Question about the hours you work.

You get high up enough the career ladder you won't 'work' full time, but you take responsibility full time. Depending on your field, you don't even need to be at work half the time, leaving you free to do whatever you want should you organise your responsibilities well enough.

The last 6 months I've been on contract my actual 'work' where I sat down behind my desk and banged out some words on a screen was done in 30-60min a day. The last 2 months, 30min a week. BUT, the responsibility of bringing these projects in on time were a solid 40 hours a week. Took a round or two of politicking, but once I had the right people and contractors in place, my job was done.

This coming Monday I'm joining the company as a full time salary worker, same role, roughly the same responsibilities. I expect my free time to increase even more now that I'll have more say as a permie.

So, if possible, try and get high enough on the ladder. You always find more free time up there.
 
Ayahuasca said:
There's people who'll have you believe you're not full time unless you're wage slaving away at 60hrs a week.
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It's ridiculous. Very very very few people, if any, are still effective after 8-9 hours a day, nevermind 12. I've seen this so many times during my career. I remember a car park construction project I was PM on. Everyone on 12 hour days to 'bring it in on time'. After 7-8 hours the workers were just stealing from the company. Everyone were tired and only trying to get to the end of the day, productivity was nonexistent during those last few hours.

I calculated what we lost during those hours and suggested to my seniors that we cut down to 8 hour shifts and bring in extra staff on contract. Financially we would've been better of and have more hands on site. Went way over their heads because 'this is what we've always done'. The same outfit that to my knowledge, never brought in a major contract on time.
 
Yup, 8-9 hour day is too long. Most people unproductive by about 3pm, waste of time being there.

bulb66 said:
Well this thread was meant to be more General Discussion than Careers & Professional Development it got moved.

The question was to you lot, what hours do you work? Does it give you the work/life balance you want?

Sorry I'm not always very clear.

J.
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I work 9am-5.30pm Monday-Friday. Sucks & I hate it. Doesn't give me a work / life balance, cba with anything outside work after being at work all day. Genuinely thinking of quitting in the next few months & seeing what happens. At least it'll force me to make a change.
 
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32hrs is pretty close to full time IMO. Depends on how it is split really, for example 11hr days vs 8hr days vs 6.5hr days (yeah yeah Maths etc - you get where I'm coming from).

Given the choice I'd work fewer days, I'm contracted to 35hrs a week over 5 days but would definitely shift to say 30-34hrs over 4 days with a pro-rata pay cut given the chance.
 
Thanks for the replies everyone.

So I should have said I currently work 32hrs over 4 days/nights 6pm to 3am. The work is physical and apart from 3 x 30min breaks nonstop lifting/moving/carrying etc. The work is OK, but I'm just not getting the life outside of work I want.

There is also word going round that the company plan on changing our work hours (they already did a while ago by making us work 1 in 4 weekends, the department I work never worked weekends before because we don't have deliveries on weekends) but a recent job ad for a new manager for our department had the hours of work 8pm to 6am?

Anyway I think I'll give it some thought, do some calculations and see how I feel.

Thanks again,

J.
 
When I started on the road with the Ambulance Service, I was given the opportunity to work 8, 10 or 12 hours depending on my preference. I opted for 12 simply as if I did less i'd spend more actual days here plus the added benefit of a secure rota with set times.

I work 4 on 4 off, 2 days, 2 nights 4 days off giving me ample chance for an extra overtime a week as well. I then get 18 days off every 7 weeks as part of my rota but this takes my annual leave and I can't book my own.

So depending really on what you want out of work, I can't do less than full time as I have a family to support but but partner works 16 a week and looks after the step kids the rest of the time and we get on fine. We still have plenty of time together for socialising and I can still rake in well over 30k a year.
 
32 hours is nothing. It's the hours you work that make it hard. You're going to work when most (working) people are free to socialize.

Could you swap to a morning shift?
 
I have 2 (sometimes 3 :p) jobs, a child and lovely lady. Often think I'm over doing it but as they say, the devil finds work for idle hands. My secondary/tertiary jobs can mostly be done remotely, so it's not like I'm out all the time.

80 hour weeks are not at all uncommon
 
regulus said:
So, if possible, try and get high enough on the ladder. You always find more free time up there.
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I guess this varies from Company to company but my experience this year is at odds with the statement. I took on a senior role in my firm, stepping up for senior management to Director. I got a decent enough rise but my hours increased fairly significantly.

Part of that is undoubtedly moving form a position of experience and expertise into a new role but the other part is that more is expected of you particularly in an "extra curricular" sense. I reckon my pro-rata hourly rate is the same if not slightly worse than it was in my previous role! I however see working as a bit of a means to an end and I'm focused on getting to a mortgage/debt free position that will allow me to have choices post 50yo. That may be downshifting to less responsibility and inevitably less income but also potentially more free time. Its too easy to get locked into a career and the trappings.

Fifteen years ago this country was on a track to reduce working hours for everyone but I actually see this trend being reversed for the next 10 years or so as we opt out of EU working time directives and try to bridge a productivity gap. Not only will many people be working till they are older but I reckon hours will increase - people will also start to become protective of their work as the threat of increased automation looms. What's apparent is that striving for the material wealth so craved by the last couple of generations will not be a priority for our children and those entering the labour market now. they already seem to have decided that a big life is better than a big job.
 
I've worked shifts for years, but the last 2 have really been office hours.

Currently work 9-5:30 Monday - Thursday and 9-5 Friday.

BUT, and it's a big but, I get emails/calls/texts/whatsapps all hours of evening, weekends, I even had one Christmas day. I have projects that I don't have time for in work hours, so I end up working when everyone at home is in bed. I have to do one weekend every 4-6 weeks for training new starters.

I wouldn't mind if I was paid a salary equivalent for the work I was doing, but i'm not. Which is why I am looking at moving on.
 
Ayahuasca said:
There's people who'll have you believe you're not full time unless you're wage slaving away at 60hrs a week.
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The problem with being expected to work a 60 hour week is that unless it comes with a very luxurious salary, you'd more than likely be better off finding a contract on 37.5 hours a week, and have more of a work/life balance albeit slightly less income.

For example a 50k salary at 60 hours/week, is about on par with a 31k salary at 37.5 hours/week.

@OP, do what makes you happy, you don't have to justify the number of hours you work to anyone. There are a lot of people of this day doing a wide range of working hours.
 
I hate my job, well would rather do something else!.

But I only do a 30hr week on a set rota which is classed as part time.

If I got a job I enjoyed I would increase the hours I work if I could, I used to do full time but hated the the flexible rota, luckily like you OP I can afford to reduce my working hour's at present.
 
I've been doing 37 hours a week for the last 2 years since graduating from uni. When I get home during the week I don't want to do anything other than laze about, especially during the winter.

4 days a week would be ideal. It's probably too early in my career to go part time though.
 
Semple said:
For example a 50k salary at 60 hours/week, is about on par with a 31k salary at 37.5 hours/week
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Taking tax into consideration it's probably equivalent in take-home hourly rate to £29k at best. Even worse for people who want childcare vouchers because you get a lower cap in that tax bracket i.e. at £50k you can only have £124/month compared to £243/month at £29k.

On the flip-side some benefits such as pension, bonus etc are often based on gross salary so you'd get more on the higher salary. But even then the marginal tax rate is higher so you lose dis-proportionally more of the bonus to narrow the advantage a bit.

Going back to the OP the question is phrased as "does not working full time matter?" which almost implicitly implies that we should by default be aspiring to full time work. I think of it the other way round, i.e. should be looking to maximise leisure time (where it makes sense to do so), I'd like to be working fewer hours if that was more accepted in the corporate world for people at my sort of level.

Looking at my current job, doing fewer hours isn't really feasible as I don't have enough time to do everything that needs doing as it is. What would likely happen is I would end up doing more unpaid overtime to keep my head above water. So as bizarre as it sounds I'd rather be contracted to more hours (assuming paid pro-rata), say going from 35 to 37.5hrs a week by halving my lunch break.
 
HangTime said:
Even worse for people who want childcare vouchers because you get a lower cap in that tax bracket i.e. at £50k you can only have £124/month compared to £243/month at £29k.
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Child care voucher switch point is £43k. It's not a sliding scale either, so someone on £42999 will be £85 a month better off than someone on £43000.
 
I should have added this is for people who didn't apply before whenever in 2011 the rules changed, on £50k you can still get full whack if you were registered before then. Which seems a bit unfair to me, I can understand them wanting to clamp down on tax avoidance but why not apply the same rules across the board, just because someone registered a while back doesn't mean the rules for this shouldn't be changed for future years in the same way they are changed for plenty of other benefits.

[And don't me started on the child benefit thing, where households with a joint income of £100k can get full child benefit meanwhile households with an income of £60k can get nothing!]
 
I do 37 hours a week, Monday to Friday and it's flexitime. Living the dream, the works easy and most of the time it's stress free, yet here I am still contemplating leaving for something more mentally taxing.
 
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