"I noticed that the developer wasn’t working on a Sunday"
There are many obvious reasons why this company failed, and I'm surprised that YC gave them any money, but that statement jumped out as a huge red flag of "bad founder". If you think you _need_ 80+ hour weeks, or _need_ to work 6 days a week, never mind 7, you are already failing. Not only are you burning your people out, you're setting a bad example and demonstrating that your business is not viable.
Your people should be working normal hours from day 1. Save the extra hours for emergencies, or big (big as in couple times a year at most) releases or deadlines. If they want to tinker from home or spend a Saturday morning writing an email with ideas, that's when you know you've engaged them, but buying into the "we run on midnight oil" story of startups is just plain not smart.
Couldn't agree more strongly. Of course in a startup you'll occasionally put in extra hours (I once spent 60 hours straight writing copy for a deadline), but if you think this should be the norm, then what the hell are you supposed to do when there's a real emergency??
Smart dudes who go four-wheeling in the mud only turn on the four-wheel-drive when they get stuck.
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"I noticed that the developer wasn’t working on a Sunday"
There are many obvious reasons why this company failed, and I'm surprised that YC gave them any money, but that statement jumped out as a huge red flag of "bad founder". If you think you _need_ 80+ hour weeks, or _need_ to work 6 days a week, never mind 7, you are already failing. Not only are you burning your people out, you're setting a bad example and demonstrating that your business is not viable.
Your people should be working normal hours from day 1. Save the extra hours for emergencies, or big (big as in couple times a year at most) releases or deadlines. If they want to tinker from home or spend a Saturday morning writing an email with ideas, that's when you know you've engaged them, but buying into the "we run on midnight oil" story of startups is just plain not smart.
Couldn't agree more strongly. Of course in a startup you'll occasionally put in extra hours (I once spent 60 hours straight writing copy for a deadline), but if you think this should be the norm, then what the hell are you supposed to do when there's a real emergency??
Smart dudes who go four-wheeling in the mud only turn on the four-wheel-drive when they get stuck.