F2F #49: Check your cortisol, Harry

Looks like the VC world is pursuing yet another fad to force their portfolio companies to push even harder. This time, they're chasing the 996 trend.

The 996 work schedule refers to an unofficial and controversial work system where employees are expected to work from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., six days a week—amounting to 72 hours per week. This schedule is widely associated with China’s tech industry but has also been discussed or adopted in other high-pressure sectors and has inspired similar work expectations in certain startups outside China as well. - Read more.

VCs have got quite the track record of telling others to pursue trends/workflows/methodologies/frameworks they don't fully understand. And when I say others, I mean their portfolio companies.

Obviously, VCs are incentivised twofold when it comes to playing hard. First, they signal that they're on top of the news and what's happening. VCs went bananas when the Spotify squads/tribes/chapters became popular and asked their portfolio companies to implement this successful model, even though Spotify really admitted that they had never followed it thoroughly. Second, they think that they increase their chances of succeeding by passing these inspirational messages down the chain of command, as if that had any sort of effect whatsoever in the gambling that is investing in startups.

One year ago, that play repeated with Founder Mode. I got tired of seeing "Founder Mode" in investment decks. I marked that as a red flag and time proved me right.

The grind didn't work, the hustle didn't work, founder mode didn't work, and now it's 996. Of course it's going to work this time around. Of course. Of course.

Twenty years ago we were trying to turn every city into the next Silicon Valley. Didn't work either. Remember when every city in Europe named their ecosystem "X valley?" or "Silicon X?". Silicon Alley (NYC), Silicon Slopes (Utah), Silicon Docks (Dublin), Berlin Valley, Tetuan Valley (in Madrid) and so on.

And now, we're being told that we're lazy fucks because China is innovating more than we do because we don't do 996. Lord, grant me strength one more time.

One person in particular is pushing this to happen, Harry Stebbings, from 20minVC, a very good podcast. One of my favourites in particular. But this aggressive stance isn't playing in his favour, in many people's eyes.

Basically, they're trying to out-China the very China. How exactly is that gonna work? Certainly, not by tweeting all day claiming to work so hard at the same time you ask for extreme working ethics to your portfolio companies. VCs aren't known for working hard, precisely. Virtue signaling will only get you this far.

996 is a very questionable framework with direct health implications furthering broken societal and family models. While it can work for someone in a given period of their time, trying to push it as a new standard is not only lazy, but a completely deranged and dangerous idea.

Further, it shows more than ever the evident classism of the technology ecosystem, whereby investors patronise the poor souls living several stories below their glass towers, peppering them with empty mantras and enough breadcrumbs to keep them "trying harder", "no pain no gain", "go big or go home" and, basically, the Paulo Coelho equivalent of bullshit optimism of startupland. All the while, investors keep spending their days tweeting, podcasting and drinking coffee with people they're going to pass on, giving them false hopes of maybe perhaps someday we can invest if the stars align and you're still alive when seven miracles in a row happen.

I tried questioning how that was supposed to work but I only got a vague response from Harry on Twitter, so I guess there are not really a lot of arguments to sustain that amount of bullshit, but there we go: we blame McKinsey consultants for selling bullshit at very expensive rates, but the average VC spits out as much, if not more, BS than an army of McKinsey interns on Twitter every given day.

I'd love to see better replies to my claim than survivorship bias like "BuT iT wOrKeD fOr NvIdIA. tRiLlIoN$. InFiNiTe TAM lol".

Come on, you lot can do better than selling the endless dose of the new version of snake oil. But, most likely, if you do, your game is over. You have to keep pretending that entrepreneurs can only build companies with VC money; that there is no real alternative to VC. And while some people still think like that, in 2025, more and more people see that the emperor is naked and the music is about to stop.

There is a case to be made that in certain situations, during short amounts of time, and sporadically, these pushes are good. Even necessary, I'd argue. There's no denying in that, and we all do it from time to time, so long it becomes the exception not the rule.

Cortisol in short doses can help you fight or flight, providing for good stress which is actually good for the body and even healthy. In the long run, it's recipe for disease. Same happens with companies. If you want to live long, don't bask in cortisol.

Don't do it in business, either.

And while you're at it, check your cortisol, Harry.