3 ms·

> Feel free to name any category of professional where working over 40 hours a week isn’t quite normal. YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that

by rualca 6y ago

> Feel free to name any category of professional where working over 40 hours a week isn’t quite normal. YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that "working over 40 hours a week is the norm" was when I started working at a US-based company. And the only reason unpaid overtime was the norm was that managers, specially skip-level management, did a piss-poor job establishing sane goals based on realistic time-frames, and typically threatened to fire people pretty much each and every single week if they did not met those unrealistic goals. Strangely enough, everywhere else people managed to do their job within the 40hours work week.

alisonkisk 6y ago
Yes, many places are willing to have lower productivity in exchange for higher quality of life. The US has a different culture and has most economically dominant companies.
- africanboy 6y ago
  I think it's the opposite, productivity is the GDP output over worked hours, in USA they work a lot more than in Europe on average, so their productivity is actually similar, not higher. More hours = more productivity it's a myth https://time.com/4621185/worker-productivity-countries/ https://time.com/4621185/worker-productivity-countries/
- emodendroket 6y ago
  Don't know that you can really make a meaningful comparison given the political and military dominance of the United States.
- rualca 6y ago
  > The US has a different culture and has most economically dominant companies. The US's post-WW2 dominance doesn't explain why layers of lower management from the US stationed abroad insist in scheduling 3 weeks worth of work into 1 week in spite of being fully aware of how long the task takes, and afterwards boast to their leadership that their non-US teams outperformed US-based teams by a long shot while leaving out that team some non-US developers had to pull consecutive all-nighters to pull it off.
barry-cotter 6y ago
> YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that "working over 40 hours a week is the norm" was when I started working at a US-based company. Irish lawyers and doctors work well over 40 hours a week on average too. I feel pretty confident the same is true in finance. Tax professionals in Spain do too. That about exhausts my personal knowledge of working hours in Europe but I kind of doubt management work less than 40 hours a week anywhere, even the civil service. > and typically threatened to fire people pretty much each and every single week if they did not met those unrealistic goals. The secret to greater American productivity and hence wealth. People just work more hours.
wott 6y ago
> YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that "working over 40 hours a week is the norm" was when I started working at a US-based company. Even in France, where the base legal hours are only 35 hours a week, intellectual/upper professions in a full-time position work an average of 43 hours a week. That's the average which includes women, who work 10% less (in terms of number of hours worked) than men. If you only consider men, you reach an average week of 45 hours for those professions.
- africanboy 6y ago
  that is hours clocked in I guess, there's a similar pattern in Italy but they are not working more they are staying at the office longer they chose to so that they can skip other obligations (family for example) and as you said it's mostly a men thing I'm in a professional full-time position and nominally I should work 40 hours but actually we work less especially now that we are working from home nobody will ask you to do something on a friday afternoon "I'll see you on monday"

by rualca 6y ago

alisonkisk 6y ago

Yes, many places are willing to have lower productivity in exchange for higher quality of life. The US has a different culture and has most economically dominant companies.

africanboy 6y ago
I think it's the opposite, productivity is the GDP output over worked hours, in USA they work a lot more than in Europe on average, so their productivity is actually similar, not higher. More hours = more productivity it's a myth https://time.com/4621185/worker-productivity-countries/ https://time.com/4621185/worker-productivity-countries/
emodendroket 6y ago
Don't know that you can really make a meaningful comparison given the political and military dominance of the United States.
rualca 6y ago
> The US has a different culture and has most economically dominant companies. The US's post-WW2 dominance doesn't explain why layers of lower management from the US stationed abroad insist in scheduling 3 weeks worth of work into 1 week in spite of being fully aware of how long the task takes, and afterwards boast to their leadership that their non-US teams outperformed US-based teams by a long shot while leaving out that team some non-US developers had to pull consecutive all-nighters to pull it off.

barry-cotter 6y ago

> YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that "working over 40 hours a week is the norm" was when I started working at a US-based company. Irish lawyers and doctors work well over 40 hours a week on average too. I feel pretty confident the same is true in finance. Tax professionals in Spain do too. That about exhausts my personal knowledge of working hours in Europe but I kind of doubt management work less than 40 hours a week anywhere, even the civil service. > and typically threatened to fire people pretty much each and every single week if they did not met those unrealistic goals. The secret to greater American productivity and hence wealth. People just work more hours.

wott 6y ago

> YMMV but the only time I ever experienced the myth that "working over 40 hours a week is the norm" was when I started working at a US-based company. Even in France, where the base legal hours are only 35 hours a week, intellectual/upper professions in a full-time position work an average of 43 hours a week. That's the average which includes women, who work 10% less (in terms of number of hours worked) than men. If you only consider men, you reach an average week of 45 hours for those professions.

africanboy 6y ago
that is hours clocked in I guess, there's a similar pattern in Italy but they are not working more they are staying at the office longer they chose to so that they can skip other obligations (family for example) and as you said it's mostly a men thing I'm in a professional full-time position and nominally I should work 40 hours but actually we work less especially now that we are working from home nobody will ask you to do something on a friday afternoon "I'll see you on monday"