Optimising The Founder CPU

Building a startup is really hard (we know), and taking time to find those game-changing moments of inspiration, thoroughly analyse a difficult choice, or layout a well-considered plan - can make all the difference.

We believe allocating brain-time for deep thinking is so important, we’re now officially offering discounts for start-up founders, and co-founders, who want to use Ashore.

All you need to do is plug in your LinkedIn into this form and make a booking request to receive a 20% discount on your stay. We’re opening this up to an initial cohort of ten founders or founding teams (first come, first served).

All you have to do is send us your details here, and tell us where you want to go.

All about Founder CPU time

In programming, the CPU handles every decision a computer makes. The concept of “CPU time” refers to the amount of time is given to the CPU to make each decision.

For founders, their CPU time-per-decision is chronically low. But allocating more time to the big decisions is easier said than done when you're operating in breakneck speed.

Pausing to think when opportunities arise

During the last twenty years alone, vast changes to UK working life and culture have taken hold through the invention of totally new jobs, technologies and industries.

The archetypal nu-industry: The Creator Economy, has been built on Youtube. They estimate they’ve contributed around 45,000 full-time jobs to the UK economy, mostly through individual creators & their teams (Perhaps really a new breed of an existing sector in the economy -  entrepreneurs and SMEs).

In 2023, we have Artificial intelligence presenting novel opportunities for the workforce across every field, and we’re still only in the first year of truly seeing its potential.

In times of change of great change and uncertainty, how have the greatest artists and entrepreneurs found inspiration to discover how to do something totally, and uniquely, new, and change the way we live and work?

Think Weeks

At Ashore, we love Bill Gates’ approach. The Think Week:

Bill started to take Think Weeks back in the 90s, when he was still running Microsoft. He would travel the Hood Canal and spend one week there alone, reading and thinking. He’d absorb stacks of books and technical papers - anything that could help him understand the future.

A CPU is a central processing unit that carries out the instructions of a computer programme. Without one, a computer can’t make calculations or decide how to function.

“When you write down all these things - when will low interest rates end? Why isn’t the clinic working better? Okay, the private sector is good at this, do they have capacity, how do we do the safety checks?... Then you think, okay do I need to read some books about this? Who do I need to talk to about that? And some things, I say to myself - ‘Hey, I just need to think.’”

“It’s CPU time”, Bill says. “When you write down these things to think about, that’s like the code.”

From Inside Bill’s Brain - Decoding Bill Gates

At Ashore, we offer think weeks off-the-shelf with our Discover product.

Does it work?

There’s an established body of scientific research that looks at each of the elements of an Ashore stay: as well as copious examples from entrepreneurs & artists throughout history (Bill Gates, Led Zeppelin and Mary Shelley all liked to take trips to unlock their best work).

A disrupted routine has been shown to boost creativity by 58% in the three weeks following the disruption.
Multi-day trips in a natural environment led to a 50% increase in performance on creative problem-solving tasks.
Performance in memory and attention tasks have been shown to improve by 20% for every hour an individual spends in nature.

What does Ashore get out of this?

We’ve already welcomed some incredibly interesting founders to work on projects at an Ashore over the past year; we’re now collecting productivity data to analyse how going somewhere new helps us do better work.

In exchange for the trip, we’ll ask you a little bit about your experience and use that information to improve the overall Ashore experience.

Sounds like a good deal? Tell us where you want to go here.