I often use company time to learn about new things that are related to my work, but not necessarily immediate tasks. For example - While working on a Java app, I will spend some time learning AWS or Kotlin. Not one person in the companies I have worked for ever told me off for doing that, most in fact encouraged it. My personal diary/notes suggests I spend between 25-30 hours/week doing actual tasks or attending meetings and remaining I spend socializing at work to build relationships which will help get things done for me or learning. This of course is average over a year, some weeks are more work heavy (even stretching to more than 40 hours) and some less so.
I have come to prefer it instead of shorter work week, which means same amount of work needs to be done in less number of sleep/break cycles, reducing the quality I produce. When I worked for myself, I used to work only 3-4 days a week and observed that in theory it sounds good, but my personal experience was, I was spending far less time subconsciously and output was not inline with my usual quality.
In my experience, there is no such thing as "getting through your tasks", as you are expected to pick up more tasks from a never ending bucket of tasks [1]. Of course this varies from place to place, but is in general true. Your peers and managers are more likely to notice you leaving early, or "not working" on the Friday, than they are to notice you working your butt off on the previous 4 days, to be honest.
[1] Edit: this is because of the nature of knowledge work, and the difficulty in estimating duration of work, difficulty, and quality. If you finish early, the powers that be are more likely to attribute it to bad powers of augury as opposed to extra hard work. This might sound overly negative, but I have seen this consistently throughout a few decades of experience (yet, I still work hard... go figure).
One of the most important changes for me, going from normal employment to self-employed, was no longer being paid by the hour. I don't know what it is about it but when I'm on the clock, all I can think about is the clock. I love being rewarded financially for being more efficient than expected and finishing early, and I love having the liberty to take a bit longer (and accept that it's not going to earn me more money) to get the job done right to my own satisfaction.
Also I dont spend less time at work, I just use post lunch hour, and 30-60 mins throughout the day to do learning.
I feel like as long as you prioritize your work well and you make sure to finish enough high-value tasks employers tend to not care too much about whether you actually fill up 40 hours with these tasks. Being able to use any left over time for myself also incentivizes me to stay productive so I'm pretty happy with this system.
Ultimately there is a trade-off between spending time at work and for yourself/friends/family. What the OP and other recent posts are increasingly showing is that the amount of time we really need to spend at work (perhaps especially if you are a knowledge worker) is not as much as our normal hours dictate.
Culture is a strong force.
Please stop treating them as some enlightened class. They're not.
Software engineers face the same idiocy as everyone else. Every other industry has smart, creative, individuals willing to buck the system and try new things for an edge.
If you truly believe people can't express a simple argument for trialing this sort of thing without losing their jobs maybe they should be looking for a new job because their current one sounds like a train wreck waiting to happen.
Software engineers are special in the sense that they’re expensive to replace. It costs time and effort, both of which are much more scarce than money. Businesses are also usually expanding, so there’s no shortage of openings. This gives us more freedom by definition.
However, some sectors of software engineering are much more strict. You wouldn’t take a “Just do it” attitude in aviation, for example. It’s easy to say “move to some other sector,” but eventually most devs try to build a career in one area.
All qualified and experienced people are expensive to replace.
That's not unique to software.
It is a privilege not shared by the large majority of jobs.
This is absolutely not the case.
Software Engineering has a massive IQ-based barrier to entry. Not only that, your advantages are in large part, from a purely technical perspective, are reflected in your ability to consume algorithms, techniques, and hold more variables in your head at a faster rate than others.
It's an incredibly unique union of art and engineering, we are in demand as every industry needs it, and there is a genetic bottleneck.
We suffer from massive privilege because even semi-technical people have no idea what the fuck we are doing, so oversight is limited at best.
As someone who came from being a huge overachiever in a different industry, we are insanely privileged.
Certain people do tend to have an easier time with skills that make it easier to be a developer, but there is a VAST untapped potential of people that think of our work as "coding" and assume they're unable to learn. We really need an influx of people with systems thinking and other "high-level" abilities—development skills are required, but not the deep technical abilities our field has traditionally prized.
I've worked with plenty of "genius" types who can write advanced algorithms with lightning speed, but aren't able to see their work in a larger context—nor able to explain to others what they're doing. And I've worked with "normal" people (usually with an oversized dose of Imposter Syndrome) who are so much more effective because they understand the why as well as the how, while also being better communicators.
And let's cut out the IQ bullshit until there's a proven link between IQ and ability to deliver business value.
>A growing body of research suggests general cognitive ability may be the best predictor of job performance.
I don't think there's any doubt between IQ and delivering business value. Some argue EQ is more valuable, but that doesn't mean IQ isn't important.
Even given studies that show a link, there's a big difference between requiring a minimum IQ of 85 to join the US Armed Forces (as mentioned in the Wikipedia article on Intelligence Quotient) compared to asserting a minimum IQ of 120 (or whatever) to be a software developer, as amosquito seems to be doing in their comment ("...massive IQ-based barrier to entry..."). Of course there has to be some floor of intelligence to perform the job—but I'd argue it's a lot lower than many in our field believe.
Second, a "genetic bottleneck"? That absolutely reeks of genetic elitism. It implies, rather heavily, that they are genetically superior to those who cannot (or just don't) do this work.
The idea that we are special because no one understands us - finance, biotech, pharmaceuticals... No one really gets those, either.
If you sprint continuously you will collapse from exhaustion. The clues in the name! But I doubt the Agile crowd thought it through when choosing the name.
> Gmail is often given as a shining example of the fruits of Google’s 20 percent time, its legendary policy of allowing engineers to divvy off part of their work hours for personal projects. Paul Buchheit, Gmail’s creator, disabused me of this notion. From the very beginning, “it was an official charge,” he says. “I was supposed to build an email thing.”
My last software job was supposedly 40 hours/week. I'd usually come in for two hours and leave. They wouldn't be an intense two hours either. Once in a while I'd stay all day. Based on what I hear from my friends from university, this experience is not the median but it's not uncommon either.
Many managers really don't know how to manage. Morale goes down the shitter, and unless you have children it's unlikely you'll care about getting caught.
I'm not even a hard worker but having so little to do gets old and boring quickly.
Unless you’re taking a 2 week task and estimating 2 years or something, and then just goofing off in the slack time, which I’d consider... somewhat less than ethical?
Just focus on doing what's important in a timely basis and happily deprioritize the useless stuff.
In some roles you have to fight for work because different departments are fighting for org budgets. Some places are afraid to make code changes so you go to meetings while some people signoff others raise random issues with the project. Scheduling the project takes months. Then months of finding the perfect slot to release.
I also been in places that bill every 15 minutes. All client billing time was added up and should equal 8 hours. But there were never enough hours to go around. And clients would nickel and dime over hours.
With employers I'm not sure ethical matters as long as a need is met. But be ethical to yourself. Always work hard learn and grow because the industry changes.
If the deadlines are reasonable I wouldn't care. If they aren't, it's time to start reviewing glassdoor before finding a job.
This is also by and large a mindset you foster. There are plenty of companies where you have engineers on both ends of the spectrum (both having a lot of leisure time and little).
E.g. I would be happier if I could work fully focussed for 3-4 hours and then go home, instead of working at a slow pace for 8 hours so I don't get tired after 4.
If you are keeping up with your commitments, and the company is not crashing, is morale the main problem?
Fasting won't give you mountains of physical pep. Sure, there is that golden time after you have done it for a while where you get great mental clarity and you feel good but you will not be voluntarily running laps or pushing your absolute peak weight in the gym.
That barrier is something you'll always feel, even if you're not pushing the limits. The fact of the matter is that barrier is closer when you are fasting.
Their bodies (and brains) are doing a lot more developing than just growth spurting, which is why such a teenager can eat huge portions[0] per day and not put on any fat at all. Because their bodies use it all up, because of all the transformations and puberty things going on.
I would suggest, in that stage, just giving the body everything it craves, and worry about the benefits of fasting later.
[0] obviously doesn't hold in parts of the world where these are considered "normal" portions.
Instead of bitching about morale it is best to see it as an opportunity. Use time to better yourself, find new job, start your own business etc. etc.
As for how well it plays for the business owners, it is their problem, not yours.
I would call that working long, not hard. If hours determines how hard (i.e. effective) you are when working, then it certainly doesn't apply to some people I know who spend 40% of their 40 hours a week browsing Facebook.
I agree with this. When I first started my current job, overtime hours were utterly ridiculous, over the years I've managed to cut it down to mostly 8 hour days while increasing productivity fairly exponentially. A lot of time was wasted manually doing work pointless i automated as much as possible.I feel I work a lot harder now and get more done in less hours than I did before working 10-11 hour days.
The very first thing that needs to go is this glorification of working hours. Nobody should care how long you work. Time doesn't have any inherent value in a knowledge industry.
I never have that Sunday night/Monday morning feeling about work coming round too soon. I miss some meetings that are scheduled for a Monday but guess what, the world keeps turning.
I also like to work hard but I gotta say running a side business while also working full time is getting harder the older I get. There’s really only so much you can squeeze out of a day.
"shouldn't" -- according to who?
"desired" -- by who?
"freedom" -- with regards to what exactly?
I guess ... enjoy your old age when you're unable to work but not part of any society you contributed to, I hope people will care enough to spare some "freedom byproduct" for you.
Personally, I enjoy working hard - usually more than 40 hours per week. But we should distinguish between working for others and working for oneself. Working for oneself can be education, passion work, or anything that energizes you. Working for others is also necessary for most people but reducing the weekly commitment gives people more freedom in their lives and makes them happier and more productive.
For some, the extra time away from work gives them the freedom to spend more time with their family or children, or spend more time on their hobbies. But ultimately it makes these people better contributing members of society.
One belief I certainly don’t agree with is the idea that working less for others makes you a lazy person or a less contributing member of society. People need free time to care for themselves and others, vote and participate in democracy, and do their laundry. We will be better off with less time committed to working for others.
And of course I cant help but plug 30 Hour Jobs here since it’s very much relevant: https://30hourjobs.com