1. introduction
This is a question I will never fully understand.
I’ve worked in this industry for four years now, and I don’t think I have ever heard anyone speak about an all-nighter quite like this before.
And this is something we have to ask ourselves every night before we go to sleep: do we really need the night?
The answer, of course, is no. But I have to ask: why do we need it?
I mean, what if the answer is yes? What if you are a highly motivated worker who wants to work as hard as possible for six hours or so every night? What if you enjoy that sort of thing very much and it makes your life better?
What if you feel that the best way to accomplish your goal(s) is by spending the entire day working nights and then trying to get up early on days when you feel more awake and refreshed?
What if the answer is no? Then what do you say then? Why not just stay up late and get up early anyway? (I used to live in a small town where nobody was awake until 8:00pm.) What’s the purpose of all this work anyway? You are suffering from insomnia, aren’t you? You should just take sleeping pills. Or maybe take some Vihnase or whatever they call it these days. Why not an all-nighter with some good friends who are also working really hard like you are doing right now too… oh well.
2. yes all-nighters are worth it
All-nighters are a special breed of overnight. They can be great, but only if they’re done right. In other words, you don’t want to do them right or you will end up with a hangover-riddled, sleepless week that is not worth it.
Numerous studies have shown that people who work long hours tend to outperform those who sleep longer and those who work more efficiently. There are also a number of reasons why people might end up working more:
• Chain of Command (e.g., executive assistant doing the same job as chief executive)
• Increased efficiency
• Lack of time management skills (e.g., day trading)
• Optimization for the future
• Inconsistency between goals and behavior (e.g., one person wants to learn coding in two months, while another wants to learn it on vacation)
Which all make lots of sense; but they generally mean that you aren’t going to be able to do much if you end up taking on too much work in the first place — which in turn means that your allotted hours will likely go down as well (or increase). But not having enough time also means that your productivity goes down; and simply because you have more tasks doesn’t mean that you have more energy for them! All-nighters are bad for your brain, poor at managing the time available and don’t lead to better performance on any measurable metric. And yet most startups do them anyway because it is considered part of their culture or their sales problem-solving strategy (especially when companies like Salesforce and Shopify offer free all-nighters anyway!).
I am not arguing against all-nighters; they can be great if done right…but only in moderation! In fact we’ve got a pretty great all-nighter program today at our company thanks to an awesome investor who has been very supportive over the years, so I wanted to share his thoughts on this topic too:
“All nigh: Bring it on! The truth is most startups need some sort of structure—even if it’s just 2 hours a day—to get things done.” — Tony Hsieh (@tonyhsieh) May 29, 2017 “All nigh: Bring it on! The truth is most startups need some sort of structure—even if it’s just 2 hours a
3. the science behind it
For many people, trying to succeed in the evening is a very different proposition from trying to succeed before 8am. This is because 8am is not a normal time for most people (who are likely on the go), and it isn’t a typical time for many people (who would rather be at home).
And so, for many people, success in the evening is simply impossible.
If you think about it, this makes perfect sense: if you have been up since 6am, you have no choice but to go back to sleep before it gets light outside. And if you are like me and have never been able to fall asleep until after midnight (and even then only after hours of sleep deprivation), then your brain will be overloaded by that time; your sleep cycle will be disrupted; and even if you manage to fall asleep when the sun finally rises, it won’t be long before your brain kicks into overdrive again. No amount of willpower can make that happen.
I grew up in a small town called West Haven, Connecticut. In my childhood I spent every night watching reruns of “The Simpsons” from 11pm-6am — and I did not get any better with time! I would often lie awake in bed just thinking about how much better I could do things if I was only able to stay awake until dawn instead of 12:30 or 1:30 or 2am. And that night wasn’t going to change anytime soon either. The same goes for most people; that’s just how it is.
We should all realize that getting enough sleep isn’t an unattainable goal — but we should also know this doesn’t mean we need to spend the whole night staring at our phones looking at lists of products and features while desperately trying to get one more person into Slack or wake up at 3 am just so we can answer “What do you guys use?” before someone else does! This is true for both startups and businesses big enough for executives who are used to 8pm-4am workdays as well as startups who have mostly stayed away from work until 10pm or later on nights/weekends where they don’t feel like going out-and-about with their friends or family just yet…
The science behind this is pretty simple: unlike humans (whose brains are designed for an eight hour day), robots don’t need any more than
4. reasons why you should do it
A few years ago, I went to a job interview where the hiring manager asked me to present my ideas for the product. The idea was that they would then go over them with me, and I’d then make a presentation of my ideas, in which case we’d have a discussion about whether it was possible to build the product.
The point of this exercise is that it forces you to think about your notion of what the product is and why you think it’s feasible. But more than that, it forces you to think through all kinds of questions: questions about whether or not you should do this, why you think that question is important and how you’re going to find the answers.
The best examples are when someone asks us questions like “Why should we build out this feature?” or “Why should we spend our time on this?” or “Why do we need it at all?” And after thinking about it for a while, we can usually say something like: “We would love to build out this feature but our team has been working very hard on something else and we really don’t have as much time as they do so they could be doing less work than they otherwise would. And if we try to force them into this feature now because they need more time than they currently have, then their efforts will be wasted because their attention will be diverted elsewhere (which is something that will negatively impact their productivity) and if we don’t want them to waste their time on something then we need to make sure that there isn’t anything else for them to spend their time on. So…we really want them to spend more time on what they really want but with less work from us so that when they come back later in the day (or at night!) they aren’t distracted by having done work which didn’t actually require any effort.
To re-phrase that: We want our team members to be able focus 100% of their attention on what matters most instead of being distracted by having done other stuff which did not require any effort at all so that their focus remains clear. We also don’t want them distracted by having done other stuff which doesn’t require any effort at all but just turned off by having done work which didn’t require any effort at all either (because even though these distractions won’t affect productivity directly, if those distractions cause distractions then
5. what i learned from doing all nighters
There are many reasons to do an all nighter:
• It’s a great way to get things done quickly, whether you’re just starting out or have been working hard lately.
• It’s a great way to get people working on a project at the same time as you.
• You can have lots of fun with it.
What are your thoughts on the idea of having all nighters? I’m curious what everyone thinks about them, why they work and whether they should be used more often.
6. conclusion and future work
Another day, another session of How-to-Hire.
This is an annual post where I recap what I’ve learned from the previous year and share my thoughts on how to best use those lessons to increase my productivity the following year.
Last year, I managed to put together a coherent set of actions for closing out 2018. This is good because it forces me to think about what I want to do in 2019 and more importantly, what I don’t want to do. (And this is crucial – when you have a clear idea of what you want in a given year, you can better plan your own career!)
It also forces me to break down the process into manageable steps so that if things ever get too overwhelming (which can happen!), I can start at the top and work my way down the list.
One problem with this approach was that it was a little hard to stay productive with such little time. After all, it takes me an hour or two just sitting down and working on one thing before I can actually start something new. So at times like these, having some sort of deadline would be great. However, there were times when I did not end up meeting my deadline (something which happens infrequently) or had some other distraction or just had too many distractions in general! So this ended up being mostly a waste of time since most of my energy was spent on getting myself into situations which were not conducive towards productivity. And at those moments when things were going well enough that I could stick with the task at hand (which is often), it was difficult for me to stay focused on actually writing anything!
So let’s discuss:
1) Productivity isn’t about getting more done – It’s about staying awake long enough. There are lots of resources out there claiming that working smarter is better than working harder so what’s the difference between these two approaches? The reality is that even if you don’t have time for naps or multiple hours per day, you still need enough time for yourself each day to accomplish your goals (or else why bother). You will never achieve these goals if you are constantly distracted by things which are interrupting your workflow and keep pulling you away from whatever task you are currently working on – even if they aren’t directly related! The first step towards accomplishing something is recognizing where you need help, setting aside some time each week/month/