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The premise that 80 hour work weeks are somehow more productive than 40 hour work weeks is known to be false in the typical case. It's not the hours which deter

by Joeri 12y ago

The premise that 80 hour work weeks are somehow more productive than 40 hour work weeks is known to be false in the typical case. It's not the hours which determine your productivity, it's the engagement and motivation. Most people who do 80 hour work weeks slack off during a majority of that time and probably realize lower productivity than if they had stuck to a 40 hour work week. Making your workforce do 80 hours instead of 40 does not make them more productive. Motivating workers and putting them in control of their own work is what gets stuff done.

TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
But it's not about productivity - it's about impression management. IMO there are two kinds of working relationships - face-based, and fact-based. Face-based relationships are about impression management, egotism, and exploitation. A face-based employer has no interest in your life, because they only care about their narcissistic self-image. At best they have a delusional belief in the value of hierarchy and process as business goals in themselves. At worst they're simply assholes. If the entire culture is face-based you're in an alligator swamp, and you need to leave and work somewhere else. A fact-based relationship is based on getting useful stuff done in an efficient way. A fact-based employer assumes employees are functional adults, and is more interested in the end result of the work. Process is only valuable if it creates observable positive results, not for its own sake. They consider employee happiness and development a significant positive benefit to the company.
mistermann 12y ago
> The premise that 80 hour work weeks are somehow more productive than 40 hour work weeks is known to be false in the typical case. How do you know this for sure? Not saying you're wrong, but I can think of many exceptions to this rule.
- Ygg2 12y ago
  An 80 hour work week implies 16 hours work during the workdays or 10 if you work weekends. If work takes 16/10 hours for your work, when do you sleep or eat or socialize?
  - logfromblammo 12y ago
    Firstly, 80:00:00 / 7 = 11:25:43 ~ As for those other things you mentioned, the remaining 88 hours in the week would allocated as follows: 56 hours for sleep, 10 hours for meals, 3 hours for personal hygiene, 2 hours for exercise, 16 hours for a personal side project, and 1 hour to socialize. ~ ~ You'll have plenty of time for friends and relationships when you're dead. If you really cared about the company, you would abandon your personal side project and work 96 hour weeks. If you spent less time eating, you could also spend less time exercising. And some of your co-workers do get a bit ripe at times, so you're probably over-allocating time to hygiene. It takes me 3 minutes to shower, head to toe. That's how you get ahead in this business: effective time management. Also, I survive on a nutrient slurry that allows me to consume an entire day's worth of meals in only 30 seconds. And since I don't have time to actually buy anything, almost all my earnings go straight to savings! ~ The real answer is that you either sacrifice some sleep or you don't have any leisure time. That previous schedule breakdown intentionally ignores the time cost of transportation between activities, and little things like bathroom breaks. Calculating from my own life, if I worked 80 hours per week, I would have approximately 4 hours of disposable leisure time left. That would only be possible if 95% of my weekly fun requirement was met by work. The likelihood of that happening in any workplace that expected 80 hour weeks is abysmally low.
    - realusername 12y ago
      If you are just 30min away from work, you can already remove 5 hours per week assuming you work from Monday to Friday. And that's an absolute minimum, you just cannot live normally and work 80 hours a week.
      - logfromblammo 12y ago
        The schedule assumes that the employee sleeps at his or her desk.
    - Ygg2 12y ago
      > The real answer is that you either sacrifice some sleep or you don't have any leisure time. You lose sleep, you get sleep debt. Which is bad and shouldn't be tried. So the answer is no leisure time... Which is bad but not at that. > Also, I survive on a nutrient slurry that allows me to consume an entire day's worth of meals in only 30 seconds. And since I don't have time to actually buy anything, almost all my earnings go straight to savings!~ ~ And with oral, anal and urinal catheter you don't even have to ever go to the bathroom. Heck cut of your legs as they are useless and constant source of problems and inefficiencies. Just keep your upper torso for maximum efficient work. You don't even need to lose 30 seconds on making those meals, let your company provide the Oral Sludge receptacle™. Upon your termination, the health inspected Murder Rod™ will pierce your head and you'll be recycled into nutrients. Yum. ~
pckspcks 12y ago
It's false in the typical case. It's true in the atypical case, where the worker genuinely cares about the job. Earlier in my career, I had sustained 70+ hour work weeks at very high levels of productivity. In the process, I've personally conservative generated tens of millions of dollars of value. That moved me into my current position. I know a number of other folks like me. I'm not unique here. It's that sort of person that you want to hire.

by Joeri 12y ago

TheOtherHobbes 12y ago

But it's not about productivity - it's about impression management. IMO there are two kinds of working relationships - face-based, and fact-based. Face-based relationships are about impression management, egotism, and exploitation. A face-based employer has no interest in your life, because they only care about their narcissistic self-image. At best they have a delusional belief in the value of hierarchy and process as business goals in themselves. At worst they're simply assholes. If the entire culture is face-based you're in an alligator swamp, and you need to leave and work somewhere else. A fact-based relationship is based on getting useful stuff done in an efficient way. A fact-based employer assumes employees are functional adults, and is more interested in the end result of the work. Process is only valuable if it creates observable positive results, not for its own sake. They consider employee happiness and development a significant positive benefit to the company.

mistermann 12y ago

> The premise that 80 hour work weeks are somehow more productive than 40 hour work weeks is known to be false in the typical case. How do you know this for sure? Not saying you're wrong, but I can think of many exceptions to this rule.

Ygg2 12y ago
An 80 hour work week implies 16 hours work during the workdays or 10 if you work weekends. If work takes 16/10 hours for your work, when do you sleep or eat or socialize?
- logfromblammo 12y ago
  Firstly, 80:00:00 / 7 = 11:25:43 ~ As for those other things you mentioned, the remaining 88 hours in the week would allocated as follows: 56 hours for sleep, 10 hours for meals, 3 hours for personal hygiene, 2 hours for exercise, 16 hours for a personal side project, and 1 hour to socialize. ~ ~ You'll have plenty of time for friends and relationships when you're dead. If you really cared about the company, you would abandon your personal side project and work 96 hour weeks. If you spent less time eating, you could also spend less time exercising. And some of your co-workers do get a bit ripe at times, so you're probably over-allocating time to hygiene. It takes me 3 minutes to shower, head to toe. That's how you get ahead in this business: effective time management. Also, I survive on a nutrient slurry that allows me to consume an entire day's worth of meals in only 30 seconds. And since I don't have time to actually buy anything, almost all my earnings go straight to savings! ~ The real answer is that you either sacrifice some sleep or you don't have any leisure time. That previous schedule breakdown intentionally ignores the time cost of transportation between activities, and little things like bathroom breaks. Calculating from my own life, if I worked 80 hours per week, I would have approximately 4 hours of disposable leisure time left. That would only be possible if 95% of my weekly fun requirement was met by work. The likelihood of that happening in any workplace that expected 80 hour weeks is abysmally low.
  - realusername 12y ago
    If you are just 30min away from work, you can already remove 5 hours per week assuming you work from Monday to Friday. And that's an absolute minimum, you just cannot live normally and work 80 hours a week.
    - logfromblammo 12y ago
      The schedule assumes that the employee sleeps at his or her desk.
  - Ygg2 12y ago
    > The real answer is that you either sacrifice some sleep or you don't have any leisure time. You lose sleep, you get sleep debt. Which is bad and shouldn't be tried. So the answer is no leisure time... Which is bad but not at that. > Also, I survive on a nutrient slurry that allows me to consume an entire day's worth of meals in only 30 seconds. And since I don't have time to actually buy anything, almost all my earnings go straight to savings!~ ~ And with oral, anal and urinal catheter you don't even have to ever go to the bathroom. Heck cut of your legs as they are useless and constant source of problems and inefficiencies. Just keep your upper torso for maximum efficient work. You don't even need to lose 30 seconds on making those meals, let your company provide the Oral Sludge receptacle™. Upon your termination, the health inspected Murder Rod™ will pierce your head and you'll be recycled into nutrients. Yum. ~

pckspcks 12y ago

It's false in the typical case. It's true in the atypical case, where the worker genuinely cares about the job. Earlier in my career, I had sustained 70+ hour work weeks at very high levels of productivity. In the process, I've personally conservative generated tens of millions of dollars of value. That moved me into my current position. I know a number of other folks like me. I'm not unique here. It's that sort of person that you want to hire.