When I was working at HP, just after graduating from college, the CEO (Lew Platt) announced that he would be stressing work-life balance among employees. He specifically said that he wanted to accommodate working mothers, and especially single-parent families. He officially blessed the idea of job sharing (such that two people could each have a part-time job) and flexible hours, to help in that way.
The particularly poignant part of this story was that he learned the importance of such flexibility the hard way: His wife died from cancer, and he was left taking care of his children by himself. Suddenly, he realized how much work it was to raise children, and he decided that HP should try to take into account people's personal needs, such that they could be with their families and have jobs.
I don't know how deep those changes really went, and I don't know how many of them have continued until today. But those announcements and attempts to help people balance their personal and professional lives have stayed with me for about two decades.
Sure, I work crazy hours (as a freelancer, and also trying to finish a PhD) -- but part of the reason I work late at night is because I value spending time with my wife and children. I cringe when I see startups (and other companies) expecting people, explicitly or implicitly, to sacrifice their family time for the sake of the company except in unusual circumstances. And yet, there's no doubt that for many of these companies, success often does demand more than a simple, 40-hour week.
I'm glad that the original author realizes now that he could and should have spent more time with his family. But I do wonder if he is willing to tell the people working at his startups, "Hey, that program can be debugged tomorrow. Go home and spend time with your children. Software can wait, but they can't."
The particularly poignant part of this story was that he learned the importance of such flexibility the hard way: His wife died from cancer, and he was left taking care of his children by himself. Suddenly, he realized how much work it was to raise children, and he decided that HP should try to take into account people's personal needs, such that they could be with their families and have jobs.
I don't know how deep those changes really went, and I don't know how many of them have continued until today. But those announcements and attempts to help people balance their personal and professional lives have stayed with me for about two decades.
Sure, I work crazy hours (as a freelancer, and also trying to finish a PhD) -- but part of the reason I work late at night is because I value spending time with my wife and children. I cringe when I see startups (and other companies) expecting people, explicitly or implicitly, to sacrifice their family time for the sake of the company except in unusual circumstances. And yet, there's no doubt that for many of these companies, success often does demand more than a simple, 40-hour week.
I'm glad that the original author realizes now that he could and should have spent more time with his family. But I do wonder if he is willing to tell the people working at his startups, "Hey, that program can be debugged tomorrow. Go home and spend time with your children. Software can wait, but they can't."