[bendotc]

I have no doubt that determination and enthusiasm are positively correlated with both success and with working long hours. However, as a rational skeptic, I've yet to see evidence that working long hours has a causal relationship to success.

However, there is evidence to suggest an inverse relationship may exist. Furthermore, hazing is effective in building solidarity, and people are generally more likely to retroactively justify hardship, which makes me think there may be a psychological bias towards overvaluing poor work/life balance.

In my particular line of work, Daniel Cook put it better than I ever could: http://www.lostgarden.com/2008/09/rules-of-productivity-pres...

[webwright]

Who said anything about causal?

"However, there is evidence to suggest an inverse relationship may exist."

So you'd bet that if I shadowed 1,000 self-made millionaires while they were building their businesses, and then shadowed a random sampling of (employed) Americans, the millionaires would work LESS than average? Really?

FWIW, I do agree that specialized knowledge work doesn't benefit from tons of hours... As someone pointed out in another comment, entrepreneurial success generally requires a wide variety of different tasks.

[bendotc]

"So you'd bet that if I shadowed 1,000 self-made millionaires while they were building their businesses, and then shadowed a random sampling of (employed) Americans, the millionaires would work LESS than average? Really?"

No, I never said anything of the like. In fact, I said that the qualities more likely to make you successful are also likely to predict working long hours. What I would say is that if you could make two copies of the world, one where entrepreneurs work reasonable hours and one where they work extensive hours, they would generally have better outcomes with the former.

In essence, it seems that working in crunch mode for extended periods of time is a bad habit of highly motivated people.

"Entrepreneurial success generally requires a wide variety of different tasks."

Obviously, there are all sorts of businesses and all sorts of entrepreneurs, but I'm not sure that the data available suggests that working with varied tasks alleviates problems of fatigue. Additionally, the penalties of multitasking are generally well documented. If the tasks just need to be completed and are straight-forward, or if you're in a short lead-up to a deadline, certainly there are times when it makes sense to work extended hours.