3/15/2025

A personal reflection on returning to San Francisco three months ago, balancing a new PM role with personal health transformation, and finding sustainable rhythms after the intense four-year journey of founding ThreatKey

Written by: Jonathan Haas

It’s been exactly three months since I returned to San Francisco, six months since I joined Vanta, and I’m finally starting to feel like I’m settling into a new rhythm. The journey from founder working 20-hour days to product manager prioritizing both career growth and personal health has been more challenging—and more rewarding—than I anticipated.

The Paperwork Never Ends

They don’t tell you this when you’re in the throes of startup passion: closing a company takes almost as much paperwork as starting one. Six months after officially winding down ThreatKey’s operations, I’m still dealing with unexpected trailing administrative tasks. Random emails from former vendors. Tax documents requiring signatures. Insurance matters needing resolution. The final legal bits that refuse to disappear.

After pouring four years of my life into building something from nothing, there’s something both frustrating and poignant about these lingering tasks. Each form I sign feels like saying goodbye to a different part of that chapter. I find myself simultaneously wanting to close this loop completely and wanting to hold onto these last tangible connections to what we built.

From Founder to PM: A Professional Identity Shift

Transitioning from founder to product manager has been an exercise in recalibrating my professional identity. As a founder, every decision was ultimately mine—for better or worse. The buck stopped with me. The weight of that responsibility was both exhausting and oddly addictive.

Now, six months into my new PM role, I’m learning to channel my entrepreneurial energy within different constraints. I’m part of a team with established processes. I need to influence rather than direct. I need to collaborate in ways that are more structured than the freewheeling startup days.

What’s surprised me most is how much I’m enjoying this shift. Without the existential pressure of keeping a company alive, I can be more thoughtful about product decisions. I can learn from colleagues with diverse experiences. I can focus on building excellence in one area rather than being spread impossibly thin across every function.

The 100lb Journey: Reclaiming My Health

Perhaps the most visible change in my life isn’t the career shift but the physical transformation. After four years of 20-hour workdays fueled by pizza and energy drinks, I’ve lost 100 pounds since starting my health journey six months ago.

The decision came from a place of painful clarity: I had sacrificed my health on the altar of entrepreneurship, believing that physical wellbeing was a luxury I couldn’t afford while building ThreatKey. I convinced myself that extreme work patterns were necessary for success. I was wrong.

The weight loss journey began during our wind-down phase and accelerated after. Without the constant stress of founder life, I could focus on establishing sustainable habits:

• Regular sleep schedules instead of coding or outbounding until 4 AM
• Meal preparation (though I should note that my girlfriend is the one who actually meal preps - I’m at best a taste tester)
• Daily movement instead of being chained to my desk
• Meditation instead of anxiety-scrolling through metrics

The irony isn’t lost on me that I’m now more productive, creative, and effective working reasonable hours with a healthy body than I ever was working around the clock in a depleted state.

The Healthy Grind: Finding Sustainable Intensity

I haven’t abandoned ambition or the willingness to work hard. I’ve just redefined what “the grind” means to me. The healthy grind isn’t about maximum hours—it’s about maximum impact within sustainable boundaries.

Some days still require intense focus and extended hours. The difference is they’re now the exception rather than the rule. I’ve learned to sprint when necessary, but I no longer treat life like an endless ultramarathon.

What’s been most revealing is discovering that many of those 20-hour days weren’t actually producing 20 hours of valuable output. They were producing maybe 8-10 hours of good work surrounded by exhausted, diminishing-returns effort that I convinced myself was necessary.

Lessons from Four Years of Founder Life

Looking back at the ThreatKey journey from my current vantage point, I can see both what I’d do differently and what I’m grateful for experiencing:

• The relationships matter most. The investors who believed in us, the customers who trusted us, the team members who joined our mission—these connections outlast the company itself.

• Sustainable pace wins. Had I maintained better balance throughout, would we have made better strategic decisions? I’ll never know, but I suspect yes.

• San Francisco’s ecosystem is unique. Being back in SF after trying to build remotely during parts of our journey, I’m reminded how much the city’s concentration of talent, capital, and innovation matters.

Coming Full Circle in the City by the Bay

The past three months in San Francisco have felt like a true homecoming. This city watched me launch ThreatKey with boundless optimism, navigate the ups and downs that followed, and now, it’s seeing me embrace a more balanced approach as I grow.

The hills I once climbed while dictating urgent emails into my phone, I now climb as part of my morning routine, present in the moment, appreciating the fog rolling over the Golden Gate.

The coffee shops where I once frantically pitched investors are now places where I can sit and thoughtfully map out product strategies or simply enjoy a moment of pause.

San Francisco has always been a city of reinvention, and I’m grateful to be writing this new chapter here—100 pounds lighter, professionally renewed, and finally understanding that sustainable growth ultimately takes us further than unsustainable hustle.