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So you're a clock-watching douchebag. Well, that's why I hope never to work with you, nevermind hire you. There's nothing worse than working with someone who

So you're a clock-watching douchebag. Well, that's why I hope never to work with you, nevermind hire you. There's nothing worse than working with someone who walks out the door at 5:00pm on the dot, regardless of what he was working on. As a part of my team, whether as a peer, a boss or a report, I hate when someone is so religious about watching the clock that they won't go out of their way for anything, whether it's an emergency, helping a co-worker or even for their own satisfaction.

noarchy 13y ago
I normally work as a contractor, so I get paid for my time. So I'll work overtime, and in fact will work as much as my client wants. They're aware of the costs, and so everything works out. But I have to say, if I didn't get paid for my time, I'd be heading out the door the second that I was no longer being paid. If that means watching the clock, so be it. My time is worth something to me. Maybe yours isn't.
- jib 13y ago
  In long-term employment, once you're in a spot where you're doing clock watching, both the employee and the employer are much worse off. I probably work on average an hour or two a week above my contracted hours (depends how you count stuff like handling a few urgent things from home etc), but I see it as a loose agreement - I get a pile of cash each month in return for generating as much value as I can in roughly 40h/week. Sometimes that means that I work 18h in a row (rollout of a new product for instance) and sometimes it means I leave early on a slow day. While the agreement says in pretty black and white that I work 9-18 Mon-Fri (I think - it was a long time since I read it), neither side is trying to encode the agreement fully, nor follow it to the letter, because doing so would be detrimental to both of us.
- JonFish85 13y ago
  Or maybe it's about more than just maximizing, to the penny, the dollars-per-hour you can make. If it's as a contractor, then I'd give you more lee-way, but as a "full-time employee", there are other things that motivate me, at least: reputation, ability to get a job done on or under time (negotiating power in the future), responsibility to co-workers, pride in my work, etc.
dmm 13y ago
So if you're not a clock watcher you don't mind if I show up twenty minutes late, right?
- JonFish85 13y ago
  As an engineer, if you're not late for a meeting, I don't care. I expect that you get your work done, and you're around the appropriate amount of time. If you're regularly coming in after your coworkers and leaving before them, then we probably have a problem. I'm not sitting with a stopwatch and noticing holy crap you came in at 9:09 and left at 4:51. If you're the last one in the office and the first to leave, week after week, then there might be an issue.

noarchy 13y ago

I normally work as a contractor, so I get paid for my time. So I'll work overtime, and in fact will work as much as my client wants. They're aware of the costs, and so everything works out. But I have to say, if I didn't get paid for my time, I'd be heading out the door the second that I was no longer being paid. If that means watching the clock, so be it. My time is worth something to me. Maybe yours isn't.

jib 13y ago
In long-term employment, once you're in a spot where you're doing clock watching, both the employee and the employer are much worse off. I probably work on average an hour or two a week above my contracted hours (depends how you count stuff like handling a few urgent things from home etc), but I see it as a loose agreement - I get a pile of cash each month in return for generating as much value as I can in roughly 40h/week. Sometimes that means that I work 18h in a row (rollout of a new product for instance) and sometimes it means I leave early on a slow day. While the agreement says in pretty black and white that I work 9-18 Mon-Fri (I think - it was a long time since I read it), neither side is trying to encode the agreement fully, nor follow it to the letter, because doing so would be detrimental to both of us.
JonFish85 13y ago
Or maybe it's about more than just maximizing, to the penny, the dollars-per-hour you can make. If it's as a contractor, then I'd give you more lee-way, but as a "full-time employee", there are other things that motivate me, at least: reputation, ability to get a job done on or under time (negotiating power in the future), responsibility to co-workers, pride in my work, etc.

dmm 13y ago

So if you're not a clock watcher you don't mind if I show up twenty minutes late, right?

JonFish85 13y ago
As an engineer, if you're not late for a meeting, I don't care. I expect that you get your work done, and you're around the appropriate amount of time. If you're regularly coming in after your coworkers and leaving before them, then we probably have a problem. I'm not sitting with a stopwatch and noticing holy crap you came in at 9:09 and left at 4:51. If you're the last one in the office and the first to leave, week after week, then there might be an issue.