[MattPearce]

Awesome! Their NZ office is just 10 minutes from my house, I was going to apply for a C++ dev role with them but was warned by the recruiter that everyone was expected to work 12 hours a day, so unfortunately I had to give it a miss as I wasn't comfortable with that.

[lukealization]

I'm in a similar position to yourself here. Would love to apply as I think working on something essentially similar to a space program would be incredible, but as someone who values days off and a work-life balance, I cannot commit to that level of employment.

It's a shame RocketLab have adopted such a SpaceX-esque policy of employment. Surely it must be possible to build a rocketry company where employees work only 40 hour weeks...

[valuearb]

You realize if you sleep 8 hours a night, you have 112 hours in a week. With careful organization it's possible to work 60 each week for long periods and still maintain some balance.

Of course if you have kids, it's way harder. But I can get close to 60 hours a week by working 50 hours Monday though Friday, and then half days Saturday/Sunday. Still time for workouts, games, hikes, fun. The reality is school events/conferences will interfere, so 50-55 is probably more reasonable long term.

It's all in what you want to accomplish in life. To me my work is my hobby so I don't need time for others.

[djsumdog]

A really good friend of mine moved there from Welly. He works insane hours, but he says her loves it. The day of the launch, he was up since 3am and he'd need some Red Bull for the party.

[duncan_bayne]

I wonder about the trendy startup high pressure environment applied to safety critical engineering areas... to an outsider, it seems like Red Bull fueled 3AM sessions wouldn't combine well with rockets.

[rbanffy]

12 hours a day, but in exchange you get to build spaceships.

Of course, it all depends on how passionate you are about space. If I lived in NZ and had the expertise for it (my really serious embedded stints ended in college), I'd be there in a flash.

[kobeya]

The novelty of "building spaceships" rubs off very fast.

[6d6b73]

>Of course, it all depends on how passionate you are about space.

How about being more passionate about spending time with my own kids, and being able to teach them about all the cool stuff like science, space, robotics etc.. What is it with companies that want claim to build cool stuff to better the humanity, but forget that the people are what's really important?

[valuearb]

You can always do that stuff later. Changing the world has always been for those willing to sacrifice.

[6d6b73]

Taking care of your family is the best way to change the world for the better.

[rbanffy]

I remember the bittersweet interviews of many Apollo program engineers. That work cost many marriages but, in the end, they sent people to walk on another world and brought them back, forever changing the way we see ourselves in the universe.

To do hard things is hard. I won't say this specific job requires 12-hour days - that's probably because this is such a capital-intensive endeavor. There aren't many hard deadlines when launching to LEO.

[lostlogin]

Was it remunerated 50% more than equivalent roles? Would many say yes to that even if it was?