to think this is not a workplace culture that should be encouraged

[jazzingaround]

A friend's son has just started a new job and was telling my friend that 'it's not the done thing' to leave the office at your contracted time. Apparently everyone hangs around, not wanting to be the first to go, finding stuff to do, deliberately sending emails to their managers so the time will show up etc etc.

AIBU to find this increasingly prevalent attitude sad and unhealthy? Obviously, in some jobs, long hours are unavoidable. In others, staff are overloaded and unwillingly working ridiculous hours.

But people deliberately and needlessly hanging around the office after their contracted working day is finished, and management encouraging and rewarding this kind of behaviour, seems like a backward step to me.

[lorelei9]

Lurking - no, I was thinking of admin too, not people who were training up to earn very high salaries later.

I think this is one of my biggest problems with this culture - I'm there do to a job, I do it well, I should be able to go home if I've done everything and done it well.

if others want to stay late because of ladder climbing, great, but I'm not climbing one, just want the money to pay the mortgage. Workplaces have a habit of treating all workers as if they must be climbing a ladder. There is very little acceptance that some of us are just there to do the job and earn money. I've also learned the hard way that if you do it too well, you get asked to do more, usually for the type of money that doesn't justify the extra effort.

[leedy]

I knew my current workplace (where I am now quite senior, definitely career job, big multinational) was the right fit for me when my first manager informed me that she would think less rather than more of me if I was in the office all the time as it would clearly mean that I couldn't manage my time. I'm still happy to work late if I absolutely have to finish something, and I'll sometimes answer work mail at home, but generally speaking I work my regular hours, take breaks, etc. I've got even better at it since having DC, I think it's just made me more focussed/efficient.

Hate, hate, hate presenteeism. I still remember getting a bollocking from a manager in a previous job for not spending enough time being visibly in the office, even though he admitted I was getting all my work done and more. Apparently it "didn't give a very good impression".

[lorelei9]

leedy, you've just reminded me of one work place where there were often late evening dos for networking etc. In theory you would get TOIL and I used to take it immediately whenever possible - i.e. come in 2 hours late the next day. HR were fine with this.

however, shortly after I left, a colleague told me that they had been asked to think about how they manage that TOIL and not take it in the morning "because the Chief Exec gets annoyed seeing empty seats in the morning".

but he thought nothing of leaving at 3.30 to pick up his kids from school and hardly ever attended those evening events. Presenteeism quickly leads to "one rule for top staff and a different rule for everyone else".

[RaskolnikovsGarret]

My staff have no reservations about leaving before me! . I am always in before them and leave after them. Fine by me, I get paid a bit more (although when I was in their role I still chose to work these hours).

[EssentialHummus]

I don't think that career ladder types should have to swallow all the extra unpaid time. I'm a lawyer. I accept that I have to stay late / come in early at times for conf calls, to meet deadlines, to attend events - i.e. when there is an actual reason, but I don't accept the need to hang about reading the Daily Mail after 6pm the rest of the time. It's demoralising and unhelpful.

Also, who wants an overworked doctor/accountant (or even lawyer) "helping" them? Recipe for negligence disaster.

[Duckdeamon]

DH once worked for accenture: frequently working until midnight in the office. Awful culture.

[Shakey15000]

Duck I had a phone interview for Accenture last year (as the interviewer couldn't make our arranged face to face one). Never even got back to me.

[GrimDamnFanjo]

Ive worked in those environments for the last 20 years. In fact, in my 3rd job my boss actually said I should never leave on time!
PR/Meejah type roles.

[FeliciaJollygoodfellow]

I work in project management for a high street bank.

As far as I'm concerned, I will stay behind if there is something critical needing to be done, but I will take the time in lieu later on.

I am not paid enough to stay behind for no reason.

I had THREE interviews for a recruitment consultant when I graduated, who basically told me I'd be in £14k, wouldn't earn bonuses for three months and would be expected to work through lunch and after hours. The bonus for the first three months would go to whoever would be training me.

I was desperate for a job, I would never take a job like that now. Plus, I was at the third interview before they told me I lived too far away and thus they would never hire me anyway . I was living in Liverpool and said I would move to Manchester should I get the job and had already viewed three different flats within walking distance of the fecking office! Arseholes.

[Atenco]

Unexpectedsocialist hit the nail on the head.

Presenteeism is ridiculous and shows bad management. But I am also shocked at the number of people on this thread who think that consistently working unpaid overtime is acceptable or even to be expected in order to get on. This is so obviously discriminatory against parents and women in particular.

I've lived in Mexico for most of my adult life. There used to be an impressive level of equality for professional women here, but unfortunately things changed, this culture of working ridiculous hours came in and now you are hard put to find a women with children in a high-flying position.

[glitterbomb80]

I've worked some weird hours in my time. I work in the pointy end of communications (political/Government stuff), so expected to be media monitoring and on call at all hours just in case something happens, then fully available when it does, even if that's at 1am. The 24 hour news cycle is a bugger. But that's just the nature of the job - I also cruise into the office at 10am if there's nothing pressing in the morning, albeit with the expectation that I've already been online for a few hours and am up to date with whatever is happening that day.

I'd hate it if I had to hang around the office waiting for someone to leave before I sloped off... but then, I guess if I don't respond to emails and press calls that come in at all hours or if something happens on my organisation's Twitter account and I'm not on top of it, it reflects badly on me. It's a kind of of virtual presenteeism culture, I guess.

The husband is a lot worse off in this regard. He manages a bunch of teams and clients across different timezones. His work Skype is constantly pinging away, it's maddening.

It's not great. We both really have to make a conscious effort to switch off, put down our phones and not feel guilty about it. I'm already making plans to get out of the industry altogether and find a career with more normal demands on time.

[nippiesweetie]

Some years ago a friend told me that in Germany, if you did not leave on time, there would be concern that you were not up to the job.

That's Germany, one of the world's most successful economies.

[FellOutOfBedTwice]

You see this in teaching a lot. I remember being encouraged by a senior teacher when I was a naive 22 year old newly qualified teacher that I should log on to my school emails at home of an evening/weekend/holidays and said the odd email to the "right people" so that they saw I was doing school stuff at ungodly hours. People do it all the time.

[Mistigri]

I sometimes worked long hours as a new graduate in advertising 30 years ago, because press deadlines wait for no-one.

I now work for a large manufacturing company where presenteeism isn't a problem, at least in the UK (there is probably a bit of it in our Japanese and some of the US offices). However there is a trend towards people being available out-of-hours, and it's not unusual to get replies to emails well outside office hours from people who check their mail at home. I sometimes do this myself but don't feel under any pressing obligation to do so.

I have a very uncompromising attitude towards timekeeping - I am paid for my skills, knowledge and output, not for my time. I don't clockwatch, and I finish early if I want to. The flip side is that if there's a deadline I'll meet it.

"Presenteeism" arises from an imbalance in the power held by employers vs employees ... Much healthier to have a workplace where employees are treated as responsible adults who can be trusted to get their job done in their allotted working hours.

[AngelsWithFilthySouls]

I've worked in 2 big accountancy firms and thankfully it wasn't the done thing. Yes, there were weeks when we all worked crazy hours and had to cancel social things last minute but only when it was required. If it was a quiet period we were all straight out the door or had long lunches etc.

[CoffeeCoffeeAndLotsOfIt]

I also work for a large accountancy firm. Was once told by a colleague that she "sits" on emails and then sends them from her blackberry at 11:30pm - to show she's still "working" at that time....when in reality she'd probably been watching television!

She made partner.

I do the hours as and when I need to. I'd hate anyone to think I was bad at my job. But staying in the office just to be seen to be there is not for me.

[Doobigetta]

I hate presenteeism. My manager loves it, openly rewards it and publicly criticises people who work their contract hours. Our team is a mix of people who thrive on competing to work the longest- 60 hours isn't unusual for them- those who put the hours in, but are miserable and resentful, and those who shrug off the pressure and work roughly their contract hours. Guess which group actually delivers the most.

[minnymoobear]

In at 8am today for training and left at 6.30 :( supposed to be 9-5.30 but most ppl are there til 6-6.30
Am planning to leave on time from now on- but get more done in that last hour than most of the afternoon as no one bothers me then!
Need a better work life balance - I'm not saving lives so shd leave and be at home with my family - simples!

[Puddlejumpingqueen]

Another accountant here in big firm and this is definitely the culture at my work. People have had no pay rise and just doing their contracted hours and no more was given as the reason as to why. You can tell who is vying for promotion as they will hang around until the last partner has left before leaving. We don't get paid overtime and clients aren't billed on hours worked (normally a set fee for a project) so they aren't wasting firm or client money hanging around, it is just being seen to be working.

[Orda1]

You won't catch me in the office past 5.01.

[ceeveebee]

Ex accountant here. I now work in house part time in a niche role, and I am lucky enough to work for an enlightened employer who realises that it doesn't matter how long I am physically in the office, it is results that matter. Contract is supposedly 9-5.30, 3 days a week - I will often arrive after 930 or leave at 430, but I will also do work in the evenings, respond to all emails and have conference calls on my days off, and will of course be in the office as late as needed (and on non working days as needed) when there are board meetings etc. It's a totally different world from working in practice. With mobiles, wifi, VPNs etc, it's really not necessary to be present in order to get stuff done!

[GiddyOnZackHunt]

A decade or so ago I worked for a company that has some departments where eyebrows went up if you left on time. For a couple of years I was in one of those teams but eventually moved sideways into another team that did 24/7 support. The head of that department used to glare at you at 5.01pm and say "Why are you still here? Go home". We worked our socks off for him :) I do try to model my management style on his

[Justaboy]

Its the English disease!, it can lead to illnesses and break up relationships and should be despised it rarely happens in Europe tho!

[cdtaylornats]

I am a software engineer and was quite used to a long hours culture, until I started working in an ATC Centre, controller hours are strictly monitored by law and it was their culture that permeated the business. Of course if you were wrestling with a deadline or a critical fix or a really interesting problem you sometimes worked on longer but sometimes you had a dead end and just went early. As long as the work got done it didn't really matter.

The controllers always said you couldn't tell the difference between a working engineer and a sleeping one anyway.

[MovingOnUpMovingOnOut]

I always ask "what are people doing?".

But then I work on outputs not bums on seats. I find it earns me and my firms more money and keeps costs down. Of course you need to have excellent management for that and that doesn't just happen... so people like me have to enable it to happen.

Radical me

Op, the situation you describe where people pretend to work is ridiculous. It's also uncompetitive and costly.