IMHO a much better question is: "how can we help our programmers be more productive?" Long hours only "help" for a pretty short time period, so making the core

IMHO a much better question is: "how can we help our programmers be more productive?" Long hours only "help" for a pretty short time period, so making the core 8 hours/day more productive is a much more sustainable approach. In my experience people LIKE being productive and don't like working crazy hours, so it's also much easier. Top hits in my experience: Is the physical environment conducive to productivity? Comfortable/ergonomic setting, fast powerful hardware with lots of screen real estate, does the office allow for uninterrupted focused work and good communication. Is the work environment conducive to productivity? Are the software tools low drag? Is the process setup to allow developers to focus on 1-24 hour sized tasks (optimal size may vary) without interruption and having to multi-task on 12 things at once? Are your programmers protected from random management interference? There are tons of factors that go into this as well, having your manager or team lead protecting and empowering you versus cracking the whip, making it easy to keep blood sugar at happy levels, having the programmers be interested in the work, have the programmers understand the value of the work and be invested in the success of the project. I would much rather have programmers working 6 hours a day, focused, motivated, and productive, than 12 hours a day, checking facebooks, switching between 12 different "SUPER URGENT" tasks all day, etc....