Reddit co-founder, Alexis Ohanian, relies on the “discipline of routines” to keep himself grounded in the midst of his bustling career.
The tech entrepreneur is building the venture capital firm Seven Seven Six, investing in the National Women’s Soccer League and working on brand partnerships with the likes of permanent-ink marker Sharpie. On top of that, he’s raising his daughter Olympia with tennis legend Serena Williams and awaiting the birth of their second child.
You could say that Ohanian has a lot on his plate, so to stay on his A-game he follows a strict morning routine: Before he’s even had a sip of his morning coffee, he has spent 10 minutes in an ice tank, taken a cold plunge and worked out.
He also takes some time to write down his personal and professional daily goals in those early hours and ends the day with a 6 p.m. family dinner every night “without exception” when he’s home, Ohanian tells Entrepreneur.
Finding work-life balance
By most people’s standards of scrolling social media before dragging themselves out of bed, Ohanian’s morning mantra is very regimented. And it also is for him—it’s far more balanced than in his 20s when he was running Reddit and perpetually in “CEO Mode”.
He recalls being “terrible” at finding any semblance of equilibrium between his work and personal life and not thinking about what he ate or how often he exercised.
It was only until he entered fatherhood in his 30s that he discovered the importance of work-life balance: “I was like, I need to change everything so that I can be around for as long as possible for this little one,” Ohanian says. “And that’s been one of the superpowers, frankly, of becoming a dad.”
Although he doesn’t regret those early days in his career where he poured himself into his work, because “there are times in your life where you will need to focus on the work,” ultimately he thinks he’s become a better leader since becoming a father.
“You actually don’t care about anything else in the world other than this kid’s perception of you. Another gear unlocks once you have that dose of humility, and it’s great,” Ohanian says. “I think it’s made me so much better. I think this chapter of my career as a dad is going to make the previous one look like amateur hour.”
Work-life balance isn’t a 50/50 split between work and life
“There are times in your life when you need to focus on life. It’s on a spectrum that’s ever-flowing back and forth,” Ohanian thinks. And right now, he’s leaning into the life side of his journey.
Even so, that still doesn’t mean that he carves out 50% of his day to find balance.
“I don’t think anyone can really accomplish that,” he says while adding that “the reality is work-life [is] never 50/50. You’ll never achieve anywhere close to that—nor should you.”
Instead of striving for that perfect balancing, Ohanian finds pockets of balance in the midst of the chaos by taking walks during the world day—sometimes during calls—finding solace in his South Florida property complete with chickens and “a little farm action going on” and drawing to de-stress.
While constantly operating in the thick of work, it can be easy to miss the magic in life’s big and small moments. By having a solid routine in place to set his day up for balance, Ohanian says that unusual occurrences in his day-to-day life now feel “more memorable”.
“That’s the other side of the routine of the discipline,” he says. “If your default state has this kind of routine and expectations to it, then you also create the opportunity to do stuff that feels out of the ordinary and different.”