it's certainly done.