Graphic designer and illustrator Aziz Hasan is the CEO of Brooklyn-based crowdfunding platform Kickstarter. The platform has helped many entrepreneurs and individuals launch their companies and products.
In August 2021, the crowdfunding company announced that funders have pledged a total of $6 billion to the company’s more than 200,000 projects. Kickstarter reached the $5 billion mark in early 2020.
Unsurprisingly, the pandemic hit Kickstarter hard. However, Hasan took this opportunity to consider how the company might improve. The result: four-day workweeks starting next year.
Aziz Hasan is passionate about Kickstarter
Hasan was Kickstarter’s Head of Product and Design before he became CEO in March 2019.
“[Kickstarter], for me personally, is a place where I feel like both my personal passion and what we do on a day-to-day basis came together really well,” said Hasan. “I come in every morning and I say, ‘OK, how am I going to fix that? What can I do to make that process better, make that easier?’…This is what gets me out of bed in the morning.”
Prior to Kickstarter, Hasan was Refinery29’s Vice President of Product Experience and Creative Director. From 2010-2014, Hasan was Creative Development Director for Say Media. He was Marketing and Branding Director for the fashion designer Eva Khurshid from 2009-2012. Hasan began advising for Crooked Letter Films in 2013.
Aziz Hasan values work-life balance
Hasan has an artistic family and is a father to young children. His illustrations are often inspired by his daughter’s drawings.
“My wife is a fashion designer,” Hasan shared in an interview. “In my family life, the space we live in, the things we do, we’re centering around silly ideas, creative work, projects, stuff like that… A simple example of that is, we try this thing every Sunday, a family art day. For a couple hours, we clear off the dining table, get the paints out.”
Kickstarter adapts to pandemic challenges
Kickstarter suffered a decline in revenue during pandemic in 2020. Due to a significant decrease in projects, the platform laid off 40% of their employees. Hasan took the opportunity to consider how Kickstarter might expand from its original crowdfunding business model.
“I do see a lot of opportunity, kind of in the future horizon, for us to explore other ways of helping people bring their projects to life, whether that’s through the funding mechanism, whether that’s helping them shape their idea, and whether that’s helping them come and make it at the end of the day,” he said.
In 2022 Kickstarter will implement a four-day workweek as part of a pilot experiment. Employees will be able to work eight hours for four days a week with no change in pay.
Firstly, trials have demonstrated equal or improved levels of productivity from a 35 or 36-hour workweek for the same pay. Workers also report increased work-life balance, having more time to spend with their families and completing household tasks.
“We don’t have the perfect design today,” said Hasan. “You could say the same thing with remote work, it wasn’t widely accepted until we stepped into this pandemic and people are now seeing capabilities unlocked by it.”
