There’s a version of this job that looks, from the outside, like a calendar full of important meetings and sharp decisions made with total clarity. The reality is something messier and more interesting than that.
Every week looks different – investor conversations one week, deep in hiring the next, then pulled back into product or working through a growth question that’s been sitting unresolved for longer than it should have been – and any sense of routine feels almost illusory.
And yet there is one fixed point every Tuesday. Without exception, my day starts with the C-suite and then opens out to the whole company. That rhythm matters more than it might sound. When everything else is in constant motion, having a moment in the week that everyone can orient around isn’t just useful, it’s necessary.
Tuesday meetings are fundamentally about alignment and making sure the team is clear and united on priorities, and honest about what’s working and what isn’t. That kind of clarity doesn’t happen by accident and it doesn’t sustain itself without deliberate effort.
I am often asked about managing my time and how I prioritise when every week looks so different. My answer is that I try to prioritise around impact rather than urgency, and that the core job stays consistent even when the schedule doesn’t.
It comes down to unblocking whatever is holding the business back and making the calls that nobody else can make. That last part requires more discipline than it sounds like because there’s a constant pull towards the immediate and towards the thing sitting loudest in your inbox. Resisting that pull is something you have to consciously work at every single day.
I’m naturally an early bird, which helps. Mornings are when I think most clearly and make the best decisions, so I try to protect that time for anything that genuinely requires concentration. By the time the day fills up – and it fills up fast! – the window for that kind of thinking has usually closed which is why evenings and weekends end up being where I think about the bigger picture.
I use this time thinking about the product, the culture, where we’re heading and why. It isn’t ideal but it’s the reality of running a fast-moving business.
The question of switching off is one I’m still working on, honestly. A founder’s day is never really done in any clean sense so I’ve stopped thinking about it in those terms. It’s less about finishing and more about knowing when to stop, recognising that continuing past a certain point produces diminishing returns and that rest is part of the job, not a break from it.
Burnout doesn’t announce itself and you avoid it by both staying focused on what actually matters and by building a team that carries genuine ownership alongside you. You cannot outwork a structural problem and if everything depends on your energy alone, the whole thing is fragile.
A week in the life of Craig Brennan – from boardroom to touchline
Bringing people onto the mission starts with clarity because people do their best work when they understand not just what they’re working on, but why it matters. This means clarity on where the company is going and what their role is in getting it there.
Energy is contagious in both directions and a significant part of this job is helping the team stay focused and confident, especially when things are uncertain. One thing people consistently underestimate is how much of founding a company is actually energy management.
If I’m honest about what I wish I had more of, it’s time for long-term thinking. In a fast-growing business, the immediate has a habit of consuming everything and big decisions need space to breathe. Smaller ones should move fast – most of them are reversible anyway, and speed matters more than people tend to admit.
No two days are ever the same and, after everything, that’s still what makes it worth doing.
Why being an AI founder is more about education than building