Tuesday, 23 December 2025 / Published in Entrepreneurship

Work 60 Hours or 80? What Actually Works at $1M-$5M Revenue

Working 80 hours a week doesn’t guarantee faster growth for your business. In fact, founders scaling from $1M to $5M revenue often achieve better results by focusing on high-impact tasks, not just adding more hours. Here’s the key takeaway: 58 hours per week can outperform 76+ hours if your time is spent strategically.

Key Insights:

Productivity drops after 55 hours/week. Research shows working beyond this point leads to diminishing – and even negative – returns.
Focus on $500/hour tasks. Prioritize strategic decisions, scalable systems, and team-building over routine admin work.
High-growth founders average 58 hours/week. Companies growing at 40%+ annually have founders working fewer, more focused hours.
Time allocation matters. Use a 40-40-20 split: 40% on revenue-generating tasks, 40% on leverage-building, and 20% on maintenance.

Why It Matters:

Founders who work smarter, not harder, build scalable systems, delegate effectively, and avoid becoming bottlenecks. This approach drives sustainable growth without burnout.

Want to optimize your time for growth? Start by auditing your weekly tasks and shifting focus to high-impact work.

What the Data Shows About Work Hours

58 Hours Outperform 76 Hours for Growth

It turns out that working longer hours isn’t the secret to faster growth. According to SaaS Capital’s 2024 benchmarking study, which analyzed over 800 founders scaling from $1M to $10M ARR, founders who worked around 58 hours per week achieved significantly faster revenue growth than those grinding 76+ hours. Here’s the kicker: companies growing at 40% or more annually had founders averaging 58 hours a week. Meanwhile, companies growing under 20% had founders putting in 76 hours or more. The takeaway? Extra hours don’t guarantee better results – they often just mask inefficiencies in delegation and system design.

Want to learn how to make your work hours count? Subscribe to our AI Acceleration Newsletter for weekly strategies on automating low-value tasks and protecting your most valuable time.

The $50/Hour vs. $500/Hour Task Divide

The difference between success and stagnation isn’t about working harder – it’s about working smarter. Founders clocking longer hours often find themselves stuck doing $50/hour tasks like managing emails and handling routine admin work. On the other hand, those who keep their workweeks lean focus on $500/hour activities. These include strategic leadership, product innovation, forming high-level partnerships, experimenting with pricing, and building scalable systems. This shift in focus not only enhances productivity but also maximizes revenue per hour, fueling faster growth.

By prioritizing high-value work, founders naturally start to streamline and systematize their businesses.

Scaling Through Systems, Not Busywork

If you’re working 80+ hours a week at the $1M–$5M stage, it’s a warning sign. It likely means you’re stuck repeating manual tasks instead of scaling your business. High-growth founders take a different approach: they document processes, delegate responsibilities, and automate repetitive tasks. This lets them transition from being hands-on "Builder/Seller" operators to taking on more strategic, CEO-level roles.

"Efficiency isn’t a constraint; it’s the compounding engine of durable growth." – High Alpha

The 2024 data reinforces this idea. Companies in the $1M–$5M ARR range that fully integrate AI into their products grow 70% faster than those using AI only as a minor tool. This highlights the importance of building scalable systems over simply working longer hours. It’s a powerful reminder that growth comes from working smarter, not harder, especially as your company scales.

How Work Hours Should Change from $1M to $5M

Optimal Work Hours for Founders Scaling from $1M to $5M Revenue

At $1M: 60-70 Hours to Build the Foundation

When your business hits $1M ARR, working 60–70 hours a week isn’t just common – it’s often necessary. This is the stage where you’re validating your business model, fine-tuning your product based on customer feedback, and locking down repeatable sales processes. You’re also making your first key hires, which can make or break your growth trajectory. At this point, your hands-on involvement is crucial because you’re laying the groundwork for everything that comes next.

One of the most critical hires during this phase is your first sales rep. A poor choice here can set you back an entire year. Jason Lemkin, CEO and Founder of SaaStr, emphasizes this point:

"If your first AE fails, you won’t even give them enough leads – you’ll instinctively start taking over deals again. Founders who get this right accelerate from $1M to $3M+ much faster."

Lemkin advises interviewing at least 30 candidates to find someone you would personally buy from. The extra hours spent on this decision can pay off significantly. As you progress, your role will need to shift from being deeply involved in day-to-day tasks to focusing on broader, strategic oversight.

At $3M: 55-65 Hours with More Delegation

Once you reach $3M ARR, the focus starts to shift. Instead of building everything yourself, your time is better spent delegating effectively. At this point, your workweek should drop to around 55–65 hours. With a team in place, your role transitions from doing to leading. However, there’s a common trap here: maintaining the same intensity you had at $1M. This can lead to burnout without delivering proportional results.

To adjust, reduce your time spent on "builder" tasks from 30–40% to about 20%. Use that saved time for strategic CEO work, which should now account for 20–30% of your week. This includes creating standard operating procedures for processes like sales, billing, and customer onboarding. It’s also the time to start delegating decisions that are reversible or involve lower financial stakes. These changes will prepare you for the more streamlined, strategic mindset you’ll need at $5M.

At $5M: 50-60 Hours Maximum

By the time your business reaches $5M ARR, you should not be working 75+ hours a week. If you are, it’s a sign that your business isn’t scalable, and you’ve become the bottleneck. At this stage, your workweek should max out at 50–60 hours. Most of this time should focus on high-level strategy, partnerships, and guiding product direction.

Data backs this up – companies that implement systematized technology grow 70% faster between $1M and $5M ARR. This isn’t about using technology for the sake of it; it’s about creating systems that amplify your impact without requiring you to work more hours. If you’re still handling non-critical tasks at this point, it’s a clear sign that your processes need refinement. Without addressing this, your business may struggle to scale further.

How to Audit Your Time Allocation

3 Types of Founder Work

If you want to escape the cycle of unnecessary hours, start by auditing how you spend your time. Every task can be sorted into three categories: revenue-generating, leverage-building, and maintenance.

Revenue-generating hours are the ones that directly bring in money. Think activities like closing deals, working on product features that customers pay for, or diving into fundraising conversations.
Leverage-building hours are about amplifying your long-term impact. This includes hiring the right people, creating processes that don’t need your constant attention, and automating repetitive tasks.
Maintenance hours are all the routine tasks – replying to emails, attending status meetings, handling admin work, and putting out fires that ideally shouldn’t happen in the first place.

The problem? Many founders think they spend most of their time on high-impact work, but the reality often tells a different story. According to audits by M Studio, founders typically allocate their time as 25% revenue-generating, 15% leverage-building, and a whopping 60% on maintenance. This imbalance often leads to longer, less effective workweeks.

Want to know how AI can help you cut down on maintenance tasks and reclaim your time? Subscribe to our AI Acceleration Newsletter for weekly tips on shifting from busywork to high-leverage tasks.

The 40-40-20 Split That Works

For founders in the $1M–$5M revenue range, a 40-40-20 split is a game-changer. Spend 40% of your time on revenue-generating tasks, 40% on leverage-building, and only 20% on maintenance. This approach prioritizes impactful work over just staying busy.

Here’s the kicker: a founder working 60 hours a week with this split is likely to achieve better results than one grinding through 80 hours with a 25-15-60 breakdown. It’s all about focusing on the tasks that actually move the needle.

Next up, let’s dive into how to analyze your weekly workload and align it with this optimal split.

Running a 2-Week Time Audit

To get a clear picture of where your hours are going, conduct a 2-week time audit. Track every activity in 15–30 minute chunks, and don’t forget to note context switches. Jumping from sales to support to admin isn’t just mentally draining – it also doubles the time it takes to complete tasks.

Break down your audit using the 4R Model:

Record: Keep a detailed log of every activity for two weeks without changing your usual routine.
Reduce and Delegate: Pinpoint low-value tasks – like excessive email checking or aimless meetings – and either cut them out or hand them off.
Replace with Leverage: Look for opportunities to automate or create systems for repetitive tasks.

Once your audit is done, calculate your Revenue per Founder Hour. Divide your total revenue by the hours you work weekly. For example, if you’re generating $3M ARR and working 70 hours a week, your hourly rate is about $820. Now, if you’re spending 10 hours a week on tasks that yield less than $100 an hour, you’re effectively losing $7,200 a week – or nearly $375,000 a year. That’s the cost of busywork staring you in the face.

The 60-Hour Week Structure

How to Split 60 Hours for Best Results

After analyzing data from over 500 founders, here’s how a 60-hour workweek can be divided for maximum efficiency: 25 hours on revenue-critical tasks, 20 hours on leverage-building activities, 10 hours on communication, and 5 hours on strategic thinking and planning.

Spend 25 hours on tasks directly tied to revenue. This includes closing sales, improving product features, managing key partnerships, and fundraising efforts.

The 20 hours for leverage-building are all about amplifying your impact. Use this time to hire the right team, create Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to reduce micromanagement, design systems to handle recurring challenges, and integrate AI tools to automate repetitive tasks.

Set aside 10 hours for communication – team meetings, investor updates, and stakeholder check-ins. This is far less than the 37 meetings a week that the average CEO attends, proving that not every meeting is essential.

Finally, dedicate 5 hours to planning and strategic thinking. Use this time to reflect, read industry insights, and map out your next steps. This is when you step away from the daily grind to make sure you’re working on the right priorities, not just moving quickly.

Curious about how AI tools can help you streamline these processes? Join our AI Acceleration Newsletter for weekly guides.

Now, let’s tackle the activities you should eliminate to make this structure work.

What to Stop Doing

To stick to the 60-hour structure, you need to cut out tasks that don’t add value. Start with email management – limit yourself to two quick checks per day. Scan for critical messages in the morning and again in the evening. Anything else can wait or be delegated.

Status meetings are another time sink. If a meeting doesn’t require a decision or produce a clear outcome, cancel it. Use tools like Slack or project management software for asynchronous updates. Your team doesn’t need you in every meeting to feel supported.

Stop wasting time on reactive problem-solving. Instead, systematize recurring issues with SOPs and delegate them.

Be selective with networking. Focus only on relationships that can lead to strategic insights, partnerships, or sales.

Finally, eliminate reporting meetings by relying on automated dashboards to track progress.

Adjusting the Framework as You Grow

As your business scales, your weekly structure will need to evolve. The 60-hour framework isn’t static – it should adapt as you move from $1M to $5M ARR.

At $1M ARR, you might find yourself working 60–70 hours a week as you establish foundational systems and validate your product–market fit. During this phase, you’ll likely spend more time on revenue-generating tasks (around 30 hours) and less on leverage-building (closer to 15 hours), as you identify which processes need to be systematized.

By $3M ARR, you’ll start to approach the ideal 25-20-10-5 split within a 55–65-hour workweek. With a team in place, your leverage-building focus will shift toward refining management systems, creating decision-making frameworks, and incorporating AI into core workflows. Revenue hours will transition to key account management and strategic partnerships, rather than hands-on execution.

At $5M ARR, your role should pivot even further toward strategic leadership. Focus on capital allocation, high-level strategy, and organizational design. If you’re still clocking 75+ hours a week at this stage, it’s a sign that your systems need improvement.

"If you’re past traction but still clocking 80-hour weeks doing the same tasks you did during validation, you’re not scaling – you’re replicating yourself." – MBA Disrupted

To keep your structure aligned with your growth, use the 4R Framework every quarter: Record your hours, Reduce low-value tasks, Remove or Delegate anything that’s not worth your time, and Replace manual work with systems or AI. This ongoing process ensures your 60-hour week stays focused on what truly matters as your company grows.

Conclusion

Focus on Outcomes, Not Hours

Spending 80 hours a week won’t necessarily deliver better results than 60 if those extra hours are wasted on low-impact tasks. Instead, define the outcomes you need – whether it’s hitting revenue goals, making key hires, or achieving product milestones – and figure out how much of your time is truly required to make those happen. Many founders operating in the $1M–$5M ARR range find that 45–55 hours of focused, high-impact work is far more effective than 75–85 hours of scattered busywork.

"Hours are an imperfect proxy for effort and outcomes. Two founders can both work 60 hours a week – one will be iterating product-market fit and making revenue, the other will be lost in administrative busywork."
– Byflyrank, MBA Disrupted

Curious about how to identify tasks that actually drive revenue instead of just filling your schedule? Subscribe to our AI Acceleration Newsletter for weekly tips on automating low-value work and maximizing your impact.

This shift in focus can help you streamline your workload while significantly increasing your overall effectiveness.

The Power of High-Impact Work

When you prioritize high-leverage activities, you create results that build on themselves over time. Strategic hires expand your capacity, well-designed systems solve recurring problems, and automation handles repetitive tasks 24/7. Every hour spent on meaningful, high-impact work has a compounding effect, while hours lost to putting out fires or sitting in unproductive meetings often lead nowhere.

"Efficiency isn’t a constraint; it’s the compounding engine of durable growth."
– High Alpha, 2025 SaaS Benchmarks Report

Founders experiencing 40%+ year-over-year growth aren’t necessarily working more hours – they’re focusing on work that amplifies their impact. This approach highlights the importance of auditing your schedule to ensure you’re spending time where it matters most.

By optimizing for impact rather than hours, you can set yourself up for sustainable growth and long-term success during the $1M–$5M ARR stage.

Take Action: Audit Your Time with M Studio

Ready to redesign your role for greater impact? Join M Studio’s Elite Founders program for a detailed, data-driven analysis of how you allocate your time. In just two weeks, we’ll help you pinpoint which tasks directly drive revenue and which drain your energy. From there, we’ll implement systems to eliminate low-value activities, empowering you to achieve faster, more sustainable growth – without working longer hours.

FAQs

How can I figure out which tasks are worth $500 per hour?

To get started, take a close look at your weekly activities and sort them into three categories: revenue-generating, leverage-building, or maintenance. Once you’ve done that, estimate how much incremental revenue or value each task generates per hour. For example, tasks that consistently bring in about $500 in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) per hour – or roughly $1,000 in value for a company with $3,000,000 ARR – fall into the high-value $500-per-hour category.

Your focus should be on high-impact activities like strategic decision-making, forming key partnerships, or making critical hires. These are the tasks that drive the most significant results. For lower-value tasks – ones that could be handled by someone earning less than $100,000 a year – consider delegating or creating systems to free up your time for more impactful work.

How can I work fewer hours while maximizing my impact as a founder?

To cut down your working hours while boosting your impact, shift your focus to high-leverage activities – the ones that truly require your expertise. These might include making strategic decisions, forming key partnerships, or hiring top talent. On the flip side, delegate or automate tasks that don’t add much value, such as routine emails, repetitive admin work, or unnecessary meetings. Studies indicate that working beyond 55 hours a week results in diminishing returns, making it essential to prioritize quality over sheer quantity.

Start by pinpointing the outcomes that genuinely need your input, and eliminate tasks that don’t contribute to growth. A simple framework can help: Refine your priorities, Remove distractions, Replace manual tasks with automation, and Reallocate your time to focus on deep work and strategic initiatives. Before committing to extra work hours, ask yourself if those hours will produce at least double their cost in value. If the answer is no, it’s likely just busywork rather than meaningful progress.

By concentrating on value-driven tasks and setting up systems to handle the rest, you can trim your workweek to a manageable 45–55 hours while still achieving substantial growth for your business.

How can I shift from handling everything myself to focusing on strategic growth as my business scales?

To shift from trying to do everything yourself to prioritizing strategic growth, start by taking a close look at how you’re spending your time. Track your activities over two weeks and group them into three categories: revenue-generating work (like closing deals or product development), leverage-building work (such as hiring, process design, or strategy), and maintenance work (emails, routine meetings, etc.). A good target is to divide your time roughly into a 40%/40%/20% split among these categories. Founders who strike this balance often find they can work fewer hours while achieving better results.

Pinpoint the tasks that only you, as the founder, are uniquely positioned to handle – things like shaping the company’s strategic vision, hiring key team members, or forging major partnerships. These high-impact activities deserve your focused attention. For everything else, look for opportunities to delegate or automate. Here’s a simple rule of thumb: for every hour you work beyond 60 hours a week, ask yourself if that time will create at least $1,000 in value. If the answer is no, it’s probably a task that can be outsourced or dropped entirely.

Lastly, structure your schedule around your growth objectives. For instance, if your goal is to scale from $3 million to $5 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR), break that down into specific milestones – like acquiring new customers, making critical hires, or launching a product. Then, estimate the hours needed to hit those targets. Many founders discover that 45–55 hours of focused work per week is enough to drive meaningful progress, while extra hours often end up being spent on less impactful tasks.

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