Ritvik Varghese is the Founder and CEO of Ripen. 

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Ritvik is on a mission to simplify adulting or growing up for the next generation with Ripen. His story started with personal life struggles when he turned 18 and moved out of his house. He faced struggles with his landlord and finances and that encouraged him to start a guide for youngsters. That was the primary reason behind starting Ripen - to provide a community and an app that helps youngsters with adulting 🫂

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What do your days look like?

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My morning starts very early, I wake up around 5:30 to 6:00. I grab a cup of coffee and jump into a deep working session till around 10 or 11. Then we have our morning stand-ups with the team till around 11:00 to 12:00. I'm mostly busy there and after then since most of my work gets done in the morning only I chill for a bit till lunch. After lunch I head to the gym at around 2:30. Post gym I pick up a few work and calls and at 6:30 I go for a run.

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I have a goal of running 1000 kilometers this year so that's something I am trying to achieve.

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If there's some work left after my run, I wrap that up and then I spend time either calling my family, or my girlfriend, or just relaxing with my friends and then wind down with a bit of journaling or reading. I sleep by 10 maximum 😴

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How do you manage your workload? 

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I think the company's energy really depends on the founder's energy. If you get burnt out, then that's going to affect the company directly.

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In terms of time, I'm very strict about it because I feel like my role as a founder is not just to protect my time but also the people in my company. So it's very important that none of us burnout. There are a few things I do: 

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• Delegation: I found it very hard to delegate because I hold very high standards for work. But what I realized it's more of a trial-and-error kind of thing. You need to give things to people and need to recognize the pattern on whether it works or not and accordingly kind of reallot and kind of re delegate to see what finally works.
• Calendar Audits: Weekly I kind of look at what calls worked, what didn't, and do I need to be there at a particular call in the coming week. This is because for me my time is very, very important and crucial. I think at most early stage companies time is the most crucial resource that we all have, right?
• Saying no very often: I think understanding your role very well where you play a part and just tell people that you don’t need to be on all calls. 
• Constantly iterating: No system works long term, so we see what timing and schedule work for us in the long term. This is quite similar to how you run a product at a company.

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How do you identify areas to improve?

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I am very introspective in nature. I spend a lot of time alone and deep thinking. I am able to understand why a particular event happened in my life and accordingly look at places to improve.

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Another thing is I have started being very honest with people and you know, people have been honest with me as well.

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So you know my co-founders and the team, we keep a very open flow of communication. So I get a lot of feedback from there. 

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I would say I kind of also have like a mentor coach who helps me and guides me through the things I need to improve. Because I never did a leadership kind of a course or anything. So I think I need to constantly learn there as well.

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What do you do for your mental health? 

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I like spending time with people I value a lot. I think I need to do more of that with my parents, my friends, and cut off, you know, all these relationships where I don't really want to invest. I realized very early on that all relationships probably don't matter.

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I spend a lot of time in solitude. I enjoy my own company a lot, and my thoughts, and trying to structure that very well.

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But other than that, fitness is a space I invest a lot of time in. Like I play a lot of football and I go to the gym and I run every day. So I kind of lose track of time. So that is something I invest heavily in as well.

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Any advice for other entrepreneurs prioritizing mental health? 

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So I think the most important lesson I would give is just, to say “no” more often.

You don't need to be at every meeting, every sales call or every partnership call, or every growth call. Sometimes it's okay to let your team figure it out. I think the older you get (I am not that old) but I have realized that you don't really have to explain your lifestyle to anybody. People who value you will automatically understand that you know this is how he is. it's just about communicating it to them. And I think they'll, if they value you, they'll understand.