One thing that comes with experience is the realization that hours of startup work do not necessarily translate into results. At IndexTank I routinely averted multi-week efforts (saving lots of late night hacking) because I realized that their potential value to the company would have been marginal at best. It's true that there are times when a team needs to fix something ASAP, which may require 24-48 hours of near-constant work. However, this should not be the norm.

In the long run, having a team where everyone works insane hours leads to burnout, turnover, and monoculture (i.e. mostly twentysomethings without family commitments). A leadership team who can figure out that 500 hours of X is as valuable as 2000 hours of Y can yield the same results without unnecessary suffering.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/06/27/sleep-as-a-competitiv...

I think it's quantity vs. quality. There are times when a huge overtime crunch is needed or when something is "on fire" and has to be dealt with right now, but the data is showing that overwork, lack of sleep, and too much focus on only one thing results in a loss of higher-order mental capacities such as creativity and long-term thinking.

I've experienced this subjectively myself... doing the workaholic thing for more than month or two and literally being unable to remember what it was that I was really doing or why I was doing it. You basically degenerate into some kind of crank-out-the-next-thing automaton with no big picture thinking ability or vision.

I've also seen second hand what occurs when this happens to a company's leadership, and I think a lot of avoidable failure spirals originate this way. If you're not being successful you need to pivot, and that takes creativity and an ability to stand outside the box of what you're currently doing. Those mental abilities are the first to go in an overwork scenario.

Other negatives include depression, anxiety, and impulsive behavior. It was actually kind of scary. I had to give up the tech entrepreneur orbit for a while until I could re-center myself, and coming back to it now I consider it very important to avoid that trap.

Personally I think the cult of workaholism is more about machismo than real performance. There's this weird ego thing in a number of industries including tech where people brag about how many hours they work, how little they sleep, etc. It's stupid.

But if you come out as a solid programmer with good technical sense and enough seasoning to figure out existing systems and work on them without introducing a maintenance nightmare down the line, that will be recognized and rewarded. If you are good at what you do and professional the only one who will look down their nose at you for working a solid 9-5 are fools and megalomaniacs—most of whom are destined to flame out spectacularly without ever having built anything of value.

our startup's been a ~50hr/wk place for 2 years, built great product, and got acquired in January. we didn't make $19B, but we aren't complaining either.

from your priority set, which I personally agree with, you have plenty of options - but you'll have to be "on guard" for the manic places that think 70hrs is normal and the "only way" to be successful. pro tip - they are incorrect.

i do recommend coming up to SF over the peninsula though.... YMMV.

Is 40-50 hours a week the new casual? That's 9-12+ hours of work and/or adjacent things per weekday considering lunch and any sort of commute.

I've done everything from 40-70+ per week, for quarters at a time.

Personally, if I was being heavily recruited I'd be looking for 20-32 hours per week of consulting over a 40+ hour grind, preferably in a place without a high cost of living.

For example last year I interviewed with a former YC company and they were saying that it's not uncommon for 90% of the team to still be in the office after 9:30pm.

Occasionally putting in long hours is a requirement of every job. I understand that, and in fact prefer to work late some times. But working past 9pm every night, never seeing your family, never doing anything with anyone outside of work? That's just absurd. Unfortunately that's the culture of the Valley.

This is actually part of my thought.

My completely anecdotal notion is that the typical 8 hours a day breaks down to something closer to half that in truly productive work.

We're just stuck with ancient conventions about time and pay that really don't make a whole hell of a lot of sense applied to knowledge work.

I think it would be a better deal for everyone involved to get 4 hours of relative brilliance per day than the same or less overall productivity out of 8+.

What I discovered is that there are always places to hike, bike, walk, play basketball, social groups, tech circles you just need to find them.

I'm 37 (so 90 in Valley Years) and I share the same vision you described above. What worked for me was making sure I separated myself from my work. Make it appoint to get out and find the things I like to do and then dont make an excuse not to do them. Does that bug really need to be fixed tonight? Or can you fix it in the morning after some exercise, food, sleep and for me a clearer mind....

YMMV.

You will also most likely make more money outside of Silicon Valley by being able to save more of your take home pay.

Sure, they're nerds, so they enjoy "weird" stuff, but they are not workaholics.

Other companies in the Valley may be different. Other people may know workaholics at Google.

But my anecdotal evidence is that yes, people can make it in the Valley and live a well-rounded life.

Then, I entered the other spectrum in a corporate structure company. Most of the people there didn't give much effort and just waited for the time to get to 5pm for then to leave home. The day was full with smoke breaks and coffee breaks.

When we (with friends) started a startup, 7 days a week was the norm. This quickly proved inefficient in the long term as people started resenting, not to mention long term thinking was missing and a lot of honest effort was a complete waste.

We're now into a normal work week model with the occasional up/down depending on the situation. But we got sufficient funding. Before we didn't and sometimes the pressure triggers a short-term mode where you want to grind as much as possible for the money-time-food you have available.

tl;dr - you are your own master and commander. You don't have to follow the "norm" but others may expect you to do so. In the end it's your choice.

@diego and @api summed up the benefits of a normal work time. Smart people value their rest. And, as you are probably aware - the best ideas usually come in the times when you are resting from work.

Free time has allowed me to get good at psychology, philosophy, sociology, marketing, critical thinking, martial arts, game design, have a decent fitness and endurance levels, social contacts with healthy people and so on resources, which I wound't have had of I was focusing only on work. Not to mention I would have probably go haywire.

Actually, without the knowledge of those fields, my overall suitability for business would be severely limited.

Though I've seen some people find a different balance: a couple years of intense work followed by lengthy sabbaticals to unwind.