Crunch Times
Startups have crunch times. These are when all-nighters get pulled. These are when you ignore the outside world to push something out the door. I have a lot of thoughts on crunch times, because I’ve lived through many over the years at AccelerEyes.
First, crunch times are heavier early on and are greatly reduced once the business gets off the ground. We rarely see big crunch times anymore. We sometimes pull crunch times now more to get back a sense of that former urgency than anything else. A sense of urgency is a good thing to keep fresh in everyone’s mind.
By my definition, crunch times are only crunch times because there exist non-crunch times. Some presumed-crunch-time-lovers want everyday to be a crunch time day. They thrive on the insanity. That’s too extreme for me. There need to be good periods of regular rhythm with mixed crunch-time modes.
In all my schooling, I never pulled an all-nighter. I was too even-keeled for those. Starting a company, however, threw my even-keel into upheaval, and I pulled more all-nighters in the early days than I care to admit.
The worst crunch time I ever faced kept me in the office for 7-days straight, only leaving to shower in the LA Fitness below our office space. I slept a few hours at a time in our server room. Other people brought me food.
It is the CEO’s job to lead the way on crunch-times, even if it is other people’s tasks (typically engineers) that warrant the crunch. There is plenty that the CEO can do to assist the engineers in getting through the crunch more quickly.
What crunch times have you faced in your startup? How often do crunch times arise and how often do you find yourself in crunch-time-mode?