4 ms·

This article doesn't pass the smell test. There is nothing magical about 40 hours per week. 60 hours is just as arbitrary as 40. Also, it probably originated w

by ksk 13y ago

This article doesn't pass the smell test. There is nothing magical about 40 hours per week. 60 hours is just as arbitrary as 40. Also, it probably originated when people did actual physical labor, and so it wont apply to dev work. Countless people in the sciences have toiled day and night to bring about great discoveries - and that's a good thing. Question: Do non-software people (I'm thinking Scientists, Mathematicians, etc) ever complain about this?

erichocean 13y ago
Filmmaking is an area where you work a lot. And then you don't, because you're trying to get work. But when you're working, to say that it takes over your life is a bit of an understatement. The director is typically putting in 18 hours a day for shoots that can last for months. The crew gets 1 day out of 7 off, but not the director (and the crews typically also work long days—overtime is rampant). It's a frigging marathon to get the footage in the can, and yet, despite nobody really liking that aspect by itself, almost without exception the end result is to want to do it again. The same is true for almost everything else surrounding the making of a film. Only the actual screenwriting is done on a relatively slow schedule. Anyway...
- ksk 13y ago
  Yeah and game development is quite similar in this aspect to film making. I was just thinking about the people who mostly sit at a desk and have their brains heavily engaged doing a particular task all day. IMO/IME people get fatigued by mental work way more easily than physical work, so its hard to compare the two. (Discounting some outliers like athletes, construction workers, etc)
claudius 13y ago
Complain about 60 hours/week? Rarely. Work 60 hours/week? Rarely. Professors tend to put in roughly 40 to 80 hours depending on their scientific and organisational workload, but most others hardly ever work 60 hours/week with an average of 40-ish. But then, nobody really measures how much time they put in, and you have to keep in mind that in science, the ‘passive work’ done sort-of in the background while doing something else plays a larger role than in programming (at least that’s my impression). That said, 40 hours is not entirely unjustified, given that 8 hours/day is relatively practical if you want to have both breakfast and dinner at home with an 2hours/day commute and that at least most universities are relatively closed-down on weekends (though some enjoy the much more quiet environment…).
- ksk 13y ago
  >Work 60 hours/week? Rarely. Do you have any data on this? Some quick data points that I found : http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06302/nsf06302.pdf http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06302/nsf06302.pdf http://www.stthomas.edu/media/hollorancenter/pdf/Should-We-Be-Working.pdf http://www.stthomas.edu/media/hollorancenter/pdf/Should-We-B... http://arthropodecology.com/2012/10/25/the-work-life-balance-how-many-hours-do-professors-work/ http://arthropodecology.com/2012/10/25/the-work-life-balance... A lot of people seem to work more than 40 hours per week. I'm sure some of them do complain. Maybe devs are just more likely to blog about it.
  - claudius 13y ago
    Not really data in any sense justifying the plural use of the word, merely a look down the hallway of the chair where I work – nobody comes in before 8:30 and most people have left by 18:30, averaging a nice-ish 40h/week, given that those who come in early will leave early, too, there are extensive lunch and coffee breaks and most people keep their evenings and weekends work-free (though, of course, not all of them).
jpttsn 13y ago
Management consultants have a culture of overtime that probably beats that of programmers. Investment bankers are on an even higher level. In their culture, overwork is also much more explicitly a badge of honor.
dwaltrip 13y ago
60 is not "just as arbitrary as 40". The human body has very real constraints.
- ksk 13y ago
  You're begging the question, how does 60, 40, 50 w/e figure into those constraints? And the more important question, because there's going to be variability how do you end up a meaningful number? To me, this sounds similar to the question - How much weight can you lift? Almost everyone can increase the amount of weight that they can lift. But physical, genetic reasons will force some upper bound on the progression.
Bahamut 13y ago
As a former mathematician and current dev, they are different environments. In software engineering, 60+ hours a week on just work stuff is bad...I've noticed a bit of performance degradation at around 50 hours. I do spend a large amount of out of work hours learning more stuff on my own, but mentally it's a different ballgame, which lets you be more relaxed. In mathematics, your mind is mostly in the relaxed state, unless you're about to take an important exam. For the process of research, you just spend the time you can delving into a particular topic and understanding it. The life of a mathematician is more analogous to learning & experimemting with different code libraries on the side. The mental balance errs more towards relaxed experimentation as opposed to just getting it done.

by ksk 13y ago

erichocean 13y ago

Filmmaking is an area where you work a lot. And then you don't, because you're trying to get work. But when you're working, to say that it takes over your life is a bit of an understatement. The director is typically putting in 18 hours a day for shoots that can last for months. The crew gets 1 day out of 7 off, but not the director (and the crews typically also work long days—overtime is rampant). It's a frigging marathon to get the footage in the can, and yet, despite nobody really liking that aspect by itself, almost without exception the end result is to want to do it again. The same is true for almost everything else surrounding the making of a film. Only the actual screenwriting is done on a relatively slow schedule. Anyway...

ksk 13y ago
Yeah and game development is quite similar in this aspect to film making. I was just thinking about the people who mostly sit at a desk and have their brains heavily engaged doing a particular task all day. IMO/IME people get fatigued by mental work way more easily than physical work, so its hard to compare the two. (Discounting some outliers like athletes, construction workers, etc)

claudius 13y ago

Complain about 60 hours/week? Rarely. Work 60 hours/week? Rarely. Professors tend to put in roughly 40 to 80 hours depending on their scientific and organisational workload, but most others hardly ever work 60 hours/week with an average of 40-ish. But then, nobody really measures how much time they put in, and you have to keep in mind that in science, the ‘passive work’ done sort-of in the background while doing something else plays a larger role than in programming (at least that’s my impression). That said, 40 hours is not entirely unjustified, given that 8 hours/day is relatively practical if you want to have both breakfast and dinner at home with an 2hours/day commute and that at least most universities are relatively closed-down on weekends (though some enjoy the much more quiet environment…).

ksk 13y ago
>Work 60 hours/week? Rarely. Do you have any data on this? Some quick data points that I found : http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06302/nsf06302.pdf http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06302/nsf06302.pdf http://www.stthomas.edu/media/hollorancenter/pdf/Should-We-Be-Working.pdf http://www.stthomas.edu/media/hollorancenter/pdf/Should-We-B... http://arthropodecology.com/2012/10/25/the-work-life-balance-how-many-hours-do-professors-work/ http://arthropodecology.com/2012/10/25/the-work-life-balance... A lot of people seem to work more than 40 hours per week. I'm sure some of them do complain. Maybe devs are just more likely to blog about it.
- claudius 13y ago
  Not really data in any sense justifying the plural use of the word, merely a look down the hallway of the chair where I work – nobody comes in before 8:30 and most people have left by 18:30, averaging a nice-ish 40h/week, given that those who come in early will leave early, too, there are extensive lunch and coffee breaks and most people keep their evenings and weekends work-free (though, of course, not all of them).

jpttsn 13y ago

Management consultants have a culture of overtime that probably beats that of programmers. Investment bankers are on an even higher level. In their culture, overwork is also much more explicitly a badge of honor.

dwaltrip 13y ago

60 is not "just as arbitrary as 40". The human body has very real constraints.

ksk 13y ago
You're begging the question, how does 60, 40, 50 w/e figure into those constraints? And the more important question, because there's going to be variability how do you end up a meaningful number? To me, this sounds similar to the question - How much weight can you lift? Almost everyone can increase the amount of weight that they can lift. But physical, genetic reasons will force some upper bound on the progression.

Bahamut 13y ago

As a former mathematician and current dev, they are different environments. In software engineering, 60+ hours a week on just work stuff is bad...I've noticed a bit of performance degradation at around 50 hours. I do spend a large amount of out of work hours learning more stuff on my own, but mentally it's a different ballgame, which lets you be more relaxed. In mathematics, your mind is mostly in the relaxed state, unless you're about to take an important exam. For the process of research, you just spend the time you can delving into a particular topic and understanding it. The life of a mathematician is more analogous to learning & experimemting with different code libraries on the side. The mental balance errs more towards relaxed experimentation as opposed to just getting it done.