Paul GrahamVerified account

While long hours can't be a goal, I worry that it's easy to mislead. As a descriptive matter, creating Stripe required obsessive intensity. Maybe better founders could have worked "smarter", but I do know that long hours were needed for *us* to build something great.https://twitter.com/alexmuench/status/1135634277058715648 …

"Maybe better founders could have..." Presumably Patrick knows what he means by that, but in case it's not clear, he's describing the empty set. If Patrick and John Collison had to work long hours to build something great, you will too.

As an empirical matter, it fascinates me that pro athletes are mostly revered for their obsessive competitiveness and work ethic (Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods) but in business it's often viewed a character defect.

It's not always viewed as a flaw though. And there's a definite pattern to the people who see it as a flaw and the people who don't.

Totally agree, the degree to which it's seen as a flaw is rather predictive.