Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian: We need to move past ‘hustle porn’

Reddit and Initialized Capital cofounder Alexis Ohanian
speaks at Business Insider’s 2018 Ignition
conference.
Jin S.
Lee

• Entrepreneur and investor Alexis
  Ohanian spoke against the popularity of an online “success”
  culture promoting constant exhaustion.
• He said his experience building Reddit and working with
  founders taught him successful businesses require mental and
  physical well-being.
• He said his wife Serena Williams taught him that while
  periods of intensity are necessary, rest is just as important.

Go onto Instagram and search for success-related tags, or check
out some of the top “influencers,” and you’re sure to find plenty
of material espousing the virtues of forgoing sleep and working
on a 24/7 schedule.

Reddit and Initialized Capital cofounder Alexis Ohanian calls
this “hustle porn,” and he finds it not only toxic but incorrect.

“It’s obviously a ton of work to be an entrepreneur. It’s
insulting to even have to say that — everyone knows that,”
Ohanian told Business Insider’s US editor in chief Alyson
Shontell at our 2018
Ignition conference. And he acknowledged that building a
business requires late nights. “But if you’re pushing four hours
of sleep every night, the quality of your work is going to
plummet pretty damn quick, and there’s value to things like rest,
there’s value to things like having someone to talk to, whether
it’s an executive coach or a therapist or both.”

It’s advice that applies to all entrepreneurs, but also anyone
who has an ambitious approach to their career.

Read more:



Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian issued an ominous warning for
Facebook: ‘We’ve hit peak social’

The year Ohanian and his cofounders started working on Reddit in
2005 was especially difficult for him. His then-girlfriend had a
nearly fatal accident that put her in a coma. Then, two months
later, on the same day he learned the family dog died, his mom
had a seizure that led to a diagnosis of terminal brain cancer.
She died in 2008.

Writing in 2010, the year he left Reddit,
Ohanian wrote, “There were some dark months there, like
living in the middle of an interminable fog. Upon reflection, I
was probably suffering from depression for most of that startup.
If you happened to meet me during that time, you probably
wouldn’t have known it.”

In that essay, he credits the grind of building a company with
helping him get through it, but eight years later, he sees things
differently. “I didn’t talk to a therapist or an executive coach
for many, many years after my mom passed,” he told Shontell. “And
what I was doing to myself was coming at the expense of my
physical and my mental health, and ultimately making our business
less great.”

Ohanian’s wife, tennis legend Serena Williams,
helped him appreciate this, he said. “One of the most
important parts of her training that you rarely see is the fact
that when she is not training, she’s off,” he told Shontell.
“Like off. Her business stops, she shuts everything off
and creates time for herself.” It’s not as exciting as a montage
of her intense physical regimen leading up to a match, but it’s
as important.

He said this same concept applies to business. Everyone needs
down time, and similar to the way athletes have coaches and
trainers, everyone should seek help from others during their
struggles.

“And frankly, I don’t know a single unicorn founder, a founder of
a billion-dollar company, that spends any of her time posting
hustle porn on Instagram,” Ohanian said. “Correlation or
causation, up to you, but I think it’s really important that we
start being a little more authentic about what it takes in order
to be successful, and a big part of that is taking care of
yourself.”

Ohanian’s interview begins in the video below around
2:37:36.