Contrary to popular belief, current startup top-down 996 grind culture is not because “AI is important” or even a pushback to COVID-era remote work. It arrived in Silicon Valley when a very specific demographic came of age: the cohort of smart Gen Z who went to top schools. For them, the mainstreaming of grind culture has been part and parcel of their lives since preschool. Millennials were the first generation raised to be future college students - hence “adulting” - but Gen Z Ivy Leaguers were the first that grew up with their parents instilling a specific work ethic and expectation around what getting to Harvard or Stanford would take. Most of them can’t remember a time in their lives where the looming axe of the college admission decision wasn’t weighing over their heads. If you read any account of successful startups in previous generations, people worked hard. Tandem Computers had people in on the weekends in the 80s. PayPal did in the 90s and so did Facebook in the 00s. But the key difference was people came in because they wanted to, not because it was mandated. It’s the difference between someone who loves to play piano staying up til 11 pm practicing versus someone who’s been told they have to. Grind culture comes from a belief that the only thing that makes a difference is sheer hours: that you can SAT prep your way into a billion dollar company. It has no patience for the tinkering of Palmer Luckey in his garage or the wilderness experiments of the early OpenAI years. It’s the fear that if you’re not grinding, you’re falling behind your peers in preparation for the Big Test. What’s the takeaway? Startups aren’t college admissions. Free yourself from the culture that has been instilled in you since your parents were applying for preschools (easier said than done - trust me, I know. I grew up like this before it was even mainstream in America.) Work hard, but because you want to, and the mission demands it. Create a culture that organically rewards work and output, but actual work, not the equivalent of mindlessly clicking piano keys at 9 pm so that your parents think you’re still practicing. Greatness lies on the other side of finding something you work hard at because you actually like it and not because it’s enforced top-down. I’ll end with a section from a brilliant @GrahamDuncanNYC blog: “Novak Djokovic said in an interview with the Financial Times that ‘I can carry on playing at this level because I like hitting the tennis ball.’ The interviewer replied in surprise: ‘Are there really players who don’t like hitting the ball?’ Djokovic answered, ‘Oh yes. There are people out there who don’t have the right motivation. You don’t need to talk to them. I can see it.’ If you can find the thing you do for its own sake, the compulsive piece of your process, and dial that up and up, beyond the imaginary ceiling for that activity you may be creating, my experience is the world comes to you for that thing and you massively outperform the others who don’t actually like hitting that particular ball. I think the rest of career advice is commentary on this essential truth.”