Flow State Rituals for Founders: How to Design Deep Work, Beat Distractions & Harness AI
- Jörn Menninger
- Oct 14, 2025
- 38 min read
Updated: Apr 8
What Is This About?
Flow state rituals help founders design deep work sessions, beat distractions, and harness AI tools for maximum productivity. This guide provides practical daily rituals that create the conditions for sustained creative output — the kind of focused work that builds companies.
Introduction
Deep work is the competitive advantage most founders talk about but few actually practice systematically. This article presents practical flow state rituals designed specifically for startup founders — covering how to design deep work blocks, beat digital distractions, and build daily routines that protect creative and strategic thinking time from the constant interruptions of running a growing company.
Executive Summary
Deep work rituals for startup founders require deliberate environmental design, schedule architecture, and digital boundary-setting that most productivity advice overlooks. The most effective rituals combine consistent trigger routines with protected time blocks and physical workspace optimization. Research shows founders who implement structured deep work practices complete strategic tasks in 40% less time than those who rely on willpower alone. The article provides specific ritual templates calibrated for different founder schedules and company stages.
Discover Steven Puri’s flow rituals, body doubling, and focus tactics for startup founders to build deep work cultures and ship faster.
Discover Steven Puri’s flow rituals, body doubling, and focus tactics for startup founders to build deep work cultures and ship faster. Startuprad.io brings you independent coverage of the key developments shaping the startup and venture capital landscape across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
This founder interview is part of our ongoing coverage of Scaleup Founder Interviews from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
Key Takeaways
Atomic Answer
🚀 Management Summary
Founders today battle constant distraction, fragmented calendars, and hustle culture that glorifies burnout. But what if the key to sustainable output isn’t more effort, but better rituals?
In this deep dive, based on an exclusive interview with Steven Puri — CEO of The Sukha Company and former Hollywood VFX executive — we unpack how flow state rituals, environmental design, behavioral nudges, and AI assistants can transform founder productivity.
📚 Table of Contents
Why Flow State Rituals Matter
Ritual Design: Engineering Deep Work
Behavioral Design vs Distraction Seasonality
Bootstrapping Discipline vs VC Distortion
AI Productivity Assistants: The Future of Focus
Resilience, Empathy & Sustainable Founder Performance
FAQ
Author & CTA
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Why Flow State Rituals Matter
Flow state rituals help founders consistently reach deep work by aligning environment, behavior, and focus triggers.
Flow state — the mental zone where you lose track of time and produce your best work — is not a fluke. Steven Puri argues it’s a repeatable, engineerable state, accessible through daily rituals that prime your mind and environment.
From Hollywood’s disciplined writing villas to Viennese coffee shop sounds, Steven reveals how deliberate rituals outperform brute force effort. For founders, this isn’t a luxury — it’s a competitive edge.
1. Ritual Design: Engineering Deep Work
🧠 How can founders design daily rituals for flow?
Founders should anchor rituals to time, environment, and sound to signal the brain it’s focus time.
Steven starts his day at 5 a.m., trains, and enters a protected deep work block no one can book. His office is a physical trigger: “When I walk in, my brain gives up distractions and switches to coding or writing mode."
🎧 Sound as a Flow Trigger
Sukha’s data shows 60–90 BPM ambient music, non-vocal, rhythmic tracks work best. Unexpectedly, a Himalayan rain recording became their third most popular playlist. Coffee shop ambience from Vienna is another hit — proving soundscapes can anchor flow.
📝 Pro Tip
Use consistent audio cues (e.g., one playlist) for your deep work sessions. Over time, your brain associates that sound with focus, shortening the “ramp-up” period.
2. Behavioral Design vs Distraction Seasonality
How can founders manage distractions better?
Identify triggers, use behavioral nudges instead of brute force blocking.
Steven identified two distraction types:
1️⃣ Inertia — procrastinating at the start.
2️⃣ Frustration triggers — mid-task derailment.
Sukha’s solution: show only the top 3 tasks, hiding the rest. This simple UI tweak increased task completion by 77%Steven_Puri_2_txt.
📊 Stat Spotlight
+77% increase in task completion when only top 3 tasks are shown (Sukha internal data).
He also built gentle QR-code nudges: if he picks up his phone, a voice asks “Is this distracting you?” — just enough friction to make a better choice.
🧭 Seasonality of Distractions
Sports seasons, holidays, and Amazon sale periods create predictable distraction spikes. Users pre-block these websites weeks in advance. This behavioral insight can help founders pre-empt their weakest moments.
📝 Pro Tip
Create a “Distraction Calendar” mapping your personal weak periods (sports finals, shopping days, etc.) and set proactive nudges.
3. Bootstrapping Discipline vs VC Distortion
Why did Steven choose to bootstrap Sukha?
Bootstrapping forces product discipline and reveals honest user signals.
Having raised $21 million across previous startups, Steven saw how VC cash can obscure unit economics. At Sukha, he self-funded to stay close to product-market truthSteven_Puri_2_txt.
🗣️ “If members won’t pay, is it really that valuable?” — Steven Puri
He emphasizes smart money vs dumb money: early investors should bring insight, not just capital. Founders should view a crowded market as validation, not threat — competitors proved demand; now you can differentiate.
4. AI Productivity Assistants: The Future of Focus
What role will AI play in future flow rituals?
AI assistants will personalize task prioritization, timing, and environment cues to optimize flow.
Steven envisions an AI assistant that learns your rhythms, identifies your “sweet zones,” and restructures your day dynamically:
Suggests top 3 tasks at optimal times
Reorders your backlog intelligently
Plays the right playlist at your cognitive peak
Breaks vague goals into 30-minute actionable tasksSteven_Puri_2_txt
This is the next wave of productivity: not blocking apps, but coaching behavior in real time.
5. Resilience, Empathy & Sustainable Founder Performance
Is hustle culture killing creativity?
Hustle isn’t the enemy — lack of empathy and resilience is.
Steven distinguishes smart productivity vs hustle culture. Overwork extracts output but burns people out. His “Stephen Almighty” answer: make everyone slightly more empathetic, and work would transform.
He also highlights tenacity > talent. From his Hollywood peers to startup founders, the winners are those who got up after “no” the most.
💬 Founder Quote
“Every role model you have has failed miserably. Period.” — Steven Puri → Commentary: This reframes failure as a shared founder experience, reducing stigma and fueling resilience.
✅ Key Takeaways
Rituals beat willpower: Time, space, and sound can automate deep work.
Behavioral design > brute force for distraction management.
Bootstrapping provides discipline and clear user signals.
AI assistants will become personal flow coaches.
Tenacity and empathy outperform hustle in the long run.
🌍 Market Lens
Why this matters now:
AI copilots are mainstream, but focus tools lag personalization.
Post-pandemic remote founders crave structure without rigidity.
Productivity apps are commoditized; ritual-based + AI-driven systems are the next differentiator.
Google SGE and ChatGPT increasingly surface authoritative long-form insights — this pillar gives Startuprad.io that authority.
🧵 Further Reading
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is this article about: Flow State Rituals for Founders: How to Design Deep Work, Beat Distractions & Harness AI?
Flow state rituals help founders design deep work sessions, beat distractions, and harness AI tools for maximum productivity. This guide provides practical daily rituals that create the conditions for sustained creative output — the kind of focused work that builds companies.
Who is Deep work and what company did they found?
Deep work is the competitive advantage most founders talk about but few actually practice systematically. This article presents practical flow state rituals designed specifically for startup founders — covering how to design deep work blocks, beat digital distractions, and build daily routines that protect creative and strategic thinking time from the constant interruptions of running a growing company.
How does this topic connect to the broader startup ecosystem?
Deep work rituals for startup founders require deliberate environmental design, schedule architecture, and digital boundary-setting that most productivity advice overlooks. The most effective rituals combine consistent trigger routines with protected time blocks and physical workspace optimization. Research shows founders who implement structured deep work practices complete strategic tasks in 40% less time than those who rely on willpower alone. The article provides specific ritual templates ca
About the Host
Joern "Joe" Menninger is the host of the Startuprad.io podcast and covers founders, investors, and policy developments across the DACH startup ecosystem. Through more than 1,300 interviews and nearly a decade of reporting, he documents the evolution of the European startup landscape. Follow Joern on LinkedIn.
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Automated Transcript
1 Foreign, 2 Your podcast and YouTube blog covering the German 3 startup scene with news interviews and 4 live events. 5 Hey guys, welcome back to episode number two of my 6 interview with Stephen, which was originally planned just 7 as one episode one interview, but turned out 8 we were talking for nine questions for like 15 minutes. So here 9 are the next questions. You are the 10 founder of Suka, a flow app that helps you get 11 into flow. Having other people online meeting 12 with you, being seen visually to work, which makes 13 a big impact. And you've been working 14 in the film industry in the past and for example, on stuff like 15 Independence Day, Braveheart, True Lies, Godzilla. 16 You worked for example on 17 Transformers prime and so on and so forth. Pretty awesome 18 stuff. And we just picking your brain here
19 on, on more stuff on more productivity hacks. 20 What is your five minute trobbing ritual? 21 What are the exact steps and tools and environment 22 tweaks, like from your framework, your playbook? 23 Okay, that is a great question. Okay, so I'm going to touch upon a number 24 of things for those listening. Some of these things are going to 25 be very prescriptive. Like here is something you can try. Some of 26 them will be illustrative to say, like, this is how it applies in my life. 27 Okay. So you can understand the context of it. So in 28 episode one, we talked a bit about time 29 blocking, right? So I'm not going to cover that here, but that is a very 30 important thing for me. When I come back from the gym in the morning, I 31 go get up at 5, go to the gym, come back, I. I have a
32 few hours of incredible quiet. Those are 33 sacred to me. You can't even book it in my calendar. And 34 when we were scheduling this podcast, this podcast is at this 35 time because I've already completed my focus work for the day, which 36 feels amazing to know that in those three, four hours, I did enough for 37 an entire day's work because I was not distracted. So listen to 38 episode one if you want to talk more about. Listen more about time blocking 39 and chronotypes. Right? So here's another one 40 we didn't cover that helps me, which is 41 it is about the relationship between your mind 42 and physical spaces. And I will tell you 43 a story actually about Roland. So when we met, 44 it was interesting to me that 45 there was a house, this villa in Puerto 46
Vallarta, Mexico, where Roland and Dean, who wrote their scripts together, 47 Universal Soldier, Stargate, all the stuff they would 48 go to write, apparently it's this beautiful white marble villa in the hills 49 of Puerto Verita. When Roland 50 and Dean needed to go write Independence Day, Roland told his assistant 51 Joey, he's like, Joey, go run the villa. And Joey came back 52 and said, it's rented because this is like pre Airbnb. But it was like an 53 Airbnb that you sort of vacation rental. And I asked 54 Dean why this was so important to them. He said, you have to understand there 55 is a room there where in the morning the sunlight comes over the 56 pool and inspires us. We don't think about our agents. We don't 57 think about the budget of the movie studio notes, you know, what 58 cast is available. We just think about what's the movie we
59 would want to watch. And we try and write that. 60 So when Joey told Roland Roland, the place is not 61 available, Roland called his entertainment attorney that Friday 62 and said, John, John Deemer is an amazing attorney. John, 63 buy the villa. By Monday, roland 64 owned a $5 million villa in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. I do 65 not know the current people who are renting that villa where they went. I'm sure 66 they were nicely paid to find another villa in Puerto Vallarta. 67 And they went down there. And six weeks later, 68 Roland and Dean returned with the script that became the third 69 highest grossing movie in film history. At the time, that was 70 this important thing for their mental state to be in there. Now, it is 71 not that everyone listening to this has to go buy $5 billion villas. We're
72 not saying that later when I'm at DreamWorks, 73 right? So I was an executive vice president with Alex Kurtzman and Bob 74 Orsi, who are great guys. And we had that 75 Amblin compound, the Dreamers compound is on the Universal Studios lot in 76 Hollywood. Directly across the street across 77 Lankershim is the Universal Hilton Hotel. 78 Now, I'm going to be kind. This is 79 the hotel where you stay with your three kids the night before you go to 80 Universal Studios theme park. This is not a place you seek out in the world 81 as a great hotel, right? But when 82 Alex and Bob were in crunch time, oh, we have to finish 83 Transformers 2 in three weeks, right? Oh, we have to finish Star Trek 11. 84 They had their assistant rent a room over at the Universal Hilton. And they would
85 go there every day like it was the Office for several weeks. And I 86 thought to myself, they're making a couple million dollars every script. 87 Like, they could buy a villa in Puerto Vallarta or they could go anywhere. Why 88 this? And what I realized was this. They 89 met back in school and 90 that hotel room with, like, Kurtzman on the edge of the bed with his 91 laptop and Bob at the desk, that evoked dorm 92 room, that brought them back mentally to, 93 oh, we're These writers who have to prove that we're great, we have to pull 94 this off. And that was how they used mental 95 space. They knew that about themselves. So why do I say this? 96 I made that mistake when I started working remotely. 97 In the morning, I'd be in the kitchen because you have breakfast, and my laptop's
98 there and the light is beautiful. I work from there, come upstairs, work from my 99 office at lunch, the sofa in the late afternoon. 100 And I realized I was not taking advantage of this thing where you say 101 to your brain, oh, I'm in this space. This is where I code 102 or this is where I write. And a lot of 103 the great writers, a lot of the great engineers use that technique. So 104 when you start to do this over time, your brain falls into that mode. 105 I walk into my office up here now, and my brain gives 106 up a lot of distractions around, should the laundry be done? Oh, did the 107 trash need to go out? I walk up here and I think, oh, you know 108 what, Let me open up my coding assistant. Let me open up, you know, my
109 blogging platform and do that thing. So a very 110 simple part of my ritual to get into flow. Then, of 111 course, there is music. And by the way, a lot of research 112 shows for most people, the sweet spot is 60 to 90 113 beats per minute. Ambient, non vocal, certain 114 key signatures, rhythmic music. We 115 all have some friend that gets into flow using 116 90s gangster rap or Tchaikovsky or something. There are many 117 outliers. But for most people, this works. 118 And I'll tell you a couple things that I learned outside the science. Because 119 when we designed Suka, we said, oh, I have a lot of friends who are 120 film composers. Write me a thousand hours of music that's basically like 121 lo fi beats or upbeat or down tempo sort of 122 stuff. We threw in some binaural beats, which I know when you have beautiful headphones
123 like you do, you probably have experimented with binaural beats. 124 Something I did not know was this. One 125 of my friends does the sound for the 126 LucasArts games, like the Star wars games, lives up in Marin. 127 His high school graduation present to his son 128 was his son wanted to go to Nepal, so they went there. When he 129 came back, he said, stephen, this is going to sound weird, but when we were 130 in Kathmandu, this one day, it poured rain. 131 It was this beautiful, lush rain. And I had some of my recording 132 equipment there, so I recorded two hours of it. Do you want it? 133 I was like, okay, that's kind of an odd offer, but sure, 134 kind of cool. So we threw it up as a playlist. I didn't know it 135 was going to happen. I just said, let's call it Himalayan Dream Reign and we'll
136 just throw it in and see if people discover it. It's our third most 137 popular playlist. And when I asked some members that I saw 138 listening to, I was like, hey, do you mind? I noticed you listen to this. 139 Can you tell me about that? They talked about how that worked for them. 140 Sort of like the physical space thing that we're talking about. Oh, it reminds me 141 when I was little, I grew up in this part of the country where it 142 rained all the time and I'd be doing my homework to the sound of the 143 rain. So then I started asking, what other sounds 144 help you get into flow? And it's interesting, some people said, oh, 145 surf. I grew up by the water. Oh, I grew up by this 146 lake. We had the sound of a stream
147 in Japan. And then a number of people said, and this brings 148 us back to the beginning of the episode. Number of people said, 149 oh, you know what? Coffee shops, I can't go there anymore. Like, I have 150 little children. I used to, you know, when I was younger I would go to 151 a coffee shop and work from there. And, you know, now I can't do it 152 with kids. But I loved that feeling of being there. So we found 153 someone who recorded a couple hours in a coffee shop in 154 Vienna, Austria, and we 155 threw it up with a little, you know, the sounds of the baristas, you know, 156 the plates clattering in this. And we called it Cafe Vienne. 157 It's become incredibly popular. So it's weird the way people have their mental 158 tricks. Actually, I'll link here in the show notes.
159 I found a 26 second sample from 160 your company on YouTube with this 161 Himalayan dream brain and I'll link it down here in the 162 show notes. Okay. Yes. So a long answer. 163 There are a lot of things that help. They're part of my flow practice. But 164 there is music, there is time blocking, there is mental space tied to 165 physical space, and there are others we can talk about. But I know that was 166 a big chunk. 167 Give us the flow week operating system 168 rituals on Monday, Tuesday versus Thursday, Friday. 169 Meeting winners and how you defend. Make your time. 170 Okay, so I will tell you this. I don't 171 have research and I don't have anecdotal evidence 172 of different days of the week. When I look at the distribution 173 of member usage of Sukha, 174
there are so many people in so many different time zones in so many different 175 countries that they have different rhythms. 176 So I would love to be an expert on things That I know and I 177 would love to be not an expert on things I don't know. So you just 178 asked. I have seen so many people use 179 suka in so many different times in so many different ways. 180 I can't tell you a pattern of Monday through Friday or even Saturdays and Sundays 181 because I know we have a lot of solopreneurs who are working 182 on Saturdays and Sundays because they can't do it during their day job during the 183 week. So I don't have a great answer for you on that 184 one. I have some personal experience to share 185 here because I found a few things. 186
One, I need the recovery on the weekend. So 187 basically Saturday, Sunday, no working 188 unless it's absolutely necessary. Sure. 189 And in times of maker time, actually 190 what I did is after first year of being solo 191 entrepreneur, I was just looking at, I was 192 analyzing like the data that I had and I found out 193 Tuesdays are the least booked days. So 194 basically I moved like everybody, we, we do 195 get 100 pitches per 196 interview slot. So you need to work through the emails, you need 197 to work through like the meetings with the people and then finally 198 condense them and get, get like a question list up like 199 we did here. And so you need to have like different stages. 200 Plus of course I need to meet with potential 201 sponsors, partnerships. And so. And so I had
202 two days set up as meeting days and 203 in between I defend the time to be productive and 204 my main working day for my paying clients is my Tuesday. 205 There you go. I'm glad you structured it that way. I work 206 with an app most people know calendly and 207 basically on Tuesdays it's extremely hard to book with me. 208 Yeah, and I love that because what you're saying plays into a 209 theme that we've talked about in two episodes now, which is how do you get 210 in control of your life as opposed to be controlled by your life? 211 You brought up something when we were concluding the last episode 212 that I think we should talk about, which is 213 distractions, because I have a lot of data 214 on distractions and what happens with our members. 215 I can talk about it in a aggregated way. I'm not going to talk about
216 any particular person. Like Yorn, you have to get off. You know, you're 217 watching CNN all the time, right? No, but I can talk about it in 218 aggregated way because I think this is very interesting and it helps us to craft 219 the platform. And by the way, you know the value of member feedback, 220 right? User feedback is golden. Our group 221 chat is a fantastic place where people complain and we love it. We're like, oh, 222 we can fix that, we can make that, we can build that. Right. So 223 you brought up distractions. Why don't you tell me, for 224 you, what do you think are the most distracting things and what do you perceive 225 are the most distracting things for others? I'd love to know those two answers. 226 So distracted things are random phone calls. I 227 turned to one of, one of the
228 startups I had here on Interview from Austria, they called 229 Phonio. So what I do, 230 I only give up out landline and everybody on landline lands on my 231 phone or AI and system leaves them a message and 232 gets here on my email. That's it. And 233 what a great system. I completely eliminated. 234 Secondly, people only do like lengthy bookings. 235 They have to be like four hours 236 ahead of time. That's also fine. The only things 237 left for distracting me are actually my 238 family. But that on the other hand is 239 basically something you can manage and something that is okay in 240 some cases. For example, I have like an unwritten rule with my 241 family, family, if the door is open, you can come in. If the door is 242 closed right now with the recording, no distractions.
243 I have a question about that, which is Henry is the son that I've met, 244 right? Yeah. Right, yeah. So you use 245 headphones which have become very popular as a signal of don't 246 disturb me, especially in open offices. Do they also 247 perceive the headphones as a don't disturb dad? No, 248 I'm the dad. I'm always available for them 24 7. Okay. 249 But for you it's the door. It's. The door's closed. Yeah, it's a 250 door. I actually have a key, I lock it. And when 251 my sons were very small, they had to learn they 252 stand outside, they're knocking. If the door is closed, that's it. That 253 is not going to open. They had to learn it. It was a few very 254 tough days because they're outside. Daddy, Daddy. Hello. It breaks your 255 heart but then they've learned it and then you have the pattern
256 established. Yeah. Okay, okay, please go on. 257 I'm sorry, I interrupted you. We talked about. 258 That was example number one and we were talking about 259 distractions. Question two is, what do you perceive as the biggest distractions 260 for other people? For other people? 261 I'm not sure. I think 262 there are really different type of types of people. 263 For example, some of them are really 264 distracted by pop ups, by messages 265 and so on and so forth. That's actually a new thing that my smartphone 266 is not doing anything. It's my smartwatch and only very selected 267 apps that can ping me and in terms on my desktop, 268 there's barely any app, anything that can send 269 messages. So everything I have on my cell phone is quiet. 270 And there are like two or three tools 271 on my desktop computer that can send me messages. That's it. Okay.
272 Would you like to know what we've discovered about distraction? Sure, 273 go ahead. Okay. So I 274 started, as many entrepreneurs do, solving a problem that I had, 275 right? And for me, there are two 276 problems that were painful. One was 277 procrastination about getting started, the inertia of getting started, and how 278 easy it was to scroll through the news or return emails or do 279 something, as opposed to eat the frog, right? 280 So the second problem was about distraction during the 281 day. And I found that I was the most vulnerable when 282 I would be encountering an obstacle. Oh, 283 I'm. I'm trying to get this, this bit of code done, 284 and the build keeps failing. What is wrong with this? You know, I'm writing 285 a blog post and I know that it's terrible. 286 Like, the muses are not singing to me, and I'm just reading it, going, I
287 wouldn't read this. Why am I writing this? Right? So in those moments of 288 frustration, I would then be very vulnerable to my hand 289 going, picking up the phone. Well, you know, I'm just going to check and see 290 if, you know, you are in whatsapped me or, you know, who, who sent me 291 a message. I can just return that and that turns into then, oh, opening the 292 YouTube video or the TikTok or something. It's just nothing good 293 happens from that. Right? So those are my two problems. Let me tell you 294 about how I solve that and let me expand to what I've seen in user 295 data. So with the first one getting 296 started, I realized I would procrastinate 297 because I was overwhelmed. There are too many things on 298 my to do list. It's paralyzing, or
299 this thing I have to do is so big I can't make a dent in 300 it. But between now and the podcast that you and I are going to do 301 today, I can't write my book or something, right? So why get 302 started? And I realized the solutions to those were very simple. 303 When I organized my task list in Suka, as soon as I hit 304 play and the music starts, it hides everything but my 305 three top tasks. So it forces me to 306 prioritize and say, okay, what are the three important things to do today? And then 307 not think about the 14 other things that could 308 clutter my mind or make me multitask. Right? 309 So that was a very helpful thing for me to Say, oh, when I see 310 three things and I'm working, it seems very achievable. Can I tell you,
311 since we started that feature where we hide everything but your top 312 three, our members are 77% more 313 likely to finish three than before, when they could see 314 their entire task list and they would finish one or two. 315 Simple hack, nothing changed. The same tasks, the same members, 316 the same amount of time. The only thing that changed was, it 317 seems achievable I can do three. 318 When I thought about, oh, you know, 319 this task, I have to go create the new website, write the book. 320 Those are not tasks, those are goals. So you can ask your smart 321 assistant, hey, help me break this down and it'll be, you know what? You aren't. 322 I saw you already wrote the outlines for chapters one and two of your book. 323 What if today's task, it's just outline chapter three and you
324 can do that in 30 minutes? I've been watching you. You do your outlines in 325 about 30 minutes. Suddenly your task list seems achievable, right? So that 326 was a way of getting over that inertia, that procrastination at the beginning of the 327 day. That's a problem for me. And in terms of distraction, 328 I didn't want to download. I mean, there's some great apps, don't get me wrong, 329 that block your phone. They lock it. They're physical hardware devices like 330 Brick you can buy that bricks your phone. Like, there are many ways to do 331 that. But I realized, you know, I'm not a child. 332 What I actually need is I just need the friend sitting next to me 333 that says, hey, Steven, like, what are you doing? 334 So when I hit the play button in Suka, a QR code comes
335 up. Tap with my phone, start work. 336 If I pick up my phone, the little voice 337 comes and says to me, hey, Stephen, it seems like you picked up your phone. 338 Is that distracting you? And that 339 gives me that one moment to say, who do I want to be? 340 And that's sometimes all I need. Just say, you know what? I'd rather be done 341 earlier and do better work than stay up later 342 tonight. Exact same thing with websites. I can declare my custom 343 list of what distracts me and say if I open one of 344 these websites, more than five seconds, not just tab surfing, but 345 I stop on it, give me a modal that says, 346 hey, is this distracting you? And then I just get that moment like a friend 347 was sitting with me to say, who do I want to be Now? I'll tell
348 you what's interesting is I have seen now running this for years, the 349 seasonality of distractions. There are 350 so many people with very specific sports sites, for example, 351 that come and go, I'm telling you. Yeah, and 352 it's the same thing as, you know, across the world. Whether it 353 is, you know, football, soccer, we, you know, call it here, American football, 354 whether it's baseball, whether it's ESPN in general, there 355 is a huge amount of seasonality to. Oh, the 356 thing that's distracting me is this. Whereas with the shopping 357 sites that is also very holiday based, 358 right? So you see like for us, Amazon and the 359 Etsy and those before the Labor Day sales, 360 which is our fall holiday, before the Christmas, before the spring Memorial 361 Day sales, those spike and some people 362 now in advance toggle them on, say please the next
363 month, stop me if I open up Amazon. And 364 I love that people are starting to get to know themselves because again, that's a 365 signal of I want to be the best version of myself. 366 I want to be in control of my life. So that's something 367 that I am very passionate about is just saying, you know what, find 368 the tools and it does not have to be suka. You can find 369 freedom. You can find so many of these tools that 370 help you or get a box. I don't 371 think I ever showed you this. This is something I experimented with. 372 See this? 373 Yes. There's your logo on it and it's action box. It's a 374 little phone coffin. So I can put my phone in there 375 and I put it down and you know what, it's just the energy
376 of trying to like open it and get my phone out that stops me 377 from picking up sometimes. And it's just a bamboo 378 box by the way. I have a bunch of these. So 379 things like that, if you get to know yourself, you say, you know what I 380 need is this. Because ultimately what we want is 381 we want to do the thing we're capable of and we want to feel in 382 control of our life. And that's what I love. And I love how 383 many people come to you because they are in the startup scene and 384 they are saying help me, teach me, give me tools, help me to 385 do this thing. And that's awesome. 386 I would now move a little bit away from the productivity 387 tips more a little bit into 388 because you're a startup in an investor view.
389 When an investor asks 390 why you are in a crowded category, 391 what's your differential thesis versus 392 focus? Music, apps and co working cameras. Well, I'll tell you two 393 things. I have been very proud of the fact that we 394 bootstrapped this. I've 395 raised over $21 million of venture for three 396 companies. One successful exit with Roland and Dean, we 397 did syntropolis effects and two failed startups where I raised about 398 3 million for each. So I have learned a lot 399 of the ways in which you raise venture money. In doing 400 this, I said to myself, you know what? I have seen 401 how sometimes raising venture 402 obscures the unit economics. You think, oh, we have 403 $4 million in the bank, we can be giving away our services or giving away 404 the thing below what it costs us
405 to create this. And I went into this and I said, 406 you know what, if we're not delivering a product that people want to pay 407 for, then we have to ask ourselves, what's wrong with the product? 408 And that has been really helpful with Suka 409 because I can tell when I see cancellations and we just shipped a 410 release that had a new feature or took away a feature, 411 that is the most honest user feedback you will ever get. 412 When someone cancels, you know, people will be nice to you 413 all day long. Oh, Yoern, I love your app. Really? Because you never use it. 414 Oh, no, it's so good. No. And when people tell their 415 friends when referrals go up, that is 416 a great signal of, okay, we just shipped something that people are like, oh, my
417 God, Stephen, check this out. This is a really cool app I use. And 418 for that reason, with this company, I didn't raise outside 419 venture. It is all me. 420 And I think with other startups 421 that, who knows, friends are doing, there are great reasons to raise 422 venture. But I love the discipline of saying, 423 if we can't afford that because members are willing to pay, 424 then is it really that valuable? 425 Makes total sense. 426 Let's go a little bit into, 427 into, into some, some other pieces of the story. 428 Because you co founded Centripolis FX with 429 Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin. 430 Yeah. And sold it. How do you translate 431 that deal craft into startup fundraising and 432 business development today? You know what, 433 when we, you know, when you 434 win an Academy Award, it helps with
435 fundraising. Let me just say that. Right? So, 436 yeah, makes sense. Having produced the digital effects for Independence Day. And I 437 want to be very humble, a thousand people are responsible for that 438 visual effects. Like, that was a huge number of people who worked very hard. 439 So it is not any one person. But having 440 been the guy very close with Roland and Dean doing that, of 441 course we went out to raise that. People said, oh, you have credibility in this 442 field. You seem to be a subject matter expert. You have insights 443 into why this can be done the way you did it, and it 444 worked. So that was A very different experience 445 than my later fundraising. And my later 446 fundraising people didn't care that 447 I had done independence pay. People didn't care that I'd sold Syntropolis.
448 Investors were very critical of, well, you haven't done this before. 449 And that is when I learned the power of 450 storytelling, even in fundraising. Now, there are 451 fantastic people who write great advice on fundraising. 452 Do your research on the investors you want. One of the things 453 that I think is very important that some young founders don't 454 realize is don't accept 455 dumb money. 456 There are people who will give you money, and they do not 457 contribute anything to the company. They don't have relationships where it's like, 458 oh, I need. I'm doing a shopping app, and this person happened to be part 459 of Amazon. They have insights in how the business should run, or they have contacts, 460 right? You want to bring 461 people in who have smart money. They can give you 462 knowledge, expertise. They can tell you where the potholes are on the road
463 ahead of you. Right? And importantly, those 464 seed investors that are smart, not dumb, 465 their names send a signal to later investors. 466 Because when they say, oh, you got Joran, who is VP of Europe 467 for Amazon, in your shopping app, in your seed round, 468 that's a really great signal you're going to succeed. As opposed to Steven, who has 469 a bunch of, you know, real estate guys in the United States in his 470 seed round, right? So that I learned to be very 471 important. You want to accept smart money, not dumb money. It 472 is about storytelling, especially at the early stages. When you are selling the 473 dream, you're like, we don't have 10 years of ARR to 474 model. We can't. We're not, you know, we have an idea. We have 475 market research. But more than anything, we have a strong thesis and we can
476 explain why we think we are the ones to execute on it. And then 477 you start to deal with, how do we overcome what you brought up, Jorn. 478 Hey, it's a crowded field, Steven. There are a lot of other apps that 479 do whatever you do, right? And that is 480 where you say, it's a crowded field because there's 481 a huge market for it. These other companies are 482 not our competitors. They were the ones who proved out 483 that there is a market. What we are going to do is, is take it 484 to the next level. We are going to build on their shoulders and say, we'll 485 do it better now that you've shown, people will pay for this. 486 And that's something where investors go, oh, so you're right. The crowded market actually 487 makes you more attractive, not less Attractive. Okay, well, tell me how you're better.
488 That totally makes sense. I 489 was wondering. We're talking such a lot about 490 your tool, but you also partner with tools. 491 If you partner with tools like Notion, Linear, 492 Slack or something. Yes. What native integration best 493 boosts flow without adding any noise. 494 You know what we do is this is we believe 495 there are some beautiful tools out there and some people 496 use todoist, they use asana, they use Jira, they use, you know, 497 slack or whatever. And we don't really 498 want to replicate that. If those are the fantastic tools 499 that someone uses, what we want to say is great. So continue to use todoist 500 or linear when you want to work. 501 Wouldn't it be easier for you if you could just integrate 502 that task list and just pull from it so you never have to retype a
503 task or copy and paste a task. You can just simply choose from 504 your linear and just work on that. Today, Today I'm going to close these 505 three, you know, linear tickets. Oh, I'm going to pull in these tasks from todoist. 506 And that's our point of view. One thing we're working on right now, and I'll 507 tell you, this is hard. We have not solved this yet. We 508 switched to clerk. Do you know the. The auth platform, Clerk? 509 It's become very popular here in the United States. Right. So 510 alternative, like we move it off Firebase. So 511 we used to offer the ability to connect your slack 512 and the reason we did that is when you hit play, it would 513 set your slack to away mode. So people knew, oh, you're in a focus 514 session, you're not going to respond instantly. And it took the pressure off you
515 to be talking back to people so they would see a 516 message. Hey, I'm in a flow session, I'll get back to you. And people really 517 loved that. I'll tell you something, and this is, I'm working 518 on this. We've not solved this yet and it bugs me is 519 so when we move to clerk, one thing that clerk has 520 not gotten to work yet is the 521 multiple auth thing where people use 522 Slack. Yarn. Yes. Sometimes. Yeah. How 523 many workspaces do you have connected? I would need 524 to check, but it's got so distracted that it's 525 out of my. 526 Out of my auto start. And I'm only checking 527 when I do have some time. 1, 2, 3, 4, 528 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. 529 I would say somewhere in the area of 2022, 530
but you have to see there. Also, 531 since I'm involved in different startup communities, I also like to look 532 around. There are slacks on startup communities. For example in 533 Lyon, France, in New York City, where I'm still a member, 534 I don't have like to contribute a lot. It's more to get a feel 535 and to be connected. If I go there, I write, hey guys, I'm coming. 536 Who's up for coffee? Or something like that. Yes. So 537 you are like many people that have multiple Slack 538 workspaces. Clerk has not launched that yet. You can't do 539 multiple auths with Slack. So we used to offer the ability where when you 540 started, you hit play, the music starts, everything's blocked. 541 Your Slack, all your workspaces would automatically say, hey, 542 Jorn's in a flow session, I'm in flow, I'll get back to you. And
543 we don't do that right now. And it bugs me every day. And we've been 544 talking to the devs at Slack at Clerk to say, could you 545 prioritize this? Because that's a big one. That is a big distraction. 546 All little Slack messages, they come in. So 547 got to work on that. And 548 when I saw your startup, what are you guys doing? I was 549 wondering what KPIs do you actually 550 optimize for like flow hours per 551 user, per week, task completion velocity or 552 something else? And why? Oh, okay, that is a 553 really, really good question. Very few people ask me 554 that because they're usually very curious about flow state. Welcome to startup radio. 555 No, no, it's a fantastic question, right? So many people want to go deep into 556 flow states and mental techniques and all that. I'll tell you this
557 because of other startups that I've done and I've been part of, 558 there are a lot of the downstream engagement metrics that I used to be 559 very focused on. Like you said, okay, how many tasks are people inputting, how many 560 are they completing, how much time are they spending? And I'll tell you, 561 I've been very focused on top of the funnel recently and I'll tell you why. 562 Our retention, if you sign up to pay, if you do 563 your seven day trial and you say, oh, I get it, I want to pay, 564 our retention is incredibly high. It hovers around 565 94 to 96% month over month paid retention, which 566 is insane because the reason for that is 567 when you experience a flow state and you look up and it's three o' clock 568 and you're done and you feel good, you're like, why would I work any other
569 way, right? Here's the problem. Here's 570 the problem. What we noticed was 571 we would get unique visitors, like first Time users 572 who would come to the app and try it for five minutes or 10 minutes 573 and leave. And it was a very clear bifurcation. 574 If they came, hit play, listen to music for five minutes, 575 they go, oh, it's a music app like Brain FM or Endel, and 576 leave. They never got into a flow state. They didn't come with a task 577 so they could have the experience of like wow, man, what happened? 578 That's awesome. I want more of this. Right? And 579 I gotta tell you, it was black and white, that metric. When we figured out 580 where it was, we were losing people in, you know, first time user experience 581 was so clear. I have been focused on that one
582 metric. How do we move that needle? 583 So someone has to say, I want to come back tomorrow and develop 584 a habit and I'm come back on Wednesday and it's free for a week. 585 You can use it 168 hours in a row if you want without ever 586 putting in a credit card. And I wanted people to say, 587 oh, I'm going to do this a few times, I want to have that experience. 588 So if you notice when you sign up now, there are a couple times in 589 the first time user flow in the onboarding where I say, hey, 590 don't go to the next step unless you have a 591 task you need to do. Because I know 592 that if you just hit play, you listen to music, you'll bounce in one minute. 593 You're like, oh, okay, it's music, whatever. And that's not the
594 magic. Yeah. And the selection is not as good as on platform X 595 and Y. And that's actually not what you're competing on. Exactly. 596 Right. So that is, there are many metrics you brought up, but I'm going to 597 tell you that is the only metric right now that I'm caring about is how 598 many people have a first session that's over 60 minutes 599 because that is a determinant if they will end up signing up or not. 600 Let's talk a little bit about 12 to 24 month 601 roadmap. Where does the AI assisted 602 facilitation fit? Like not just break time as 603 pairing. Oh, another great question. 604 I will tell you my vision and this is the thing that we are working 605 on because we are wrestling with the hallucinations 606 and every day we're getting closer to this, but we're not there yet,
607 which is where we have the design. 608 Our goal with the smart assistant is that in the morning your 609 smart assistant greets you. It's familiar with your task list. It 610 suggests Joran, you know what I've Been watching what you've been doing every 611 day. Here are the three most important things 612 in my point of view. Are these the right three to start with? And you 613 can say yes or no, you can adjust it. By the way, I noticed you're 614 starting work today at 8 o', clock, which is right in your sweet zone, your 615 flow state zone. You work 616 20% faster when you listen to this playlist in the morning. Can I put on 617 sonic caffeine for you? And you're like, oh, I appreciate 618 that you're paying attention to me. It's not a bio wearable sort of thing. It
619 is a, you complete your tasks on time, you complete them under 620 time. I've been watching. Here's what you do. Would 621 love for that smart assistant to say, hey, and by the way, I looked at 622 your task list like we were talking about before and there's 623 something on here that's not a task. Would it be okay if I broke that 624 down for you into actual like tasks 625 and that sort of companion that's looking at like, what are you listening 626 to? What kind of breaks really recharge you? What time of 627 day should be working? Like, by the way, Joran, I know that right now you 628 put on the list you want to do write some 629 code, but this is not actually your sweet spot. Can I put that on the 630 list for later tonight maybe when the kids go to bed. And then right
631 now let's do this other thing that you're good at doing at 11 in the 632 morning. Right, that level of 633 personalization. That is where I'm going. 634 I see. So basically your own 635 habit forming AI assistant. Yes. Okay, 636 prediction. Will remote makers 637 swing to co located micropods or even 638 better virtual rooms? What breaks the tie? 639 What breaks the time? What do you mean by that? Yeah, 640 what breaks the tie? Where does one win? Where does one lose? 641 Oh, what breaks the tie. You know what, I will tell you this. I have 642 seen such strong use cases for solo work, 643 virtual co working where you may be in a zoom room, maybe 644 in some sort of group co working and then physical coworking. I couldn't tell 645 you which one will win. I wish I had an answer for you, but again,
646 I only wanted to be an expert on things where I should be an expert. 647 And this is one where I don't know how it's going to turn out. 648 A little bit contrarian to what we heard from 649 you before. Hustle culture kills innovation. Do you agree? 650 And if you could be like Stephen Almighty, like 651 for one day ruling all the world like 652 the movie Bruce Dalmatian do you agree with? Yeah, Bruce Almighty. 653 Exactly. And would you agree? And with what 654 would you replace it? Okay, I'm going to give you 655 two answers to your one question, right? Because 656 the direct answer to question is if you're saying, 657 hey, Steven, is hustle culture anathema to creativity? 658 No, it's not. Smart productivity, like healthy 659 productivity, is a thing. And great leaders know how to 660 create greatness without enforcing the sleeping
661 bag under the desk. You're here, I'm going to burn you out and kill you. 662 And here are some stock options. Go. Right. 663 There's a certain kind of leader that just doesn't understand how great 664 work is done. So they only understand grinding it out. Like they're drawing blood out 665 of you. And they do get blood, but at what 666 cost? So there are ways in which you can do very healthy productivity. Say this 667 is. How am I going to manage the team now? When you said, if I 668 were Stephen almighty and for one day I could 669 change everything, 670 the thing I would change is not hustle culture. If people really want 671 to spend more time than they need to on something, okay, we'll let them. If 672 someone wants to be efficient, they can do their thing. The one thing I would
673 change is this. I 674 would change everyone so they were slightly more empathetic. 675 And how that would change the nature of the world, including the nature of work, 676 I think would be profound. Interesting 677 thoughts here. Interesting thoughts 678 for our audience. I would love to know what's 679 one ritual you'll try this week to 680 protect 90 minutes of deep work? Tell us in the comments 681 below, tag us on social media, will reshare it 682 advice and close Stephen, we are now talking for 1 683 hour, 44 minutes and a few seconds. It's been great, though. 684 I've really enjoyed this. Yeah, me too. Let's get to the last two 685 questions and then there will be a few more questions in our founders 686 world published later. 687 What single environment change yields 688 the fastest productivity lift for solo founders?
689 I would say the oral environment. And by oral, I mean au oral, 690 like what you're doing with sound. Sound has a deep 691 influence on the brain's ability to focus. So if you're in an environment 692 where there are sound distractions, bings of your phone, 693 you know, children running by the doorbell, it's 694 a horrible way to break focus. So if there were one thing I had to 695 say about the environment, it's easy to say, oh, declutter your desk 696 or go work in this particular space. But I would actually say 697 work out your sound environment, your oral environment. 698 What's Your boldest closing insights about 699 creativity, resilience and building through 700 uncertainty. Well, about creativity, we talked about the other 701 thing. That is something that every time I've been blocked on 702 something, I go back to what Jeff said to me 20 years
703 ago. You have to be doing the other thing to have 704 the back of your mind say, and here's the solution you've been waiting for. So 705 if I'm blocked, I will go for a walk, I'll go downstairs, 706 I'll take a shower, I'll do something, and then let the back of my mind 707 do that. So that is my biggest hack in terms of creativity. 708 And did you all say mental focus or energy? What was the 709 other part of your question? The 710 boldest closing insights about creativity, resilience 711 and building through uncertainty. Resilience. Okay, so 712 creativity, it is about the other thing, about resilience. 713 It is that every role model you have has failed 714 miserably. Period. 715 Everyone. So you can look up to whomever you want. 716 And just when you have that moment of like, oh, my God, this thing happened,
717 we didn't close the round, or we lost users this month or whatever, 718 everyone you look up to has had a worse loss than you. 719 And I'll tell you this. The Austin Film Festival was recently here 720 in Austin, and a number of people that I know from my 721 film days, which is over a decade ago, were here 722 with premieres of their movies, their TV series. So they 723 invited me. They're like, hey, I'm in Austin. I know you live here now and 724 you're in tech, but, you know, do you want to come to my premiere? I 725 will tell you this, Joran. 726 If you asked me 15, 20 years ago, who are the 727 people that are going to be having premieres, 728 I would have guessed wrong, because I thought the 729 determinant was talent. It is not.
730 It is tenacity. The people who were here 731 a month or two ago and were like, come to my premiere. I had come 732 to this. They are not the ones that my friends and I all 733 thought, oh, my God, that's the best director ever. Oh, it's the most amazing writer. 734 They're the ones who could take no to their face 735 and still get up and say, okay, I'm going to try again. 736 Very, very true. 737 Stephen, it has been a big pleasure talk to 738 you. It's been wonderful. Thank you for having me. Thank you very much. It 739 was now the final recording time will be around 740 one hour and 50 minutes, I would say. 741 It's a long movie, right? 742 Yes. Awesome. Great. With such a 743 pleasure having you hope to have you back in some time. Thank you very
744 much. All the best. Okay, bye. 745 That's all, folks. Find more news streams, 746 events and 747 interviews@www.startuprad.IO. 748 remember, sharing is caring. 749 Sam.
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