CAITLIN OCHS/ Reuters
Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd is stepping down as CEO after almost a decade.The exec said she hadn’t “lived like a twentysomething since I started Bumble in 2014.”Here’s a look at her daily routine over the years.
Whitney Wolfe Herd recently announced that she was stepping down as the CEO of the dating app Bumble after nearly 10 years and moving into the role of executive chair.
Wolfe Herd, who launched the women-focused dating app in 2014, became the youngest female CEO ever to take a company public when Bumble had its IPO in 2021.
Here’s a look at Wolfe Herd’s daily routine, according to past interviews.
Morning
Wolfe Herd usually wakes up at 5:15 a.m. and starts responding to emails, she told The Times of London in 2017.
Her days were often unpredictable and started at different times during that time period, so she did her best to maintain a stable morning routine, she told Entrepreneur.
“I sleep with the drapes open to rise with the sun,” Wolfe Herd told the outlet back in 2017. “I think that’s a healthy thing to do because even if you don’t like to wake up early, your body does adjust.”
She added that she keeps a bottle of water and a yoga mat next to her bed to hydrate first thing and that she gets in a morning workout before going on her phone.
“I spend the first 30 minutes of the morning being cognizant of my family and dog — taking him for a walk, spending time with my fiancé — before it goes into madness and work mode,” Wolfe Herd said.
Wolfe Herd married her husband, the oil and gas heir Michael Herd, in 2017. The couple has since had two sons together, the first in 2019 and the second in 2022.
In an interview with Time earlier this year, Wolfe Herd said she tries to make sure she has no calls scheduled while she drives her older son to preschool, so she can give him her full attention.
“And then the minute I drop him off, literally as I’m giving him a hug out the door, I have to dial into something,” she told the publication. “But I’ve structured it so that that call on the way home is totally sequenced perfectly to get back to my computer to then pick up another two things on Zoom.”
Wolfe Herd hasn’t always followed a structured workday
The Tinder cofounder gave The New York Times a day-by-day breakdown of her schedule over one week in 2019.
That week, it included testifying at the Texas Capitol building in support of a bill to criminalize sending unsolicited lewd photos; looking over the rebranding of Chappy, the brand’s since-shuttered gay dating app; discussing whether or not to add videos to Bumble dating profiles; a quarterly strategy meeting; a monthly directors’ meeting; and a call with Emma Watson.
Wolfe Herd also told the Times that she liked to go through her inbox and answer emails on Saturdays, as she had more time to respond thoughtfully, storing email drafts and hitting send on Monday mornings so she didn’t make her staff anxious with weekend emails.
In the days leading up to her older son’s birth, Wolfe Herd said she was still signing business deals, she told Time, and she checked her email from the hospital. With her second child, she said she tried to go offline for the first 10 days — but she did bring him to an earnings announcement with her when he was five weeks old.
Winding down
Wolfe Herd enjoys cooking as a way to unwind and connect with her family.
“You only have two hands,” Wolfe Herd told Entrepreneur in 2017. “If you are chopping veggies, you are forcing yourself to put the phone down or step away from the computer. It’s extremely relaxing. As stressful as cooking might be, it’s a stress that is different from the stress of the day. It creates a really nice shift of thought process.”
Wolfe Herd could be described as somewhat of a workaholic, however — she’s been known to wake up every two hours through the night to check her emails, although she told the Times in 2017 that she was trying to break the habit.
Like many parents, Wolfe Herd also said she dealt with late nights and sleep deprivation.
“You just never know what you’re gonna get,” Wolfe Herd told Time. “It’s tricky because you need so much of your brain during the day to be a CEO. You need a rational, rested mind to function. Everyone says: ‘One day at a time.’ I actually prefer one hour at a time.”