3 ms·

I think the key is less-stress and not shorter hours. Meetings, especially long ones, induce stress. I've tried reducing hours (as a freelance remote developer

I think the key is less-stress and not shorter hours. Meetings, especially long ones, induce stress. I've tried reducing hours (as a freelance remote developer). I cut my working hours to 25 per week from somewhere around 60ish per week. (And I could afford losing out money) At first, I felt I was missing something. I thought it was the money. After being completely off work for a month, I realized I was missing the people (Slack chats, meetings, fire-fights) When I started back with another client, working just 25 hours per week was much much much harder. None of these worked: 8x3days, 4x6days, 6x4days, 5x5days. Few weeks I could not even complete 15 hours, and other weeks I was over-working. I was still stressed. Finally, what worked was odd - (10-12 hours)x2.5 days. So I ended up working a bit more hours than I wanted to. It was proven again that it takes time and focus to pickup momentum and costs a lot more to loose it frequently. And I still work on my other stuff totalling to about 45-50 hour work-weeks and still feels much less stressful.

dnh44 10y ago
Have you tried working when you feel like it (or when you really have to), and just not working when you're not in the mood? I had a three year period working freelance and it was most profitable and fun. I have no clue how many hours I was doing but for the last six months I only worked a few hours a week because I was able to automate most of my work. I'm doing a startup now and this lifestyle wouldn't be acceptable to my partners so it's back to a 9-late schedule plus weekends. I'm nowhere near as productive and strongly feel like I'm accomplishing less, but to go back to working how I like would just cause conflicts.
- anupshinde 10y ago
  Unfortunately, I do not have such luxury. I do have flexibility within a work-week. i.e. I could be working on client project on MTW or FSS or in between, but I prefer doing much work within Tue-Fri. Fortunately, I have been with one very good client working on challenging stuff yet does not have tight deadlines. It is a risky strategy to stay with just one client - but I am not worried too much about it now. Since its billable hours, I don't see automation would help reduce my hours - it increases efficiency though. I tried a startup with some partners and recommended a flexible schedule, but unfortunately partners got too flexible and it never took off. It is better to slog and make others do that in a startup.

dnh44 10y ago

Have you tried working when you feel like it (or when you really have to), and just not working when you're not in the mood? I had a three year period working freelance and it was most profitable and fun. I have no clue how many hours I was doing but for the last six months I only worked a few hours a week because I was able to automate most of my work. I'm doing a startup now and this lifestyle wouldn't be acceptable to my partners so it's back to a 9-late schedule plus weekends. I'm nowhere near as productive and strongly feel like I'm accomplishing less, but to go back to working how I like would just cause conflicts.

anupshinde 10y ago
Unfortunately, I do not have such luxury. I do have flexibility within a work-week. i.e. I could be working on client project on MTW or FSS or in between, but I prefer doing much work within Tue-Fri. Fortunately, I have been with one very good client working on challenging stuff yet does not have tight deadlines. It is a risky strategy to stay with just one client - but I am not worried too much about it now. Since its billable hours, I don't see automation would help reduce my hours - it increases efficiency though. I tried a startup with some partners and recommended a flexible schedule, but unfortunately partners got too flexible and it never took off. It is better to slog and make others do that in a startup.