Break Through the Work/Life Balance Fear
I am glad that the eight-hour day had not been invented when I was a young man. If my life had been made up of eight-hour days, I don't believe I could have accomplished a great deal.
Thomas Edison
The Dreaded Interview Question
"What does your company do to ensure a good work/life balance for your employees?"
Many candidates ask this while interviewing for a job at our company. It has been like that for many years.
The question blows my mind, especially from young college graduates.
Translation: "I want you to take a chance on me, to hire me, pay me well. But what will you do to ensure I don't work too hard?"
Inspiration from the ‘80s
Last week, after supper, my kids scrolled through our movie library. They landed on "The Secret of My Success," the 1980s movie starring Michael J. Fox as a high-energy college graduate moving from Kansas to New York City, determined to make it big on his own.
It is not a highly-rated or well-known movie, but one I have always liked. I told the kids it was the movie closest to capturing my path when I moved from Iowa to college to Chicago almost thirty years ago.
In the movie, Brantley (Michael J. Fox) works two jobs at the same company - a mailroom job to get his foot in the door and his dream corporate job he then creates. This ambitious set-up requires Brantley to burn the midnight oil regularly. I love the scene showing him alone in his office after dark, busy working but happy in his own world as he delves deep into research for his corporate job.
The Early Days
The next day at lunch, I talked about the movie to my best friend Charlie, the owner of our Internet company. We reminisced about the early days when we started building websites in the mid-1990s. Charlie focused then on computer networking and hardware, selling to local small businesses and law firms. I worked as an intern at a sports organization. We worked 9-to-5 jobs, and Charlie swung by my office to pick me up at the end of the day. We then drove downtown on the Kennedy Expressway to his older brother's law office on the 22nd floor of a classic art deco high-rise, where we hosted our one Internet server. That was our second job - our fledgling web development company.
When I arrived in Chicago after college, the original plan was to build a website for the sports organization as part of my internship. However, like Brantley's experience in the movie, that first door quickly shut. ESPN rolled my website project into a multi-million dollar TV contract, taking away my primary job responsibility.
Charlie had just sold his first website to the owner of a local Western clothing store. Our new customer's main business was a plant nursery, but the man loved cowboys and Western clothing and wanted to create a website dedicated to his passion.
Besides him servicing my company's Novell computer network, Charlie and I didn't really know each other yet. But Charlie knew I had created a sports website in college and asked me to help build the cowboy site, offering me a new computer in return. I jumped at the chance.
We worked nights and weekends, scanning photos from Western catalogs and magazines and typing in content. I learned all about Tony Lama boots and Stetson hats. It felt so free to work hard at something I loved, especially after scrambling 8 hours each day trying to stay busy at my internship.
After a couple of months, we launched the new cowboy site on the first T1 Internet line to go into that downtown office building. A T1 line is 1.5 Mbps. Almost thirty years later, our company's data center network now supports over 10,000 Mbps. I remember sitting in our office and noticing the router's lights start blinking. Charlie would say, "Look! Someone is using the site!" He would call his dad to see if he was on the site. Then contact the owner of the website, the "cowboy guy," to see if it was him. If it were neither, Charlie would hang up the phone, puff out his chest, and say, "Yup, that is a real user on the site."
A Growing Business
We searched for more sales, going to prospects dressed in our best suits, sometimes bringing Charlie's dad and his friends for backup. We did anything we could to make ourselves look older and more like an established company. We knew we could do the job if we could gain enough trust to win the deal.
After about a year, we finally had enough business for Charlie to pay me a salary so I could quit the sports job and work full-time with him creating websites. Although I loved sports, I realized that working with Charlie and his company was a better fit for me. Not only because of the computers/Internet, but the fun and excitement of starting a company and building it up. It was one of the easiest (and best) decisions I have ever made.
Before long, we hired several more guys our age and moved into a small office in a suburb on the northwestern edge of Chicago. We all handled multiple roles, chipping in to help our customers in any way we could. We closed the office for an hour at lunchtime every day and forwarded the phones to Charlie’s mom. After work, we blew off steam by playing “NFL Blitz” on our Sony Playstation or by racing in a network version of the "Need for Speed" video game. We lost a lot of 16-inch softball games on Thursday summer nights, followed by laughter over pizza and beer. Our camaraderie was not scheduled like a child's playdate, as so many corporate events are these days. No, it was spontaneous; it was real.
As our company grew, I worked nights and weekends, usually 70+ hours weekly. I loved it. Seeing my hard work pay off in new customers and new employees was so much fun. I was hooked.
I often forgot to leave the office to eat dinner because I was so enthralled with my work. It reminded me of helping my grandpa shingle roofs as a kid. Our town's noon whistle would blow, meaning it was time for lunch. But Grandpa was so locked in that he would not even hear it, relying on my brothers and me to tap him on the shoulder to stop and eat.
A 15-Year Holding Pattern
This period of 60-70 hour weeks lasted way longer than I hoped. I wanted to meet someone special, get married, and start a family. But God's timing was different than mine. I poured my time and energy into the company instead of sitting around and doing nothing. I knew my life was out of balance but didn't know what else to do.
When I look back at those years before meeting my wife, Kristy, I don't know what I would have done differently. Many people told me that working so hard wasn't good for me and would stress me out. But I was much more stressed going to bars or clubs, trying to do what "normal" people my age were doing. Even today, my heart rate uncomfortably skyrockets when I hear the thumping beat of a dance club song - pure misery.
I could have read more, but I didn’t yet know the right books, especially the Bible or ones like “Jesus Calling” that would point me there. And even if I had known the right books, they likely would not have held the same meaning as when I read them after Kristy passed away.
Our company launched many impressive, high-profile sports, e-commerce, and government websites. For a high-achiever like me, this was a big deal.
Of course, there were low points as well. I struggled with unreasonable expectations for others, disappointed when they didn’t match my high dedication to the company. Although I valued family and wanted one of my own, I didn’t fully understand how to manage people with kids until I became a dad. I didn’t trust people enough and learned hard lessons when I stumbled into messes by taking on too much.
Building a Shelter
But above it all, I value the special friendships I made over these years. I didn't know it then, but my hard work, dedication, and loyalty were building a shelter for a storm.
When the unthinkable happened, and Kristy was diagnosed with cancer, our company was there to support us. Charlie, his brother, and his mom and dad had become my Chicago family. The company itself had become my extended family with special relationships spanning over 5/10/15/20+ years.
I had built such a high level of trust with the people at our company. They now helped cover me and my family as we went through the most turbulent time of our lives.
I am so grateful for that. Something that I can never put a price on.
Something I will never forget.
Life gets better as you replace transactions with relationships.
Kevin Kelly
No Regrets
In today's world, most people worry more about protecting themselves so their company doesn’t take advantage of them. They set firm boundaries, not wanting to clock a minute past 5 pm. Forget about working on a weekend. They ask for a raise or new title anytime they take on any new responsibility. Also, can I be fully remote? What about hybrid? More PTO, please?
I feel sorry for the people brainwashed into this way of thinking.
Stop carefully keeping score about what you’re giving to your employer and what you’re getting back. Give, give, give, then give some more. Be humble and willing to help wherever you can. Be curious, ask questions. Hustle for the customer.
If you do those things, you will be rewarded beyond what you thought was ever possible. You will be so in demand that you will likely never have to ask for a raise.
I hope more people open their minds and consider the possibility they are missing out on something extraordinary. That, rather than sitting on the couch like a log watching Netflix or obsessed with sports gambling, they may be more fulfilled by plunging into their work. That they take advantage of their immense freedom when they’re single by investing more time in their craft, often creating lifelong friendships along the way.
Things obviously change when you marry and start a family - more balance is needed. I am in a different season of my life now with two young kids, and I’m loving it, soaking in every moment I can with them.
And, while I no longer put in such long hours at work, those many years prepped me so I could better enjoy this time. I saved money to afford a beautiful old house with a huge backyard within a 5-minute drive to our office. I improved at delegating and getting more efficient at my time. It took patience, but I trained trusted, loyal employees who handle more now, so I have the time to help coach my son's travel baseball team and be there for my kids' fun times.
During those years when I logged heavy hours at work, many people told me I was crazy. They thought I was getting the raw end of the deal. But I knew better.
I wasn't just getting paid well for doing what I loved. I was gaining a second family.
Image credit: Alamy