Somewhat solo founder for many years: I don’t have a schedule, on purpose. The more schedule you maintain, the more you potentially lead yourself to burnout.
Each day I feel it out. I definitely load mornings more towards errands, communication, planning. Depending on contractors or employees I shift schedules to match them.
Motivation will come and go. If it goes, I’d advise to avoid resisting and just let it go. Focus instead on “everything else” for a while, relax, and think over why it may have left.
>"Motivation will come and go. If it goes, I’d advise to avoid resisting and just let it go. Focus instead on “everything else” for a while, relax, and think over why it may have left."
I don't know if your advice is correct or not but I do want to add to the discussion the fact that it is 180° opposed to advice I received to the contrary: don't wait for motivation (which comes and goes); discipline is more important, and that means just doing it, regardless of whether you're emotionally motivated at the time.
Again just putting this out there because your advice and this advice are opposites. No comment on which (or both) are correct.
As a founder, I was always extremely motivated, to the point it was painful to take a break. I required heavy discipline to slow down. At the point many founders lose motivation, they have likely been working too hard.
There were always tedious things, like refactoring, audits, dealing with investors (the ones who are tire kicking). But as a founder, the tedious stuff becomes a kind of high, something to look forward to. Think of it like grinding in a game or hobby, vs the kind of repetitive grinding you do at a job.
I think maybe one of the differences is that, as a founder, the more work you get in, the less work you have to do later. If you were too efficient at a job, you end up having to do more work at the same pay. Same goes for say, homework, if you're getting straight A's, you have to maintain that work rate.
But as a founder, if you get this thing done, that saves you work for the future and also means more money and less trouble in the long run.
I am extremely disciplined already so perhaps that is the context I didn’t provide. But there are limits and once I got myself to a certain level I noticed going any further was actually a negative.
Each day I feel it out. I definitely load mornings more towards errands, communication, planning. Depending on contractors or employees I shift schedules to match them.
Motivation will come and go. If it goes, I’d advise to avoid resisting and just let it go. Focus instead on “everything else” for a while, relax, and think over why it may have left.
Just a few insights.