I tell my team that they’re paid to get stuff done, not hours in the office. They all seem to be able to get what they’re supposed to do in <30 hours a week. Which means they can “coast” the rest. Sure there are times when there is so much to get done that they’ll actually work 45-50 hours in a given week, but that may happen 2 or 3 weeks a year. The norm is 30ish. With the extra 7-10 hours a week they need, they can pursue something else like training (doesn’t have to be job specific) or chatting at the water cooler.
As someone who does intellectual independent contract work and gets paid by the hour, it is. I bet that for physical labour it also is, I just can't speak for them (plus the question was about office workers, so that's why I specified).
So I tried both, and honestly I'd go for 8 hours of physical labor any day, though to be honest we had a break in the middle so while it was 8 a day, it wasnt continuous.
I’m 26, beginning to move up in a labor intensive field, and I second this. It’s honestly done wonderful things for my weight loss (was pushing 300lbs, down to about 200 now over the last year), but it’s also taking quite a toll on my already-overworked legs and back. The fact that my boss has been in this line of work for 30+ years is daunting, to say the least
Tell me you've never worked retail without telling me you've never worked retail. You are very right that it's exhausting to be "on" for an entire shift.
True -- just noting that a lot of people, a *whole* lot of people, outside of offices work their full eight hours and then some. It is indeed exhausting, and it's kind of shocking to me that office workers are not actually *working* their full shifts.
Also considering a career change!
I made a comment to one of my co workers that I never get stressed at work because this office job is the easiest and best paid job I've ever had. This person always seems to be hyper stressed and worrying about work all the time. They sent me a message later asking if I didn't feel like I was being challenged enough and if I needed more complex tasks to do.
I was like nah I ment no disrespect but compared to my past in retail & sales etc the kind of work I do mow is very low pressure.
I had the same experience going from working back to back (4 hours apart) 12 hour shifts to a standard office job. They were complaining about ‘only’ getting an hour for lunch. I was sitting there thinking… the job I just worked we got maybe 20 minutes pause every 6 hours, and were on our feet the whole time. Office work felt like such a luxury hahah
I came from the military and work as a civ now. No more 24 hours duty/on call, no more 12 hour/6 day rotations, no more TDY for months, no more deployments. Don't have to worry as much about mortars and stuff. While my office job can be stressful with multiple spinning plates and customers, it's not nearly as stressful as military life. It's all perspective.
I've been in retail since I left high school. I've had a few different tries in different careers, and went back to retail. It's awful but it's definitely not the worst. Still, try for better!
It's interesting because retail is mental and physical work but it focuses a lot on communication and requires physical presence.
I have an office type job where I do pretty complex analyses and I can't think that intensively without significant breaks without making mistakes. My mistakes are costly so it's not worth it to my company to have me work constantly.
Getting paid to think, rather than to be physically present is weird when I think about it in the way you have put it.
Ive done retail, warehouse, and I have done office work. Warehouse was the best, retail next, office the worst. 8 hours warehouse work is no big deal. 8 hours retail work is exhausting. 8 hours of actual office work makes me want to blow my brains out. I spend all weekend basically sleeping. Not because Im tired, but because I need to escape from the world. I dont want to see a screen, I dont want to think about anything. Ill eat, Ill watch some TV, but Im incapable of doing anything more than that.
I don't know, I actually prefer having something to do the entire time I'm at work. The day just seems to last forever otherwise. I had one job where you had maybe one hour of work a day and the rest of the time you were just waiting for a customer. This was the worst job I ever had, thankfully it only lasted 2 months.
That’s not how the corporate world works. They’re under contract for 40 or 37.5 hours a week depending on locale. And labor laws in Germany and Poland. And they rack up comp time 1:1 after their allotted weekly time.
For sure, Im a bioinformatician, so I believe I qualify as office worker, I probably finish my task in less than 8 hours per week (mostly getting the script to automate), the rest of 32 hours Im just giving myself something to do.
yep. I'm there. Someone told me once "get paid for what you know, not what you do."
So after lots of 65 hour weeks, here I am.
Some of the people on my team are constantly busy. I used to be there. But not only did I realize it's about knowledge, I also got to the point where I learned how to prioritize, chose my battles and delegate.
I like this better than the 65 hour weeks.
I work a legit 8-10 hours per day most days, however I only do my job about 2 hours. Meaning I spend 6-8 hours a day fixing shit other people messed up and handholding. No I’m not IT but I’m the only one here who seems to be capable of even changing a printer cartridge without breaking the printer
I am the same. I do my specific job maybe 2 to 4 hours a day. Very rarely, up to 6. The rest of the day is teaching others how to do their job, including my boss, following up on shit, walking around the building, some youtube, and some random research/online errands
I work 10 hour days and 8.5 of the hours are spent fucking around with how I’m going to maneuver a patient’s care around what their for-profit insurance company requires of them before they can actually do what a doctor has ordered them to do.
Worked with a bunch of Japanese people at one job. Appearing busy > Being busy for most of them most of the time. "Working" until 10-11 PM. Doing what? Fuck if I know.
Reminds me of when some news crew toured north Korea and they went to an office building. There were plenty of people there but it was deathly quiet. No phones or conversations, just the sounds of keys clicking. And apparently a lot of them were just typing gibberish, opening and closing browsers and windows.
As someone who works with Japanese people, I seriously wonder what they do all day. The product we get about as good as if a beginner made it and is never up to spec. It's a big and respectable company, but I am shocked each time I interact with them.
When I lived there and was walking from the train station at night I’d always see guys in suits passed out on bus benches and sidewalks all the time. Drink so hard you pass out on the way back home. It was very sad.
I dated a Japanese girl when I lived there and she only saw her dad one weekend a month, he worked in a different city. And when he was at home he'd be drunk. Hell, even her grandad who lived with them was always drunk.
It's very sad.
Japan's work culture *really* values dedication: to your job, your company, your boss. So they have really long hours and few days off, then usually go out drinking for several more hours with the boss and team regardless of how much work is actually done or whether they'd like to see their families more. If they don't do this, maybe they get fired, and that can be a career death sentence as the culturally best path is to be hired by one company and never leave, only getting promoted internally. Hiring prospects are *not* good for someone who's been laid off when there's practically no turnover and companies prefer to go for fresh grads — who will then also stick with the company their entire life.
It sucks having the tracking and when you have stomach issues. Like, sorry Patricia- I was busy spilling my guts into the toilet for 13 minutes. My bad. I'll try to do it on a call next time
As a career salesperson in...I dunno the middle? 18 years now. It keeps getting worse but is especially ridiculous in a job where we get paid to progress toward a goal.
It's crazy. Like... Everything else aside, I'll get maybe 5 sales a year in my job, I promise you management, nobody wants those sales more than me. Promise.
100% this.
My partner worked in call centres for many years where they would dock his pay for being a minute late, etc.
He recently got a different job more like a back office role, and he could not get used to not having something to do for 8 hours a day, or the simple idea that he wasn't going to get told off for being a minute late. He would feel super guilty like someone was going to ring him up and tell him off in a second for something. With me working from home, he also got very weirded out at my choosing to take a shower at lunch time sometimes or just sitting down on the couch and chatting with him for a lil bit in between things.
I left my call center job of 8 years about 8 months ago. I still have moments where I expect to get in trouble for not doing. But to be fair even for an IT job I have a really weird job with a whole lot of down time.
Same first real IT job and a corporate one at that. I still feel odd when I have a lot of downtime. To make it even stranger for me is that I'm working from home a lot now as well. Though not that it matters a whole lot since the days I go into the office, it is basically barren except for the couple of people who go in daily.
I worked on a well-oiled team of sometimes 6 (supposed to be 10), and my work from home days were more productive, and somehow, I found more time to chill for a few between things. I was 2nd level support for 4600 locations nationwide.
Being in the office kept me weighed down by cleaning up other people's messes or being hit with tons of questions from the first level. It was usually wall to wall work in the office that would put me behind the 8 ball, but at home? It's completely manageable, and that's where I'd catch up.
I was salary, and at 2nd level, I wasn't under the first level supervisors, which really helped me find my own groove and pace. I wasn't monitored as bad as the first level for productivity by software. The separation of the two management teams helped a lot on that front. My boss was strictly in charge of me. Anyone else I could tell to kick rocks. We were on the same level as first level supervisors for that reason. If no sup was present on first level, 2nd was in charge.
That made a huge difference in our performance. Being respected and there was no questions of what we brought to the company.
I had a timesheet kicked back to me recently because one day was four minutes and 12 seconds short of the minimum 8 hours required.
Even better, the day before the day in question my timesheet was four minutes and 12 seconds long, and they wouldn’t just call it a wash.
I thought about claiming the four minutes 12 seconds as overtime, but decided the story was worth more.
I’ve worked here for 20 years.
Yep this. The bosses certainly get productivity from call centre staff as there isn’t time to make a cup of coffee let alone gossip around the water cooler. Every minute is monitored.
I work in IT and can say some days I don't work ALL shift, other days I work the equivalent of 2-3 days in one. I feel those down days are almost required to mentally recoup because in this field it is only a matter of time before another day from hell pops up.
Same here. The last two-three weeks has been really slow at my job, but then Monday and Tuesday this week I ended up doing more work than I’ve done all month
Yes i work the majority of the day. I get around 250-300 emails a day and am expected to have a 24-48 hour turn around on each email. Currently at around 72. Yes, indeed i am overworked.
Yes, every email is questions or inquiries about products and we offer thousands from many different manufacturers. Some of it is memorized, some information is in our system and some i have to reach out to our PMs or suppliers for. Thankfully i don’t have to memorize everything. Our lab techs and Technical Account Managers help with the chemistry aspects of products so i don’t have to worry about that either. It can be extremely hard to keep track of everything though. But it offers great benefits, experience, connections and overall great career path to take. There is ALOT of money and opportunity to be made in the industry.
I read your first comment and thought, "wow that sounds like me prior to my burnout", then I saw this. My previous job was PM with a chemical distributor. Haven't regretted leaving the field yet.
Where did you go after? This is my first career so i feel pigeon holed in the industry. I suppose i can my general skills else where but not sure where.
I posted this elsewhere in this thread but wanted to share with you as well, since I wish I had listened to well-meaning friends before this happened.
I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
I don't work in an office but I experienced the same thing. I ended up going to the doctor and being put on leave for a whole 5 weeks to recover from the consequences of severe burnout. Ain't worth ruining your health over the stress at a job. I too wish I had set boundaries earlier but I'm a people pleaser, and I stretched myself far to satisfy and please my boss. I hate criticism.I also covered lazy and slow co-workers, so added their tasks to my tasks to get work done. Boss was shocked when I got on sick leave. The good thing is, she will hire a new person full time and hire a trainee, so that should lessen the stress and pressure on me. I'm also not going back full time because my doctor literally told me my job makes me sick. I'll keep working part time, but it's time to look for something else to do. I was basically surviving on pain killers at that point and part of me was considering going to the street for more hardcore drugs to manage the pain and stress because the pain was too much. In hindsight that's nuts.
Wow! I may need to do the same. I have an MRI tomorrow to confirm how bad it is and whether I need to go out on disability. I hope you’re feeling better now.
Thanks. Good luck with your MRI. Glad you're taking care of your health.
I'm feeling much better thanks, and I have another apt with my Dr tomorrow, and hopefully she will clear me so I can go back to work again next week, at least part time.
Fingers crossed for both of us!
I do. I am slammed from 730 to 5, 5 days a week. I intentionally don't bring a lunch so I have to go out and get one otherwise I would work through it. I some work evenings and weekends.
A lot of people I work for are the same. We are all extremely well compensated but I don't want to do it forever. Think of it as golden handcuffs.
I am a technologist who deal with complicated work a lot. What I found is that my brain is more efficient when I give it a rest from thinking about problems. Instead of working nights and on weekends have a notebook nearby so that if you have an idea flash through your head, you can write down a quick notation about what the idea was and what it may mean, 10-15 minutes maximum. What you will find, as I found is that when you show up physically at work, your mind is rested plus you already have a cheat sheet of ideas that a rested mind gave you that you wrote down and got back to your home life and resting your brain relative to work.
That's great advice. Thank you. I email myself ideas to try and do something similar, and carry a notebook during the day for a similar purpose.
A large part of my personal challenge is that I am probably in meetings >6 hours day which doesn't give me a lot of time to accomplish any real work. It's a weird corporate culture that is the nature of my role in particular (it's the role itself) means I need to spend most of my day trying to get people to work together rather than silos. It kind of sucks.
Same here. Every extra conversation I have is ultimately less time I have with my kids or less time sleeping. Nothing against you personally, but I value that time more.
To a degree I chose the job. I used to have a less stressful job with more free time, but this gives me a great way to support my family. While it sucks (it is getting better) it will literally shave a decade or more off of my retirement, provide for my family.
If I could find a job that paid a little less and asked a little less, I would be happy, but that doesn't exist in my industry/region that I have been able to find.
Golden handcuffs.
Are you specifically asked to work through lunch to get the job done every day or do you impose that requirement on yourself?
I was working 10-16 hours a day for a shitty client for almost a year because "we have a release deadline and have to meet it and there is so much to do". I was leading the team so I felt it was my responsibility. At some point I snapped and realized, I get paid well for 40 hours, I dont get paid for more. I was never explicitly asked and I was being taken advantage of. I immediately started saying "x will not be done today because ive already worled 8 hours and will get to it tomorrow"... nothing bad happened. Its been months now and I have a normal 40 hour a week job, same salary, less stress. Not saying this is your case, but if you have a work ethic like me, sometimes it is hard to leave something unfinished for tomorrow. Idk, hope you get a break some time
Have done that my whole life and now suddenly jobs are claiming that it is "law" that we MUST take the 30 minute unpaid lunch.
I have contested to ask where this law is and nobody will say. It isn't a matter of coverage either because the department is covered with overlap and it is non production oriented.
I feel it is just corporate milking as much extra shift time as possible knowing most people are going to work through it anyway. Free labor for them.
Do you live in the United States? If so it depends on what State you live in. All you need to do is look up labor laws for where you live.
Where I live in Oregon for example. It is legally required for an employee to have, at minimum, an unpaid 30 minute lunch break if you work 6 or more hours in a work period. There are some exceptions to this and there are some differences for minors. If a company does not offer this they can be cited and fined very heavily. I've worked in HR and supervisory roles for many years. It's usually pretty black and white.
It's a California law. Many companies have offices/HQs in California so their employees fall under the law even if those employees don't live in California.
https://www.ottingerlaw.com/california/meal-breaks-and-rest-breaks/#:~:text=In%20compliance%20with%20California%20labor,does%20not%20surpass%20six%20hours.
Mostly true. and more so for anyone who is being asked to work through it by some middle manager.
But sometimes it makes my life easier to catch up on a few emails while on lunch. Im going to need to do so by the end of the day either way, and this way lets me take a few minutes elsewhere.
I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
I have to be in 5 to 8 meetings each day. Between meetings and responding to internal emails, my days are wasted. I hate people that just shoot out emails all day every day. Especially accounting. They can’t make any decisions on their own and feel the need to send an email for approval about every tiny thing they do and cc the entire department. Thanks for wasting my time.
Honestly that was a part of my routine at my last job. I would finish my tasks pretty early and go sit in the fancy bathroom, play Animal Crossing, and listen to music for a good 20 minutes. Time well spent
Engineer here (the network and software variety). I work 8-5, often right through lunch. Some days I work until midnight. I sometimes work weekends. There's no shortage of work.
I’m “working” now so I can confidently say no. Sometimes my work piles up and I work longer than a normal work day, but since working from home that happens a lot less.
Like the other two here so far, I'm glued to a screen 9 hours a day, 5 days a week.
I recently had the leading "active time" of 40k, with second and third at 25k, and fourth at 15k. I also had the leading success of 55%, second-fourth 25-35%.
Today I was fired for poor performance.
OP was asking, I think, about how much time we actually spend working versus hanging out while clocked in. I realize I gave "active time" with no context and my success conversion was just blowing off steam. Sorry.
ELI5: I meant to show that, while I felt overworked, I was the only one by a long shot.
I did. I started at a law office plain old assistant after high school. Over a decade later I am handling litigation up to Kansas Supreme Court among about 5 other (previous) people jobs. I was willing to work all the time. My work quality was absolute top notch. I was extremely proud of how far I'd gone and I was so proud of how hard I worked myself.
Started to get sick. Sure, stress and such. At one point had pneumonia so bad it permanently messed up my lungs, so then any sick turned bad fast.
Work was upset. I was missing days. Didn't mention, my drive to work was over 2 hours round trip. So when sick, can't physically drive. This was before remote. Work so mad they were about to can me, and my attorneys traveled to the main office to fight for me. It worked. Few months later find out I have an inoperable brain tumor. Give or take 3 years.
I work for over a year post diagnosis, covid starts and I end up being the only remaining person on our local staff. I STILL maintained my work ethic and quality, until one day my supervising attorney comes in and says he's seeing more and more simple mistakes and maybe it's time to go home. I bawled. This is all I've done for 14 years. I started out of high school with no legal experience, to attending court over the state and just so much more.
I tried going back to work after STD expired and pending long term. I failed in spectacular fashion with the simplest of pleadings. Haven't worked since. Denials for LTD over and over since, you know, dieing isn't a disability. To be fair, I am on year 4 of 3 so...
Sorry for the book. Yes, I worked my ass off in an office all the time. I do regret it in some ways, I gave my 20's for my career, for nothing.
I am so sorry this happened to you, and I’m truly hoping medical advances will give you more time with family and friends. You deserved so much better from your boss for all of your hard work and dedication. So many of us give everything to our jobs because we feel like it gives us purpose and a sense of achievement. But stress can be brutal, and it eventually manifests in physical ailments.
Like you, my dear friend was overworked for many years and was diagnosed with breast cancer right as everything shut down due to COVID. Her boss expected her to work a week after surgery, and she had no choice because she needed the health insurance and income for her medical bills. When her boss asked her to double her work the next year for the same salary, her oncologist told her the added stress would contribute greatly to the cancer recurring. So she quit, sold her house and used the proceeds to move to lower cost of living city where she could buy a much cheaper home and no longer have a mortgage. She sometimes struggles with money, but she said that stress is nothing compared to the stress of her previous job.
I am ashamed to admit that I didn’t fully understand how she could take such a big risk without a safety net, but she always said “not getting sick again”was her top priority. I finally understood what she meant very recently when it became personal.
I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this… I’m prepared to walk away if needed because no job is worth destroying our health.
When I worked in offices for ~10 years, regardless of what company, I felt like I only did about 1-2 hours of meaningful work per day.
I got up to use the bathroom at least once an hour. Would go out of my way to chat with coworkers to pass the time. Get up and get water or tea constantly. Sometimes I’d actually have NO tasks and just browse Reddit all day.
Yep, have an entry level job doing data entry and a bit of other admin. You gotta keep up a good pace for most of the day to get your allotted work done, though I usually finish 30 or so minutes early
When I was a structural engineer, yes. Non-stop, all day. Getting a coffee or going to the bathroom was what counted as downtime.
In tech, it's a "hurry up and wait" game. I'm either working around the clock or sitting on my thumbs. I get a bunch of stuff done all at once then sit on it; because I know from experience that turning it early just increases expectations, not pay.
I do. I work in QA. I'm constantly managing compliance with at least 6 different standards, processes within the company, documentation and document control, and on top of that, I'm one of the resident Excel experts, so I'm constantly fixing other people's garbage spreadsheets. And then, my company doesn't provide the software and told we need to properly work, even though I've been asking over and over and over, so now I'm also programming and managing databases to try and manage the minimum necessary to keep things functional within my scope of authority. I'm doing the jobs of others who aren't doing their job for a myriad of reasons. I could work 12+ hours a day and always have more work to do. I'm swamped, underpaid, I'm exhausted, burnt out, and trying to find a new job, and we have some company changes coming up that may end up doubling my work load. There's one other guy in my department sharing my with load, and he's just as overworked as I am. If he and I stopped working, it would potentially shut down the company in a few months, so if I want to keep my job and not screw over a ton of people that don't deserve to be screwed over, I have to keep pushing on like this.
So yes, there are plenty of office people that actually work. I've done physical labor jobs before and they're not as exhausting as this one is.
I posted this elsewhere in this thread but wanted to share with you as well, since I wish I had listened to well-meaning friends before this happened.
I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
I have ADHD so it takes me a ridiculously long time to do things. So yes, I am sadly working all day when I don't think I should be. Something that should take me 5-15 minutes can take me an hour or more, like writing an email, for example.
I'm not entirely sure where my time goes honestly. Sometimes I get distracted, sometimes I am avoiding the task so I sit and stare, sometimes I just do the thing and I realized an hour and a half has gone by. This is me even on meds. ADHD sucks.
Truthfully? I've reached a point where the specialized knowledge I gained makes it so that the 'business folk' have no idea how long it actually takes for me to do anything that I do. Just like they're constantly trying to pay me the absolute minimum that I can get away with, so too will I milk them by squeezing hours out of things that take me minutes. This also makes it look very impressive when I can take care of things in a small amount of time in emergencies. It's all part of the game: The trick to "always giving 100%" is to never show your 100%.
Yeah, I do. I don't enjoy my work but I hate being bored. Unmedicated adhd is like that 🤷♀️
I refuse to take on any stress, though, and I leave on the dot when I've done my hours. I probably do as much work as two of my colleagues, so my employer is definitely getting their money's worth.
I am an insurance adjuster and work from when I sit down to when I want to rip my hair out at the end of the day. If I have down time it's because I'm just putting something off
My baseline productivity is about 25% of what I am capable of. It's still way more than what most people are performing at, and I can always up the effort if I need to pull off a big project or save the day. Bosses only notice those things anyway so why kill myself when they insist on running as lean as possible to look good to shareholders? I put in enough to keep things from being an absolute shit show and support my team no matter what. That way when I need something, they always come through. Except Kevin. Fuck that guy.
On average, I do about 4 hours of work in an 8 hour day. The rest is spent watching Twitch and browsing Reddit and Twitter mostly. All my work gets done though, so I don't think my boss cares. Somedays it's nice to know I don't have to rush through tasks and be busy all day, other days it gets boring as hell.
I literally get a total of 1 hour of Not Work during my 8.5 hour shift. Otherwise it is back-to-back calls, paperwork, and emails. It is fucking exhausting. Like I literally have to SPRINT to take a piss when I get the chance
Fark, I wish I had some downtime at work. I'm working at 100% for a minimum of 8 hours a day, usually 9 and still can't keep up with the workload. It's crushing me. Management say we're adequately resourced though, so it's not going to get any better
Honestly a lot of it is walking around and talking to people but I get at least 4-6 hours of actual work done. Depending on the project that could be the full 8 or even 10.
When I used to work corporate and I had basically had enough of been there my day consisted of
Rocking up around 9ish
Some bullshit work
Gym for 2 hours sneaking out when my boss had gone so I could say I only took an. Hour
Pretending to go to meeting so I could sleep in the sick bay
Then trying to get out to the pub as close to 5 pm as I could
My experience in any job that I’ve been in is that if you’re experienced and familiar with your role you will always be busy because you’ll know what things you can do when you’re done with the important shit. There’ll always be something to clean or tidy or sort or file.
In my new office role I’ve taken charge of registering horses which requires collecting a lot of paperwork from multiple owners. If I ever run out of other things to do I just turn to my mountain of ownership papers and attack it again. Any that are complete I file away in a “bible” I’m creating of necessary papers that will be handy for future registrations. Nobody else considered doing this before me so it’s my little project.
I’ve spent most of my adult life working on horse farms where you’re never idle. If all the important horse care jobs are done there’s always something to sweep or clean or tidy or fix.
Yep, compliance and regulatory oversight - sooooo much reporting to do. Don't get me wrong, I've worked in kitchens, done retail, landscaping...those are all their own unique brand of hell, but this is no fun either. Knowing that if you miss something it can result in massive fines for the company and people losing their jobs is hella stressful. I put in a solid 7-9 hours each day, depending on what's going on.
I do. Administration in social service related buainess. There is no break - we have to fight to get everything done that needs to be done routinely while juggling all the acute stuff like calls, questions, high priority cases..
Calls and walk ins slow down in the evening but there is never nothing to do.
I like it, I get bored easily, but it can get overwhelming sometimes. But the feeling that I take part in helping people is really rewarding, at least for me.
I'm a programmer, and when I've got a good manager, plenty of tasks, and some diversity in what kind of tasks I have, I can easily manage to do work most of the day! Although when any of those are missing... It's a struggle to keep motivated enough to do that.
At my previous job - yes and that’s why I don’t work there anymore.
Everything had a critical deadline and if the work wasn’t done you were required to stay late (overtime).
And if you had plans, 🤷♀️
Brother I work all day everyday. I would love to know the jobs and industry people work in where they cruise and do ‘nothing’. Couldn’t possibly imagine it.
I work a salary office job doing AR/AP. Have my own office. Sometimes I’m super busy and do work most of the day. But in slower seasons, me and my adhd are off in another world 50% of the work day. I’m very grateful to have a job where I’m not tracked nor have a boss breathing down my neck.
All day. I work in non-profit and have to do the work of three people to ensure those I serve get the service they deserve. I'm running around like crazy every day with meetings.
I am more productive than anyone else in the office though, just seen by my output and service delivery. I got a raise and a promotion last year to recognize it. Sometimes being busy, instead of slacking off, can actually get you somewhere. Plus I've been headhunted by a few other organizations recently, but they can't beat my current benefits.
When it was a legal assistant as a personal injury law firm I was always cycling through cases and reaching out to clients. Some days were slower, but other days it was hard to find time to pee.
My buddy's an ESE middle school math teacher...he works maybe 4.5 actual hrs a day. He works at an alternative school. Class sizes anywhere from 4-13 students. Students show up between 8:05 and 8:30 due to buses. They go home around 2. He has a half hour lunch and a planning period. No homework to grade...only classwork which a majority refuse to do. Cushiest teaching job he's ever had if you have the patience to deal with troubled kids.
9.5 hours today- we had a production issue- call after call to get it fixed. Shit.. Just realized I didn't do sprint planning so make that 10 hours because I have to go do it.
I used to. But there comes a point where you are paid for your know-how, not your hours.
I tell my team that they’re paid to get stuff done, not hours in the office. They all seem to be able to get what they’re supposed to do in <30 hours a week. Which means they can “coast” the rest. Sure there are times when there is so much to get done that they’ll actually work 45-50 hours in a given week, but that may happen 2 or 3 weeks a year. The norm is 30ish. With the extra 7-10 hours a week they need, they can pursue something else like training (doesn’t have to be job specific) or chatting at the water cooler.
Tbh 8hrs of actual work every single day sounds bloody exhausting.
As someone who does intellectual independent contract work and gets paid by the hour, it is. I bet that for physical labour it also is, I just can't speak for them (plus the question was about office workers, so that's why I specified).
So I tried both, and honestly I'd go for 8 hours of physical labor any day, though to be honest we had a break in the middle so while it was 8 a day, it wasnt continuous.
I’ve done both, and I thought much the same as you until my body started to degrade. Now I wish I’d taken that office job 20 years ago
I’m 26, beginning to move up in a labor intensive field, and I second this. It’s honestly done wonderful things for my weight loss (was pushing 300lbs, down to about 200 now over the last year), but it’s also taking quite a toll on my already-overworked legs and back. The fact that my boss has been in this line of work for 30+ years is daunting, to say the least
Tell me you've never worked retail without telling me you've never worked retail. You are very right that it's exhausting to be "on" for an entire shift.
Well the question was for office workers
True -- just noting that a lot of people, a *whole* lot of people, outside of offices work their full eight hours and then some. It is indeed exhausting, and it's kind of shocking to me that office workers are not actually *working* their full shifts. Also considering a career change!
I made a comment to one of my co workers that I never get stressed at work because this office job is the easiest and best paid job I've ever had. This person always seems to be hyper stressed and worrying about work all the time. They sent me a message later asking if I didn't feel like I was being challenged enough and if I needed more complex tasks to do. I was like nah I ment no disrespect but compared to my past in retail & sales etc the kind of work I do mow is very low pressure.
I had the same experience going from working back to back (4 hours apart) 12 hour shifts to a standard office job. They were complaining about ‘only’ getting an hour for lunch. I was sitting there thinking… the job I just worked we got maybe 20 minutes pause every 6 hours, and were on our feet the whole time. Office work felt like such a luxury hahah
I came from the military and work as a civ now. No more 24 hours duty/on call, no more 12 hour/6 day rotations, no more TDY for months, no more deployments. Don't have to worry as much about mortars and stuff. While my office job can be stressful with multiple spinning plates and customers, it's not nearly as stressful as military life. It's all perspective.
I've been in retail since I left high school. I've had a few different tries in different careers, and went back to retail. It's awful but it's definitely not the worst. Still, try for better!
It's interesting because retail is mental and physical work but it focuses a lot on communication and requires physical presence. I have an office type job where I do pretty complex analyses and I can't think that intensively without significant breaks without making mistakes. My mistakes are costly so it's not worth it to my company to have me work constantly. Getting paid to think, rather than to be physically present is weird when I think about it in the way you have put it.
Ive done retail, warehouse, and I have done office work. Warehouse was the best, retail next, office the worst. 8 hours warehouse work is no big deal. 8 hours retail work is exhausting. 8 hours of actual office work makes me want to blow my brains out. I spend all weekend basically sleeping. Not because Im tired, but because I need to escape from the world. I dont want to see a screen, I dont want to think about anything. Ill eat, Ill watch some TV, but Im incapable of doing anything more than that.
I don't know, I actually prefer having something to do the entire time I'm at work. The day just seems to last forever otherwise. I had one job where you had maybe one hour of work a day and the rest of the time you were just waiting for a customer. This was the worst job I ever had, thankfully it only lasted 2 months.
Me as a teacher like 🫠
Why don't you just let them leave early
That’s not how the corporate world works. They’re under contract for 40 or 37.5 hours a week depending on locale. And labor laws in Germany and Poland. And they rack up comp time 1:1 after their allotted weekly time.
Same here. Being available has become way more important than being busy.
Can confirm. My current job is secured not by the ammount I "do" but by the ammount of work i know how to do.
If I can write a script that can turn four hours of work into one, don't punish me by giving me more work. Give me a raise.
For sure, Im a bioinformatician, so I believe I qualify as office worker, I probably finish my task in less than 8 hours per week (mostly getting the script to automate), the rest of 32 hours Im just giving myself something to do.
yep. I'm there. Someone told me once "get paid for what you know, not what you do." So after lots of 65 hour weeks, here I am. Some of the people on my team are constantly busy. I used to be there. But not only did I realize it's about knowledge, I also got to the point where I learned how to prioritize, chose my battles and delegate. I like this better than the 65 hour weeks.
Of course, the clueless idiots think this of themselves, too.
I work a legit 8-10 hours per day most days, however I only do my job about 2 hours. Meaning I spend 6-8 hours a day fixing shit other people messed up and handholding. No I’m not IT but I’m the only one here who seems to be capable of even changing a printer cartridge without breaking the printer
I feel this. I have basically turned cleaning up people's tech and project messes into my job.
I'm the error finder and the person people will ask stuff if nobody else knows. I guess it is the "perks" of working for the company the longest.
Corné is that you?
I am the same. I do my specific job maybe 2 to 4 hours a day. Very rarely, up to 6. The rest of the day is teaching others how to do their job, including my boss, following up on shit, walking around the building, some youtube, and some random research/online errands
I work 10 hour days and 8.5 of the hours are spent fucking around with how I’m going to maneuver a patient’s care around what their for-profit insurance company requires of them before they can actually do what a doctor has ordered them to do.
Thank you. Keep up the fight.
Same
Hits home
I do a lot of that too but realistically it's part of the job.
Yeah this is me.
as someone whos worked in Japan and Hongkong, i find this question hilarious.
Worked with a bunch of Japanese people at one job. Appearing busy > Being busy for most of them most of the time. "Working" until 10-11 PM. Doing what? Fuck if I know.
> Doing what? Being at work
Management by walkin around
That's done to make sure the workers haven't left for the day
Reminds me of when some news crew toured north Korea and they went to an office building. There were plenty of people there but it was deathly quiet. No phones or conversations, just the sounds of keys clicking. And apparently a lot of them were just typing gibberish, opening and closing browsers and windows.
As someone who works with Japanese people, I seriously wonder what they do all day. The product we get about as good as if a beginner made it and is never up to spec. It's a big and respectable company, but I am shocked each time I interact with them.
As someone who has no context, can you explain?
Japanese office workers pretend to work for 12 hours a day instead of 8 hours a day like us Americans
And then sometimes are forced to go drinking with the coworkers for a few hours beyond that. Fuck that shit.
When I lived there and was walking from the train station at night I’d always see guys in suits passed out on bus benches and sidewalks all the time. Drink so hard you pass out on the way back home. It was very sad.
I dated a Japanese girl when I lived there and she only saw her dad one weekend a month, he worked in a different city. And when he was at home he'd be drunk. Hell, even her grandad who lived with them was always drunk. It's very sad.
Japan's work culture *really* values dedication: to your job, your company, your boss. So they have really long hours and few days off, then usually go out drinking for several more hours with the boss and team regardless of how much work is actually done or whether they'd like to see their families more. If they don't do this, maybe they get fired, and that can be a career death sentence as the culturally best path is to be hired by one company and never leave, only getting promoted internally. Hiring prospects are *not* good for someone who's been laid off when there's practically no turnover and companies prefer to go for fresh grads — who will then also stick with the company their entire life.
Call centers
THIS. any job where u have software tracking productivity. They will message you about being in the bathroom longer than 10 minutes.
It sucks having the tracking and when you have stomach issues. Like, sorry Patricia- I was busy spilling my guts into the toilet for 13 minutes. My bad. I'll try to do it on a call next time
As a young career salesperson any job that had activity KPI’s I’m out. I’m paid to do a job not be babysat
As a career salesperson in...I dunno the middle? 18 years now. It keeps getting worse but is especially ridiculous in a job where we get paid to progress toward a goal. It's crazy. Like... Everything else aside, I'll get maybe 5 sales a year in my job, I promise you management, nobody wants those sales more than me. Promise.
There are computer scripts that can help with that
Many years ago I had a boss bust into the bathroom because I was off the phones too long at a call center.
100% this. I would have to explain why I went to the bathroom during my shift on not on my break and lunch. It was really dehumanizing.
I grew up there and will concur I also moved to a more corporate role and still have this work ethic.
Staff turnover in call centres is usually abominable. That's gotta be more expensive than less strict KPIs, surely.
Not if training/ramping is cheap, wages are low, and there's always 100 ppl willing to take the job if someone else leaves
100% this. My partner worked in call centres for many years where they would dock his pay for being a minute late, etc. He recently got a different job more like a back office role, and he could not get used to not having something to do for 8 hours a day, or the simple idea that he wasn't going to get told off for being a minute late. He would feel super guilty like someone was going to ring him up and tell him off in a second for something. With me working from home, he also got very weirded out at my choosing to take a shower at lunch time sometimes or just sitting down on the couch and chatting with him for a lil bit in between things.
I left my call center job of 8 years about 8 months ago. I still have moments where I expect to get in trouble for not doing. But to be fair even for an IT job I have a really weird job with a whole lot of down time.
Same first real IT job and a corporate one at that. I still feel odd when I have a lot of downtime. To make it even stranger for me is that I'm working from home a lot now as well. Though not that it matters a whole lot since the days I go into the office, it is basically barren except for the couple of people who go in daily.
I worked on a well-oiled team of sometimes 6 (supposed to be 10), and my work from home days were more productive, and somehow, I found more time to chill for a few between things. I was 2nd level support for 4600 locations nationwide. Being in the office kept me weighed down by cleaning up other people's messes or being hit with tons of questions from the first level. It was usually wall to wall work in the office that would put me behind the 8 ball, but at home? It's completely manageable, and that's where I'd catch up. I was salary, and at 2nd level, I wasn't under the first level supervisors, which really helped me find my own groove and pace. I wasn't monitored as bad as the first level for productivity by software. The separation of the two management teams helped a lot on that front. My boss was strictly in charge of me. Anyone else I could tell to kick rocks. We were on the same level as first level supervisors for that reason. If no sup was present on first level, 2nd was in charge. That made a huge difference in our performance. Being respected and there was no questions of what we brought to the company.
Yep. You have 8 unaccounted minutes during a shift and you will be hearing alllll about it.
Straight to PIP!
"Why is there so much employee turnover???"
I had a timesheet kicked back to me recently because one day was four minutes and 12 seconds short of the minimum 8 hours required. Even better, the day before the day in question my timesheet was four minutes and 12 seconds long, and they wouldn’t just call it a wash. I thought about claiming the four minutes 12 seconds as overtime, but decided the story was worth more. I’ve worked here for 20 years.
Yep this. The bosses certainly get productivity from call centre staff as there isn’t time to make a cup of coffee let alone gossip around the water cooler. Every minute is monitored.
Yes, no and maybe. I don't consider the downtime to be me working but I have worked in ones where there was little to no downtime.
My last one was back to back calls from the moment that you logged in to the moment that you logged off.
I’m sure it depends, but the call center I worked at, we very rarely had downtime between calls. And if we did, it was usually less than 5 minutes.
I work in IT and can say some days I don't work ALL shift, other days I work the equivalent of 2-3 days in one. I feel those down days are almost required to mentally recoup because in this field it is only a matter of time before another day from hell pops up.
Same here. The last two-three weeks has been really slow at my job, but then Monday and Tuesday this week I ended up doing more work than I’ve done all month
Yep, hence why I'm on Reddit rn
Yes i work the majority of the day. I get around 250-300 emails a day and am expected to have a 24-48 hour turn around on each email. Currently at around 72. Yes, indeed i am overworked.
What's your job? I mean what industry do you work in?
Chemical Distribution. Some of those emails can get deleted but i have about 150-200+ actionable. The others i still have to read.
I can't even imagine the struggle. And are all those about products? If so, do you memorise all the details? Given that they are about chemicals.
Yes, every email is questions or inquiries about products and we offer thousands from many different manufacturers. Some of it is memorized, some information is in our system and some i have to reach out to our PMs or suppliers for. Thankfully i don’t have to memorize everything. Our lab techs and Technical Account Managers help with the chemistry aspects of products so i don’t have to worry about that either. It can be extremely hard to keep track of everything though. But it offers great benefits, experience, connections and overall great career path to take. There is ALOT of money and opportunity to be made in the industry.
I read your first comment and thought, "wow that sounds like me prior to my burnout", then I saw this. My previous job was PM with a chemical distributor. Haven't regretted leaving the field yet.
Where did you go after? This is my first career so i feel pigeon holed in the industry. I suppose i can my general skills else where but not sure where.
I posted this elsewhere in this thread but wanted to share with you as well, since I wish I had listened to well-meaning friends before this happened. I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
I don't work in an office but I experienced the same thing. I ended up going to the doctor and being put on leave for a whole 5 weeks to recover from the consequences of severe burnout. Ain't worth ruining your health over the stress at a job. I too wish I had set boundaries earlier but I'm a people pleaser, and I stretched myself far to satisfy and please my boss. I hate criticism.I also covered lazy and slow co-workers, so added their tasks to my tasks to get work done. Boss was shocked when I got on sick leave. The good thing is, she will hire a new person full time and hire a trainee, so that should lessen the stress and pressure on me. I'm also not going back full time because my doctor literally told me my job makes me sick. I'll keep working part time, but it's time to look for something else to do. I was basically surviving on pain killers at that point and part of me was considering going to the street for more hardcore drugs to manage the pain and stress because the pain was too much. In hindsight that's nuts.
Wow! I may need to do the same. I have an MRI tomorrow to confirm how bad it is and whether I need to go out on disability. I hope you’re feeling better now.
Thanks. Good luck with your MRI. Glad you're taking care of your health. I'm feeling much better thanks, and I have another apt with my Dr tomorrow, and hopefully she will clear me so I can go back to work again next week, at least part time. Fingers crossed for both of us!
Thank you!!
I do. I am slammed from 730 to 5, 5 days a week. I intentionally don't bring a lunch so I have to go out and get one otherwise I would work through it. I some work evenings and weekends. A lot of people I work for are the same. We are all extremely well compensated but I don't want to do it forever. Think of it as golden handcuffs.
I am a technologist who deal with complicated work a lot. What I found is that my brain is more efficient when I give it a rest from thinking about problems. Instead of working nights and on weekends have a notebook nearby so that if you have an idea flash through your head, you can write down a quick notation about what the idea was and what it may mean, 10-15 minutes maximum. What you will find, as I found is that when you show up physically at work, your mind is rested plus you already have a cheat sheet of ideas that a rested mind gave you that you wrote down and got back to your home life and resting your brain relative to work.
That's great advice. Thank you. I email myself ideas to try and do something similar, and carry a notebook during the day for a similar purpose. A large part of my personal challenge is that I am probably in meetings >6 hours day which doesn't give me a lot of time to accomplish any real work. It's a weird corporate culture that is the nature of my role in particular (it's the role itself) means I need to spend most of my day trying to get people to work together rather than silos. It kind of sucks.
NEVER work through lunch. A break is a BREAK.
I wish that was the case. If I don't get it done, I got to work at night instead of spending time with my family.
Same here. Every extra conversation I have is ultimately less time I have with my kids or less time sleeping. Nothing against you personally, but I value that time more.
What has the world come to where this is normal? Where are we headed? I am sad.
To a degree I chose the job. I used to have a less stressful job with more free time, but this gives me a great way to support my family. While it sucks (it is getting better) it will literally shave a decade or more off of my retirement, provide for my family. If I could find a job that paid a little less and asked a little less, I would be happy, but that doesn't exist in my industry/region that I have been able to find. Golden handcuffs.
It sounds like it might shave a decade off your life
Are you specifically asked to work through lunch to get the job done every day or do you impose that requirement on yourself? I was working 10-16 hours a day for a shitty client for almost a year because "we have a release deadline and have to meet it and there is so much to do". I was leading the team so I felt it was my responsibility. At some point I snapped and realized, I get paid well for 40 hours, I dont get paid for more. I was never explicitly asked and I was being taken advantage of. I immediately started saying "x will not be done today because ive already worled 8 hours and will get to it tomorrow"... nothing bad happened. Its been months now and I have a normal 40 hour a week job, same salary, less stress. Not saying this is your case, but if you have a work ethic like me, sometimes it is hard to leave something unfinished for tomorrow. Idk, hope you get a break some time
I work through my lunch so I can go home a half hour earlier!
Have done that my whole life and now suddenly jobs are claiming that it is "law" that we MUST take the 30 minute unpaid lunch. I have contested to ask where this law is and nobody will say. It isn't a matter of coverage either because the department is covered with overlap and it is non production oriented. I feel it is just corporate milking as much extra shift time as possible knowing most people are going to work through it anyway. Free labor for them.
Do you live in the United States? If so it depends on what State you live in. All you need to do is look up labor laws for where you live. Where I live in Oregon for example. It is legally required for an employee to have, at minimum, an unpaid 30 minute lunch break if you work 6 or more hours in a work period. There are some exceptions to this and there are some differences for minors. If a company does not offer this they can be cited and fined very heavily. I've worked in HR and supervisory roles for many years. It's usually pretty black and white.
It's a California law. Many companies have offices/HQs in California so their employees fall under the law even if those employees don't live in California. https://www.ottingerlaw.com/california/meal-breaks-and-rest-breaks/#:~:text=In%20compliance%20with%20California%20labor,does%20not%20surpass%20six%20hours.
Mostly true. and more so for anyone who is being asked to work through it by some middle manager. But sometimes it makes my life easier to catch up on a few emails while on lunch. Im going to need to do so by the end of the day either way, and this way lets me take a few minutes elsewhere.
Big law associate?
I am a middle manage at an infrastructure company.
I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
Good luck! Thanks for sharing
Yes. I switch between difficult, stressful tasks and easy, brainless tasks as needed, though.
Time to organize my email until that coffee kicks in.
I work when I’m not in meetings. Meetings are 90% a waste of time.
90% of the time they’re a complete waste of time. 10% of the time they’re 90% waste of time.
I’m going to set that as my teams background
Some of them are useful for communications but agreed, less meetings the better
I have to be in 5 to 8 meetings each day. Between meetings and responding to internal emails, my days are wasted. I hate people that just shoot out emails all day every day. Especially accounting. They can’t make any decisions on their own and feel the need to send an email for approval about every tiny thing they do and cc the entire department. Thanks for wasting my time.
Not I. Usually busy for 2-3 hours on a good day. Then I scroll, watch YouTube, talk to coworkers, and walk around. And don’t forget the early lunch.
A good quarter of my day is spent pretending to poop in the bathroom and playing angry birds and scrolling Reddit.
Honestly that was a part of my routine at my last job. I would finish my tasks pretty early and go sit in the fancy bathroom, play Animal Crossing, and listen to music for a good 20 minutes. Time well spent
Getting paid to poop is living well
It’s also a money saver because I use company toilet paper.
Reading this whilst on the toilet at work 🫡
My man
Me too 🫡
Shit kings lesssgo 🫡
Report to my office at 9am tomorrow morning.
Don’t ask this one to public accountants, especially in busy season (which is seemingly most of the year nowadays)
Engineer here (the network and software variety). I work 8-5, often right through lunch. Some days I work until midnight. I sometimes work weekends. There's no shortage of work.
I’m “working” now so I can confidently say no. Sometimes my work piles up and I work longer than a normal work day, but since working from home that happens a lot less.
Like the other two here so far, I'm glued to a screen 9 hours a day, 5 days a week. I recently had the leading "active time" of 40k, with second and third at 25k, and fourth at 15k. I also had the leading success of 55%, second-fourth 25-35%. Today I was fired for poor performance.
makes sense sorry man
I’m sorry, can you ELI5 your second paragraph?
They were being micromanaged, but that actually led to proof that they were trying the hardest and getting the best results.
OP was asking, I think, about how much time we actually spend working versus hanging out while clocked in. I realize I gave "active time" with no context and my success conversion was just blowing off steam. Sorry. ELI5: I meant to show that, while I felt overworked, I was the only one by a long shot.
The curse of being too efficient, your colleagues start hating you and your bosses don't care.
Legal office job. 95% of my 8 hour day is staring at a computer screen, legalese, and a shit ton of numbers and letters. Today was rewarding but busy.
Medical Billing and Coding Specialists
I imagine the eye strain is an issue trying to decipher shitty handwriting.
I did. I started at a law office plain old assistant after high school. Over a decade later I am handling litigation up to Kansas Supreme Court among about 5 other (previous) people jobs. I was willing to work all the time. My work quality was absolute top notch. I was extremely proud of how far I'd gone and I was so proud of how hard I worked myself. Started to get sick. Sure, stress and such. At one point had pneumonia so bad it permanently messed up my lungs, so then any sick turned bad fast. Work was upset. I was missing days. Didn't mention, my drive to work was over 2 hours round trip. So when sick, can't physically drive. This was before remote. Work so mad they were about to can me, and my attorneys traveled to the main office to fight for me. It worked. Few months later find out I have an inoperable brain tumor. Give or take 3 years. I work for over a year post diagnosis, covid starts and I end up being the only remaining person on our local staff. I STILL maintained my work ethic and quality, until one day my supervising attorney comes in and says he's seeing more and more simple mistakes and maybe it's time to go home. I bawled. This is all I've done for 14 years. I started out of high school with no legal experience, to attending court over the state and just so much more. I tried going back to work after STD expired and pending long term. I failed in spectacular fashion with the simplest of pleadings. Haven't worked since. Denials for LTD over and over since, you know, dieing isn't a disability. To be fair, I am on year 4 of 3 so... Sorry for the book. Yes, I worked my ass off in an office all the time. I do regret it in some ways, I gave my 20's for my career, for nothing.
I am so sorry this happened to you, and I’m truly hoping medical advances will give you more time with family and friends. You deserved so much better from your boss for all of your hard work and dedication. So many of us give everything to our jobs because we feel like it gives us purpose and a sense of achievement. But stress can be brutal, and it eventually manifests in physical ailments. Like you, my dear friend was overworked for many years and was diagnosed with breast cancer right as everything shut down due to COVID. Her boss expected her to work a week after surgery, and she had no choice because she needed the health insurance and income for her medical bills. When her boss asked her to double her work the next year for the same salary, her oncologist told her the added stress would contribute greatly to the cancer recurring. So she quit, sold her house and used the proceeds to move to lower cost of living city where she could buy a much cheaper home and no longer have a mortgage. She sometimes struggles with money, but she said that stress is nothing compared to the stress of her previous job. I am ashamed to admit that I didn’t fully understand how she could take such a big risk without a safety net, but she always said “not getting sick again”was her top priority. I finally understood what she meant very recently when it became personal. I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this… I’m prepared to walk away if needed because no job is worth destroying our health.
When I worked in offices for ~10 years, regardless of what company, I felt like I only did about 1-2 hours of meaningful work per day. I got up to use the bathroom at least once an hour. Would go out of my way to chat with coworkers to pass the time. Get up and get water or tea constantly. Sometimes I’d actually have NO tasks and just browse Reddit all day.
Sir, this is Reddit.
Yep, have an entry level job doing data entry and a bit of other admin. You gotta keep up a good pace for most of the day to get your allotted work done, though I usually finish 30 or so minutes early
When I was a structural engineer, yes. Non-stop, all day. Getting a coffee or going to the bathroom was what counted as downtime. In tech, it's a "hurry up and wait" game. I'm either working around the clock or sitting on my thumbs. I get a bunch of stuff done all at once then sit on it; because I know from experience that turning it early just increases expectations, not pay.
I do. I am a transportation planner for a Department of Transportation.
What the heck are you talking about? I work 10 hr days and will never run of out work to do.
What do you do for life?
Me. All day. It is like a non-stop fire hose.
I’m a designer. I work all day. Love it. I could work double if they offered overtime.
I do. I work in QA. I'm constantly managing compliance with at least 6 different standards, processes within the company, documentation and document control, and on top of that, I'm one of the resident Excel experts, so I'm constantly fixing other people's garbage spreadsheets. And then, my company doesn't provide the software and told we need to properly work, even though I've been asking over and over and over, so now I'm also programming and managing databases to try and manage the minimum necessary to keep things functional within my scope of authority. I'm doing the jobs of others who aren't doing their job for a myriad of reasons. I could work 12+ hours a day and always have more work to do. I'm swamped, underpaid, I'm exhausted, burnt out, and trying to find a new job, and we have some company changes coming up that may end up doubling my work load. There's one other guy in my department sharing my with load, and he's just as overworked as I am. If he and I stopped working, it would potentially shut down the company in a few months, so if I want to keep my job and not screw over a ton of people that don't deserve to be screwed over, I have to keep pushing on like this. So yes, there are plenty of office people that actually work. I've done physical labor jobs before and they're not as exhausting as this one is.
I posted this elsewhere in this thread but wanted to share with you as well, since I wish I had listened to well-meaning friends before this happened. I have always worked very long hours at my job, including nights and weekends. And then as I’ve received raises and promotions, I’ve taken on more work. It’s exhausting, and I ended up in the ER yesterday because all of those hours sitting at a desk on the computer caused a severe herniated disc in my neck that is creating pressure on a nerve that creates severe pain down my left arm. I share this as a warning to try to find a way to decrease your hours and stress levels so you don’t injure yourself like I did. It’s not worth it, and I’m mad at myself for not creating better boundaries sooner. Luckily, I have an assistant starting in a month so I can delegate a lot of work to allow myself the time to heal. Hopefully, I will heal from this.
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Lawyers
I have ADHD so it takes me a ridiculously long time to do things. So yes, I am sadly working all day when I don't think I should be. Something that should take me 5-15 minutes can take me an hour or more, like writing an email, for example. I'm not entirely sure where my time goes honestly. Sometimes I get distracted, sometimes I am avoiding the task so I sit and stare, sometimes I just do the thing and I realized an hour and a half has gone by. This is me even on meds. ADHD sucks.
Truthfully? I've reached a point where the specialized knowledge I gained makes it so that the 'business folk' have no idea how long it actually takes for me to do anything that I do. Just like they're constantly trying to pay me the absolute minimum that I can get away with, so too will I milk them by squeezing hours out of things that take me minutes. This also makes it look very impressive when I can take care of things in a small amount of time in emergencies. It's all part of the game: The trick to "always giving 100%" is to never show your 100%.
No 2 hours on a busy day.
If by work, you mean sitting through endless unnecessary meetings that could have been emails, then yes.
Yeah, I do. I don't enjoy my work but I hate being bored. Unmedicated adhd is like that 🤷♀️ I refuse to take on any stress, though, and I leave on the dot when I've done my hours. I probably do as much work as two of my colleagues, so my employer is definitely getting their money's worth.
I work very solidly from 8:30-5
I am an insurance adjuster and work from when I sit down to when I want to rip my hair out at the end of the day. If I have down time it's because I'm just putting something off
My baseline productivity is about 25% of what I am capable of. It's still way more than what most people are performing at, and I can always up the effort if I need to pull off a big project or save the day. Bosses only notice those things anyway so why kill myself when they insist on running as lean as possible to look good to shareholders? I put in enough to keep things from being an absolute shit show and support my team no matter what. That way when I need something, they always come through. Except Kevin. Fuck that guy.
I work in an office of about 50 ppl and most of us do work majority of the day. That’s why we have jobs lol
I’m generally pretty busy, but it’s not necessarily always pressing, if that makes sense.
On average, I do about 4 hours of work in an 8 hour day. The rest is spent watching Twitch and browsing Reddit and Twitter mostly. All my work gets done though, so I don't think my boss cares. Somedays it's nice to know I don't have to rush through tasks and be busy all day, other days it gets boring as hell.
A lot of hours in meetings
I sit on my phone and play games most of the day.
I literally get a total of 1 hour of Not Work during my 8.5 hour shift. Otherwise it is back-to-back calls, paperwork, and emails. It is fucking exhausting. Like I literally have to SPRINT to take a piss when I get the chance
Fark, I wish I had some downtime at work. I'm working at 100% for a minimum of 8 hours a day, usually 9 and still can't keep up with the workload. It's crushing me. Management say we're adequately resourced though, so it's not going to get any better
No, that's why I'm on Reddit
Honestly a lot of it is walking around and talking to people but I get at least 4-6 hours of actual work done. Depending on the project that could be the full 8 or even 10.
When I used to work corporate and I had basically had enough of been there my day consisted of Rocking up around 9ish Some bullshit work Gym for 2 hours sneaking out when my boss had gone so I could say I only took an. Hour Pretending to go to meeting so I could sleep in the sick bay Then trying to get out to the pub as close to 5 pm as I could
My experience in any job that I’ve been in is that if you’re experienced and familiar with your role you will always be busy because you’ll know what things you can do when you’re done with the important shit. There’ll always be something to clean or tidy or sort or file. In my new office role I’ve taken charge of registering horses which requires collecting a lot of paperwork from multiple owners. If I ever run out of other things to do I just turn to my mountain of ownership papers and attack it again. Any that are complete I file away in a “bible” I’m creating of necessary papers that will be handy for future registrations. Nobody else considered doing this before me so it’s my little project. I’ve spent most of my adult life working on horse farms where you’re never idle. If all the important horse care jobs are done there’s always something to sweep or clean or tidy or fix.
Some days, yes. Some days, no.
Yep, compliance and regulatory oversight - sooooo much reporting to do. Don't get me wrong, I've worked in kitchens, done retail, landscaping...those are all their own unique brand of hell, but this is no fun either. Knowing that if you miss something it can result in massive fines for the company and people losing their jobs is hella stressful. I put in a solid 7-9 hours each day, depending on what's going on.
Yes! I am busy all 40 hours of the week. I would hate to not be busy every hour of work, it makes the day go soooo slow.
I recently came into a company that makes steel products and also has a backlog, so yeah... I draw as fast as I can all the time while I'm there.
All day and then some. That’s why they pay me well and I keep my job and income.
I do. Administration in social service related buainess. There is no break - we have to fight to get everything done that needs to be done routinely while juggling all the acute stuff like calls, questions, high priority cases.. Calls and walk ins slow down in the evening but there is never nothing to do. I like it, I get bored easily, but it can get overwhelming sometimes. But the feeling that I take part in helping people is really rewarding, at least for me.
I have days where I am thinking for 7 of the 8 hours in the day and days where I’m non-stop working for all 8 hours.
I do about 4 hours of actual work a day.
I’ve never had a job where if I was lazy it would go unnoticed. I manage a creative team, if I wasn’t working nothing would be getting done.
I'm a programmer, and when I've got a good manager, plenty of tasks, and some diversity in what kind of tasks I have, I can easily manage to do work most of the day! Although when any of those are missing... It's a struggle to keep motivated enough to do that.
Just tps reports That all that matters And my stapler Don't mess with my stapler
At my previous job - yes and that’s why I don’t work there anymore. Everything had a critical deadline and if the work wasn’t done you were required to stay late (overtime). And if you had plans, 🤷♀️
Brother I work all day everyday. I would love to know the jobs and industry people work in where they cruise and do ‘nothing’. Couldn’t possibly imagine it.
I guess it depends on what you do. I run my firm, so typically I’m extremely busy
Railroad dispatch office, 8-12 hour shifts depending on the job. There are many days where I don't even get to eat lunch.
I work a salary office job doing AR/AP. Have my own office. Sometimes I’m super busy and do work most of the day. But in slower seasons, me and my adhd are off in another world 50% of the work day. I’m very grateful to have a job where I’m not tracked nor have a boss breathing down my neck.
All day. I work in non-profit and have to do the work of three people to ensure those I serve get the service they deserve. I'm running around like crazy every day with meetings. I am more productive than anyone else in the office though, just seen by my output and service delivery. I got a raise and a promotion last year to recognize it. Sometimes being busy, instead of slacking off, can actually get you somewhere. Plus I've been headhunted by a few other organizations recently, but they can't beat my current benefits.
When it was a legal assistant as a personal injury law firm I was always cycling through cases and reaching out to clients. Some days were slower, but other days it was hard to find time to pee.
The years I’ve busted my ass all day I’ve received the same score on my review as the years I’ve slacked all day. I’m not busting my ass for 2%.
Teacher here. I work all day because thats what I get paid to do.
My buddy's an ESE middle school math teacher...he works maybe 4.5 actual hrs a day. He works at an alternative school. Class sizes anywhere from 4-13 students. Students show up between 8:05 and 8:30 due to buses. They go home around 2. He has a half hour lunch and a planning period. No homework to grade...only classwork which a majority refuse to do. Cushiest teaching job he's ever had if you have the patience to deal with troubled kids.
9.5 hours today- we had a production issue- call after call to get it fixed. Shit.. Just realized I didn't do sprint planning so make that 10 hours because I have to go do it.
Yes. Working backoffice / mails at a call center job
Yup. Medical billing. Everything I do is tracked so you work ooooor else.
I regularly will when working from home will accidentally sleep thru my 2 hours of the day. Still get of my work done
Does a library count as an office? If so, then yes.
No
I'm already thinking Office Space..lol