I’m an ‘overworker’ and have 3 FT jobs - AMA

[SallyGs]

Ive had a few people now mention on the careers topic to do an AMA so am taking the plunge.

An overworker is someone who holds multiple full time roles at the same time. Started in the US and became big during COVID - for obvious reasons as it’s pretty much impossible to do with non remote work.

I currently have 3 full time jobs, at my peak I had 5 during 2020. And am working towards buying a rental property with my additional income.

So for anyone who has wondered about it or are interested in trying it themselves - AMA

This isn’t really a thing though. Find me one case of a company, in England, being able to claim hours back. Especially when work was completed.

Esp since I’m salaried.

I do my job quickly but I’ve always just gone back to my manager and said I have capacity to take on more projects. I now do a third of two of my colleagues’ jobs as well as my own. Did you never think of just asking for more work in your primary role? Surely that would have been more honest?

I did it for the money primarily, I needed IVF for DD and wanted extra to cover that. I then took 9 months off overworking as the maternity leave situation would really have brought down the house of cards and just went back to it after realising how easy it was once back from maternity leave.

My primary role has very good enhanced maternity pay so kept that one the whole time, and the other just slotted in.

I do regret pushing for the 5, it was pure greed and I couldn’t keep up, esp as one I was stupid enough to go for a more snr role and it came apart quite quickly, took them 4 months to get rid of me though, and I worked for 2 months prior to that, so I got a decent amount out of that role despite not doing anything for most of the time.

Of course not, that’s a bit silly no?

Also I can’t really just take on more work, I lead a department, it’s not as easy as taking Brenda’s daily admin tasks unfortunately

Thanks, OP. I wonder if I could do something like this myself. I have a full-time job and also make an increasing amount of money from my writing and social media posts. My plan is to work fewer hours in my primary role and use that time to do more writing and social media.

I suspect I have ADHD too (my daughter is diagnosed). If I'm not very busy, I seem to slump into low mood and become very unproductive somehow. Interesting!

I just don’t do meetings tbh, at this point it’s a personality joke at work, to not even try to book one in that nice not set up myself

Get a new job and some self respect. Clearly you’ve outgrown your job and need to move on, or get a second job and be a fraud like the OP!

It’s definitely worth looking into, especially as when it’s a secondary role you can usually be more flexible regarding salary, so many small businesses benefit from this as they’ll get a more experienced person for their lower salaries.

One of my secondaries realise this and at this point I could ask tor the business owners kidney and they’d give it, as they’re getting a higher quality of work output and a more snr team member for a fraction of the cost.

Once you get the organisation piece down it’s actually quite easy to manage

a more snr team member for a fraction of the cost.

and a fraction of the time they are paying for

You don’t seem to have the ability to understand roles and jobs outside of your experience it seems.

Something many on here struggle with

And it’s quite common in many businesses to have bonus multipliers for the SLT, it’s really not that uncommon.

When they’re achieving 700% more growth than they predicted from the channels I manage I don’t think it matters too much.

Plus they benefit from contacts and systems I have access to they’d not be able to afford.

I’m pretty sure that your company would find you more work to do if they knew that you were only working two hours a day.

When others have said they do the same thing, and the overworking community being 1000s strong in the UK alone it’s a bit silly to have this view.

If you have a genuine question though please feel free to join in, in good faith for once

It makes me chuckle you think it’s a case of finding more work. I create my work. You don’t just tend to give people tasks in my role. I defined my job, I have business objectives and that’s it.

Sorry this is so alien to you

Or make her redundant.

I was stupid enough to go for a more snr role and it came apart quite quickly, took them 4 months to get rid of me though, and I worked for 2 months prior to that, so I got a decent amount out of that role despite not doing anything for most of the time.

This is utterly appalling. You did barely anything in a senior role while getting paid for 6 months. Shame on you. No wonder U.K. productivity is up shit creek with shysters like you taking the fucking piss. I hope you get your comeuppance as this is not right.

My only question, OP, is whether you have any sort of moral compass at all? What you are doing is dishonest.

It is really interesting the amount of people who act as if it’s their company I am working for.

See I don’t get posts like these. What has morality got to do with anything?

I am paid a salary, am smashing my targets, everyone wins. No one has any tangible loss in this situation. As if I was fired they’d just hire someone on the same salary who would do the same, if not a worse job for the full hours.

Very unlikely considering how they weren’t able to fill my maternity contact and have actively put me on a flight risk pathway with HR (which means I’m actively ‘taken care of’)

Thanks for the condescension, but what I am struggling to see beyond is my experience combined with that of pretty much everyone I’ve ever known and what I read and hear about the world of work in general.

I don’t doubt bonus multipliers like that exist (in the same way I don’t believe any of the other individual details of your posts), but when you add all of the details together it isn’t credible, no.

Well it’s the UK PLC that is missing out so yes, I do care about that.

What would you do if you found out that one of the people in the team you lead was doing the same thing?

1. As a manager, you are responsible for ensuring that those who report to you are complying with company policy and procedure.
2. You are not giving that person enough work to justify their salary so you should be recommending either an increased workload or a reduction in headcount

Then you must have a very limited circle. As I have the opposite, I don’t know of many people who have ever worked their full hours, it’s quite common in the industry.

That is alien to me, the ‘asking for more work’ is alien to me and everyone I’ve ever spoken to about work. Even at net wording and industry events. But I don’t doubt some poor sods do that, even though it’s outside of my personal experience.

thats a great question

@SallyGs how will you deal with a member of your team doing the same as you?