Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, has a lot on her plate: She’s founder and CEO of home and lifestyle brand As Ever, is the mother of two, has a media arm Archewell Productions and oversees her charitable work through the Archewell Foundation, which she founded with her husband Prince Harry in 2020.
But the Duchess doesn’t let all of her work and charitable demands get in the way of spending time with her family.
Meghan said her team at As Ever is lean at fewer than 10 people. The Duchess said she stays heavily involved in the creative aspect of her brand, which sells home goods like marmalades, teas, and cookie mixes, but that she is also involved in crunching the numbers.
“The brand is an extension of my aesthetic,” she told Fortune’s Editor in Chief Alyson Shontell. “But it’s more than that. The operational side is so key. I am constantly looking at ways in which we can adjust our margins [and what] our spend looks like [by] really going through P&L.”
Many CEOs of large companies don’t necessarily prioritize work-life balance; many see work as life and life as work.
“If you’re happy at home, you’ll be better at work,” he said at Italian Tech Week earlier this month. “If you’re better at work, you’ll be better at home. These things go together. It’s not a strict tradeoff.”
Hoffman, on the other hand, has said that for founders to be successful, they have to be “committed to winning.”
Cerebras cofounder and CEO, Andrew Feldman also recently issued a harsh warning for startup founders: “This notion that somehow you can achieve greatness, you can build something extraordinary by working 38 hours a week and having work-life balance, that is mind-boggling to me.”
“It’s not true in any part of life,” he said.
“When bias happens in the workforce, it strips away a woman’s confidence,” she said. “When it attacks your confidence, it attacks your competence.”
