5 ms·

Managers say 4-6p.m. is now a work 'dead zone.'

35 points by jedberg 3y ago

mydriasis 3y ago
https://archive.is/vEIId https://archive.is/vEIId
Buttons840 3y ago
> Gone are the days of the standard nine-to-five workday for many in the US. Say hello to the "triple-peak" workday. Degrading boundaries and mixing work into all hours of my life? No thanks.
jpitz 3y ago
Anyone else think this is a consequence of households converging on dual-income due to flat earnings vs cost of living?
- JohnFen 3y ago
  I don't know. The majority of households that I'm familiar with have always been dual-income. Being able to live on a single income became something only the wealthy could afford (in my part of the US, anyway) decades ago.
- jedberg 3y ago
  For sure. Now that dual income is expected to maintain the cost of living, no one is left to do housework and child care. Which means either outsourcing that to someone who makes less than your lowest earner, or taking time off to care for the kids and housework. But honestly as an employer, I'd rather people take a few hours off to tend to their family's needs then stick around being unproductive and then having a stressful family life too. But most corporations don't think that way. Especially since the ones in charge are usually single income earners with staff to take care of the house.
ryandrake 3y ago
> You can imagine the effect on collaboration if your colleagues need something from you, but you won't be back on until after they've all logged off for the day. I mean, "core hours" have been a thing long before mass-WFH and the pandemic. Companies can keep the overall workday flexible while insisting on availability during, say, 11AM to 2PM or something. Where I work, Fridays have become totally dead. Pre-WFH, Fridays were pretty slow, but if you needed something from someone, you could at least stalk them and eventually ambush them at their desk. Now? Good luck, it's almost impossible to get ahold of anyone synchronously on Fridays. So how do you deal? Make sure everything requiring synchronous communication happens Mon-Thu. Not a huge problem.
- eschneider 3y ago
  Is this such a huge problem? The coworker I work most closely with is twelve time zones away, so we have almost no overlap other than a few evening(for me)/morning(for them) meetings during the week. The usual stuff works: write things down, think ahead about info you might need, and try not to leave things until the last minute. With a bit of planning and consideration for your coworkers, the lack of sync isn't a big problem for a lot of jobs.
tj-teej 3y ago
"roughly 30% of Microsoft employees in the study now had a third productivity peak at about 10 p.m" Maybe I'm naive but I'm surprised one in three workers at Microsoft have a productivity spike at 10pm (they said it's measured by keyboard usage).
- theduder99 3y ago
  maybe this is a veiled reference to their offshore employees.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > (they said it's measured by keyboard usage). Which is not well-correlated to being productive.
  - darthrupert 3y ago
    I should get a job at Microsoft and play a mud all day. I'll be principal engineer in no time.
- doubled112 3y ago
  If I’m still working at 10pm, there’s a good chance it’s gibberish due to falling asleep at the keyboard and drool, or me waking up really fast as my face hits it. Even in an outage or emergency, I’m probably bored, exhausted and useless before then. Assuming I started at my standard 8am, of course.
- dangus 3y ago
  If you’re a parent, you might end up getting real shit done when your kids are asleep.
  - red-iron-pine 3y ago
    Or because they wake you up. Send a lot of 11pm emails because baby needs a late night change and it's the wife's turn to sleep in.
damnesian 3y ago
It's a dead zone regardless. Most real concentrated work for 8-5ers trails off around 3. It's a basic truth of human cognition.
- morkalork 3y ago
  Then people book meetings in the 10-3 window and not the end of the day! Way to blow the most productive hours.
- red-iron-pine 3y ago
  Studies have shown, repeatedly, that productivity drops off after ~6 hours. Doesn't mean you can't be productive after 6, but diminishing returns. Call the spade a spade and focus on improving the 6 hours, since in most cases it's silly meetings that could be chopped down.
silisili 3y ago
Quite the opposite for me. I'm a 10 to 6er. 4 to 6 is when I have most uninterrupted time...perhaps because it's a dead zone for everyone else?
- m463 3y ago
  good time for uninterrupted work for me too (remotely). I think it IS that others are busy.
- hightrix 3y ago
  My hunch is that this "dead zone" was detected by productivity tools that noticed email and Teams messages slow down during that time period. I say this because it is relatively well known around my team that 3-6 or so are "working hours" in that, we are all getting stuff done and not chatting.
- tnecniv 3y ago
  In grad school, I was always most productive after dinner because that was the largest uninterrupted block of time to do math / code.
- muzani 3y ago
  Came here to post this. I usually do the whole day's work in those two hours. No PRs, no slack, no fires, no important meetings.
fullsend 3y ago
Gasp! Next “Managers” will be saying that Friday is now a work “relaxed zone”.
sublinear 3y ago
Why does anyone care about this? You're not going to squeeze more work out of people by analyzing or playing games with hours. You're just pissing your employees off. Get your estimates, set your deadlines, and then leave them alone as much as possible. If that's not good enough your real problems are bad planning, poor prioritization, or just being clueless in general. You want more productivity? Fire all non-technical middle management immediately and promote technical talent from within. These idiots are the direct source of all the wasted time. They need to be babysat, maybe even more so than the kids at home, with constant meetings or multiple explanations when they've already been given enough information long ago and are also the source of burnout for the single people working at 10pm. This becomes a vicious cycle when work becomes uninspiring at best or chaotic at worst. As the saying goes: people don't quit their job. They quit their boss.
- nine_zeros 3y ago
  The org structure is broken. One of the reasons why so many companies beat large companies in cheap money environment was because they could use that money on real execution aka, less management. The large companies could never produce as many useful products in a cheap money environment because they have hamstrung themselves with layers and layers and layers of managers, each with their own agendas.
dmvdoug 3y ago
Isn’t there an actual circadian low in the 1-3pm range?
tibbydudeza 3y ago
I can't work one solid block. Divide my day in two blocks with a large gap in between them for household chores - general life stuff and alo taking a nap. 9am-12pm 8pm-12am

35 points by jedberg 3y ago

https://archive.is/vEIId https://archive.is/vEIId

> Gone are the days of the standard nine-to-five workday for many in the US. Say hello to the "triple-peak" workday. Degrading boundaries and mixing work into all hours of my life? No thanks.

jpitz 3y ago

Anyone else think this is a consequence of households converging on dual-income due to flat earnings vs cost of living?

JohnFen 3y ago
I don't know. The majority of households that I'm familiar with have always been dual-income. Being able to live on a single income became something only the wealthy could afford (in my part of the US, anyway) decades ago.
jedberg 3y ago
For sure. Now that dual income is expected to maintain the cost of living, no one is left to do housework and child care. Which means either outsourcing that to someone who makes less than your lowest earner, or taking time off to care for the kids and housework. But honestly as an employer, I'd rather people take a few hours off to tend to their family's needs then stick around being unproductive and then having a stressful family life too. But most corporations don't think that way. Especially since the ones in charge are usually single income earners with staff to take care of the house.

ryandrake 3y ago

> You can imagine the effect on collaboration if your colleagues need something from you, but you won't be back on until after they've all logged off for the day. I mean, "core hours" have been a thing long before mass-WFH and the pandemic. Companies can keep the overall workday flexible while insisting on availability during, say, 11AM to 2PM or something. Where I work, Fridays have become totally dead. Pre-WFH, Fridays were pretty slow, but if you needed something from someone, you could at least stalk them and eventually ambush them at their desk. Now? Good luck, it's almost impossible to get ahold of anyone synchronously on Fridays. So how do you deal? Make sure everything requiring synchronous communication happens Mon-Thu. Not a huge problem.

eschneider 3y ago
Is this such a huge problem? The coworker I work most closely with is twelve time zones away, so we have almost no overlap other than a few evening(for me)/morning(for them) meetings during the week. The usual stuff works: write things down, think ahead about info you might need, and try not to leave things until the last minute. With a bit of planning and consideration for your coworkers, the lack of sync isn't a big problem for a lot of jobs.

tj-teej 3y ago

"roughly 30% of Microsoft employees in the study now had a third productivity peak at about 10 p.m" Maybe I'm naive but I'm surprised one in three workers at Microsoft have a productivity spike at 10pm (they said it's measured by keyboard usage).

theduder99 3y ago
maybe this is a veiled reference to their offshore employees.
JohnFen 3y ago
> (they said it's measured by keyboard usage). Which is not well-correlated to being productive.
- darthrupert 3y ago
  I should get a job at Microsoft and play a mud all day. I'll be principal engineer in no time.
doubled112 3y ago
If I’m still working at 10pm, there’s a good chance it’s gibberish due to falling asleep at the keyboard and drool, or me waking up really fast as my face hits it. Even in an outage or emergency, I’m probably bored, exhausted and useless before then. Assuming I started at my standard 8am, of course.
dangus 3y ago
If you’re a parent, you might end up getting real shit done when your kids are asleep.
- red-iron-pine 3y ago
  Or because they wake you up. Send a lot of 11pm emails because baby needs a late night change and it's the wife's turn to sleep in.

damnesian 3y ago

It's a dead zone regardless. Most real concentrated work for 8-5ers trails off around 3. It's a basic truth of human cognition.

morkalork 3y ago
Then people book meetings in the 10-3 window and not the end of the day! Way to blow the most productive hours.
red-iron-pine 3y ago
Studies have shown, repeatedly, that productivity drops off after ~6 hours. Doesn't mean you can't be productive after 6, but diminishing returns. Call the spade a spade and focus on improving the 6 hours, since in most cases it's silly meetings that could be chopped down.

silisili 3y ago

Quite the opposite for me. I'm a 10 to 6er. 4 to 6 is when I have most uninterrupted time...perhaps because it's a dead zone for everyone else?

m463 3y ago
good time for uninterrupted work for me too (remotely). I think it IS that others are busy.
hightrix 3y ago
My hunch is that this "dead zone" was detected by productivity tools that noticed email and Teams messages slow down during that time period. I say this because it is relatively well known around my team that 3-6 or so are "working hours" in that, we are all getting stuff done and not chatting.
tnecniv 3y ago
In grad school, I was always most productive after dinner because that was the largest uninterrupted block of time to do math / code.
muzani 3y ago
Came here to post this. I usually do the whole day's work in those two hours. No PRs, no slack, no fires, no important meetings.

fullsend 3y ago

Gasp! Next “Managers” will be saying that Friday is now a work “relaxed zone”.

sublinear 3y ago

Why does anyone care about this? You're not going to squeeze more work out of people by analyzing or playing games with hours. You're just pissing your employees off. Get your estimates, set your deadlines, and then leave them alone as much as possible. If that's not good enough your real problems are bad planning, poor prioritization, or just being clueless in general. You want more productivity? Fire all non-technical middle management immediately and promote technical talent from within. These idiots are the direct source of all the wasted time. They need to be babysat, maybe even more so than the kids at home, with constant meetings or multiple explanations when they've already been given enough information long ago and are also the source of burnout for the single people working at 10pm. This becomes a vicious cycle when work becomes uninspiring at best or chaotic at worst. As the saying goes: people don't quit their job. They quit their boss.

nine_zeros 3y ago
The org structure is broken. One of the reasons why so many companies beat large companies in cheap money environment was because they could use that money on real execution aka, less management. The large companies could never produce as many useful products in a cheap money environment because they have hamstrung themselves with layers and layers and layers of managers, each with their own agendas.

dmvdoug 3y ago

Isn’t there an actual circadian low in the 1-3pm range?

tibbydudeza 3y ago

I can't work one solid block. Divide my day in two blocks with a large gap in between them for household chores - general life stuff and alo taking a nap. 9am-12pm 8pm-12am