How to improve your productivity by 200% in just 9 months

The other day, at a Founder Forum, a colleague asked me how I managed everything. I’m a father of two and a serial co-founder of diferent startups. And, well, he had just become a dad and was struggling to balance both roles. That question reminded me of this article I’ve had sitting in my head for about ten years.

And yes, let me start by saying: the title is a trap. This is not about magic hacks, online courses, or productivity porn. What we’re really talking about is how having kids forces you to become more productive. I said “forces” because that’s the real verb here.

Actually, I said “you”, but it should be “me”, because this whole thing is just my experience.

Here’s the thing. Having a child when you’re building or growing a company is not just hard, it messes with your sense of identity. You live in this constant low-level fear. You’re never fully present in either world. When you’re at work, you feel like you should be at home. When you’re home, your brain keeps looping through the never-ending list of things you still need to do. Especially in tech, where everything moves fast, and standing still feels like falling behind.

So here’s what I’ve learned.

Kids are an amazing framework for prioritization

Kids helps to kill procrastination

Before becoming a parent, I had this fantasy that I could always catch up on work after the work-day. So I usually pushed tasks to later. Then later became later again. And so on. Now I know the truth: when I get home, I’m done. And maybe, just maybe, I get another 30 minutes once they fall asleep. If something doesn’t get done during the workday, it rolls over to tomorrow. No more mental gymnastics.

I have to say, this is the hardest part. And it’s not something you consciously decide. You just don’t have another option. If you have to pick up the kid, you have to be there. If it’s bath time, you can’t take a meeting at the same time. There’s no overlap. It’s a hard boundary, and that’s exactly what makes it powerful.

Kids make it easier to say no

One of the best skills I’ve developed in the last few years is the ability to say no. There’s a quote I love, though I don’t know where it comes from:

“I don’t know the secret of success, but the secret of failure is not saying no.”

This becomes very real once you have kids. Every moment you spend on something pointless is time taken from them. That changes how you filter decisions. Random coffees, meetings without a purpose, events that don’t align with your goals, they’re no longer harmless. They have a cost. And saying no becomes a default, not a struggle.

Kids force you to self-organize

You should see the shared calendar between Natalia and me. It’s more structured than the one at my company. Every detail is there. From school pickups to tennis classes to who is cooking dinner. If it’s not in the calendar, it simply doesn’t exist.

This reminds me of a great talk from Molpe at Tarugoconf, probably ten years ago. He spoke about how he and his wife managed their calendars together, and why that mattered. What I loved about that talk is that it broke out of the usual tech bubble and tackled something very real. Something everyone faces, no matter their industry.

I could keep listing points, but the main takeaway is simple. Having kids doesn’t ruin your productivity. It changes the rules of the game. And in many ways, it improves how you operate. It forces you to focus. To prioritize. To give time the value it deserves.

You just need to stop seeing it as a problem to solve and start treating it as an upgrade to how you work.

Also, let’s be real for a second. People have been having kids since forever. We’re not inventing anything new here. And we’re lucky to be in tech. We have tools, flexibility, remote work. Most people don’t.

And one last thing. This is my perspective, and I’m a man. I’m very aware that for many women, this balance is even harder. They face expectations and pressures that we often don’t even notice. So take this for what it is: my experience, not some universal truth.

If it resonates, or if you want to talk about it more, ping me on Twitter or LinkedIn. Always happy to have this conversation.