Should Founders Have Hobbies? This is Why I’d Argue Yes

Why “CEOs shouldn’t have hobbies” is not sound startup advice.

“I worry about CEOs with too many hobbies”.

This is a tweet, from a trusted SaaS Founder and investor, that I came across recently. More worryingly, was a video tweeted in response by another SaaS Founder/CEO, that claimed:

FOUNDERS WITH HOBBIES SLOW COMPANY GROWTH 20%

Having worked in the tech industry for almost 20 years, I’ve seen first hand, the dangers of promoting a culture that startup Founders be “all-in” and that anything less than 100% commitment of time, energy (and the unsaid — health, both mental and physical) means that your company is doomed to failure.

This October 10th is World Mental Health Day and the theme for this year? Suicide prevention. According to a study by founder-led community We Are 3Sixty, 78% of founders report that running a business has negatively impacted their mental health.

This comes as no surprise yet is something that’s often discussed but rarely disclosed. Particularly as a Founder, where admitting to mental health conditions is far more of a taboo than admitting something more socially acceptable, like a sports injury or sickness. Despite what investors suggest is true, capital flows towards the best bet. That best bet is unlikely to be on the Founder who admits they’re struggling with crippling depression or anxiety.

Yet as a Founder, I think some periods of stress, anxiety and other mental strains, are unavoidable.

How do I know? Because like many Founders I’m sure, I have my own story to tell.

How my hobby saved my sanity

As I talk about in this podcast episode, in 2016 I experienced what I can only comprehend as a mini mental health breakdown.

We were nearing the end of our runway at ScreenCloud, the country had just felt the first Brexit tremors, and I was pitching relentlessly to investors without much luck. To say I was exhausted was an understatement.

The breaking point came one night when I started crying and I couldn’t stop, or even speak. Which is not normal for me by any means. When you’re crying and you can’t stop, or even explain why, it’s very scary. I wasn’t bereaved or anything that might justify it in a normal sense, the only way I can describe it was that it felt like a breakdown.

On the iceberg of mental health, that was still probably only the tip, but it felt very extreme to me.

I knew within that moment that I had to fix it and it was then that I religiously rebrought exercise back into my life. Starting with, yep you guessed it, a hobby. I began turning up to group Bodypump classes 3 times a week, and now I am a qualified Bodypump instructor, which means that I spend around 5–10 hours a week teaching Bodypump to others.

That’s why this particular tweet, which no doubt would initiate a feeling of guilt in Founders with hobbies, was a trigger for me. Seeing something that suggests that I might be responsible for the downfall of my company, for doing something that at the start at least, began as a way to protect my mental health, perpetuates a growing problem.

The Hustle Porn pay day loan — want to buy it?

On some level, most of us are aware that Hustle Porn + startup pressure = poor Founder mental health. So why do we still buy into it?

The trouble is, in the early startup days you’ll listen to anyone who offers you a solution. The startup trajectory is known as impossible, improbable, inevitable. And there’s a reason why the first stage is called impossible.

This leads to the payday loan affect. It makes no sense financially, but if you’ve got no other option (and as a startup Founder, with odds stacked against you, that’s often how you do feel) then you have to buy into it. So there’s a predominant culture which is saying the way to succeed, is to basically work yourself to the ground and to commit completely, when actually, for your mental health this is the one thing that you want to avoid.

On the other side, Hustle Porn is called Hustle Porn for a reason. Porn is a visual thing, it’s shocking and it gets your attention, but it doesn’t reflect the real sexual lives of (most) people. One is for entertainment, and one is for real life and we all understand that.

Hustle porn does the same. It sells conference seats, it gets click throughs and retweets, but does it teach you how to act in real life? Of course it doesn’t.

We’d all do better to turn off the entertainment and find ourselves a real partner.

Not only does Hustle Porn have a dangerous effect on Founder mental health, it can also lead to internal toxicity and obsessive founders.

When you will do anything, including committing your own life and health, to succeed, you begin to lean towards bad practices, because nothing is off the table, no demand “too far” if it means a higher chance at success. You only have to look at the recent leaked Slack message from “Unicorn” startup Revolut’s CEO to see the negative effects of an “always on” mindset. We’re lucky at ScreenCloud that there are three CoFounders, to keep outlandish behaviour at bay, but for other CEOs, who are running the show alone, we see the dangers more and more. WeWork’s CEO stepped down recently because of IPO controversies and distribution of power discrepancies, and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted in a leaked audio file, that he would have been fired, had he not retained voting control from shareholders.

Sometimes “all-in”, is dangerous, for both shareholders and wider society.

In my opinion, if you are trying to build a great team, wouldn’t people prefer to work for someone who has multiple dimensions rather than an obsessed workaholic?

I should also caveat here, that while 10 hours per week on a hobby (which is what the “study” used as a data point), may seem like a lot, I am in a fairly unique position of being a 40 year-old male, with no children and no elderly dependents. In that context, 5–10 hours is not actually that much time out of my week.

Then there’s the perceived bias in what we perceive as a “worthwhile” hobby for a CEO. Fitness? Fine. Reading business books? No problem.

Would that be the same if it was spending time with friends, watching a show or visiting an exhibition “just for fun”, making music or something less “hustle worthy”?

If we only approve certain hobbies, we end up with a cookie cutter approach to what a successful CEO or company looks like, and that’s something that’s already a problem.

My hobby also gives me perspective, which can only be a good thing. I now have a boss, who I have to report to and turn up for. My clients are all from different walks of life and I’m learning about people who might not usually fit within my regular circles. Some of the people I meet are getting over major illnesses or setbacks in their life. One client is recovering from a brain tumour and side effects that mean he’ll never be able to balance properly again. That, not turning up to a workday boasting of four hours sleep, is true resilience.

Anti-hustle Founder advice

So what can we do to reclaim control? In my mind, we need to learn to take care of ourselves as Founders, to protect our mental health and as a result, our team, our company culture and our longevity. Some of the ways I try to do this include:

1. Exercise

Alongside the benefits mentioned above, exercise gives you a break from what you’re doing. Whether that’s yoga, a walk in the park or something more energetic, it rebalances the bad things happening in your body.

2. Take back control of your life — in whichever way you can

I think that a lot of what triggers mental health issues, for me at least, is a lack of control. You can’t force customers to buy from you, you can’t force people to join, you can’t force investors to give you money. You’re at the mercy of other people, who you can influence but who ultimately you can’t control, no matter how much you try. So staying in control of the things you can, like personal admin, maybe having a clean house, or food in the fridge, lets you retain some semblance of being an adult who is in control.

3. Sleep

Trying to get regular, good amounts of sleep is important. When you’ve not had enough sleep or your sleep is interrupted that does mess with your brain.

4. Trust in the journey

Particularly if you’re at an early stage in your startup, you need to trust in the journey. Try to make good decisions, but forgive yourself if you happen to make a bad one. Despite what you may find on Twitter, there is no silver bullet to success. You’ve just got to try and optimise for what makes you a consistently good leader or Founder. And that might be the hours you work, what you prioritise and how you feel at the end of it. If you keep burning yourself out, a year down the road, your business will be suffering for it.

5. Stop listening to the hustle porn community

Will I be giving up my hobby any time? Absolutely not. Do I deserve to be made to feel guilty for it, when I could be spending every waking hour working on ScreenCloud? I don’t think so.

We, and particularly those in respected positions, need to be very careful about provoking further guilt in founders for not being committed enough.

When it comes to both mental health and being a morally sound Founder, the price of being “all-in” may be just too high.

The World Health Organisation recognises World Mental Health Day on 10 October every year. This year’s theme set by the World Federation for Mental Health is suicide prevention.

Here is a list of resources of free services and resources you can use (some, immediately) to access mental health support and services.