If you think the longer you work the more tasks you complete, then you’re dead wrong. Recently news reports about Sheryl Sandberg — COO of Facebook — flooded in, all full of praise. Why? Because she leaves work at 5:30 every afternoon to play with her kids. By the way, she’s been doing this for years; it just happened to be reported recently. [caption id="" align=“aligncenter” width=“431”]
Programmer, you must not work more than 40 hours a week[/caption] And the reason Sandberg now thinks it necessary to report this is that, after a century of research, working over 40 hours a week actually lowers productivity. In the early 20th century, Ford Motor ran dozens of experiments to find the working hours that let employees perform best. They found the weekly productivity peak was “40 hours”; adding another 20 hours might initially increase production, but after three to four weeks it has negative effects. In fact, everyone who works in enterprises knows that the early-1900s factory worker experiment applies equally to office workers. Those smart people who consistently work only 40 hours absolutely accomplish more than workaholics who regularly overtime 60 hours or more. The workaholics (misguided poor souls) might object to the above, but from what I’ve personally observed, long hours lead to project scrap and rework.
Burnout
A very important point: long-term work leads to exhaustion, which shows in all aspects of work, such as careless thinking and wrong decisions. I remember a guy at a company I once worked at who actually used the team’s divorce rate as a productivity metric. Believe it or not, the funniest part is the company’s higher-ups actually liked it. The end result: the team accomplished little — and I’m not surprised. Thinking about it now, I think this guy had reasons to propose such a ridiculous or absurd metric. The supporters of the view that longer hours create greater competitive advantage are mostly from countries with longer average working hours, like Thailand, South Korea, and Pakistan. (Translator’s note: the author seems to have forgotten China)
Europe Bans Over 50 Hours a Week
Among the world’s top 10 most competitive countries, the 6 European ones (Sweden, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, and UK) classify working over 48 hours a week as illegal. In the US, working 50, 60, or 70 hours a week is basically unseen, and this has become fashionable in parts of that country’s business circles. If American managers were smart enough, they shouldn’t say idiotic things like “If you don’t come overtime Saturday, you’d better come Sunday whether you like it or not!” You know, if we want employees most productive — finishing tasks in least time at unchanged hourly pay — then 40 hours a week is best for the company. In other words, if you leave work at a reasonable time, say 5:30, you needn’t feel sorry. In fact, those who work long hours every week should feel sorry — because they likely lower the whole team’s efficiency. Translator’s note: 40 hours a week is hard in China, at least in the programmer industry. How many hours do you work a week? Translation link: http://news.html5tricks.com/programmer-work-less-40-hours.html Original English: Stop Working More Than 40 Hours a Week (http://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/stop-working-more-than-40-hours-a-week.html) Translator: IT News (http://news.html5tricks.com/) — Jiang Lili [Reposting must annotate and retain the original link, translation link, and translator information in the body.]