Reddit co-founder says there’s no such thing as perfect work-life balance

Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit, is married to Serena Williams

Alexis Ohanian is a father, a husband, an entrepreneur, an investor and, perhaps most famously, the co-founder of Reddit. He should know a thing or two about balancing the personal with the professional, but Ohanian is of the opinion that there is no such thing as achieving the perfect work-life balance.

In an interview with Entrepreneur early last month, Alexis Ohanian said that life is all about prioritising correctly instead of trying to achieve work-life equilibrium.

Asked how he manages to balance his professional life with his personal life – the Reddit co-founder is married to tennis star Serena Williams and they have a daughter together – Ohanian said: “I don't think it's about work-life balance. I don't think anyone can really accomplish that. It's not about balancing.

“If you're chasing balance, you're implying, like Thanos, [that] you'd be able to create something perfectly balanced. And the reality is work-life [is] never 50/50. You'll never achieve anywhere close to that — nor should you.”

Instead, he says, people should prioritise different things at different points of life. “There are times in your life where you will need to focus on the career, the work,” Ohanian says. “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 reveals that before he got married, he was “terrible” at finding any kind of balance. In his 20s, he barely gave any thought to how often he exercised or what he ate. But all that changed when he became a father in his 30s – “I was like, I need to change everything so that I can be around for as long as possible for this little one,” he says.

Now, he leads a more disciplined life, starting each day with a cold plunge, sitting down for dinner with his family at 6 pm whenever he his home, writing down his professional and personal goals every day and more.