re office cultures where people are expected to work beyond contracted hours

[user1485342611]

Just following on from the 100% attendance thread, AIBU to think there's nothing wrong with working the hours you're contracted to work and then going home and getting on with other things.

There just seems to be a growing attitude that anyone who leaves work at 5.30 every evening lacks ambition or commitment or drive or whatever, even if they're hitting their deadlines and doing the work they're supposed to do.

Obviously, there's times when you have to be flexible and hang on a bit later than usual to get something finished on time, or help a colleague out. But surely that should be the exception rather than the rule?

We own 4 shops and our staff literally steal a living they don't earn it

They don't actually steal off us but we could employ so much more people if they managed their time and jobs correctly it's heartbreaking the managers only think of their own targets and not the stores as a whole

So manage them?

I think it's a horrible attitude. I don't mind it at all when the role is something that is genuinely helping others (nurses, doctors, teachers etc.), but when the sole purpose of a company is to make money and managers are expecting employees to stay beyond their contracted hours (without paying overtime) it is just wrong. You want my time? Pay me.

There is some big boss at the top rolling in money for all the extra time the "little guys" put in without getting paid and that's ok? I think not!

Working unpaid so that some big boss somewhere can buy himself another golden ferrari off the back of my labour? fuck that shit. If there's work to do, hire more people to do it.

In my old job my contracted hours were 9-5.

I regularly worked 8 through until 9. And got paid overtime. it was expected.

The shit royally hit the fan when after a final year of absolute hell, I resigned and was told no overtime while I was on notice and I had to be out by 5.39 at the latest (their rules). When I packed up to leave on the first day of my notice period the managers wanted to know where the hell I thought I was going. I pointed out the companies rule and said I was going to the beach (live on an island it was summer time...and hot!) they didn't like it. But I stuck to my guns and left. I don't work for free.

In my new job its rare to see anyone in the office past 530, were considered inefficient if we are (unless there's a really good reason). And I don't get paid overtime.

Obviously I'll stay later if there's a client need but emerald things can wait until tomorrow. As a result I'm much happier. And have my life back.

Ladylunchalot - how much grief do the managers get if they don't meet targets?
They're not going to think of the bigger picture if under pressure , its about survival - as it is for all of us .

Well it also depends how efficient people are. Some people manage to do their work and more between 9-5, others take longer.

In my job we work in order to get a job done. Sometimes we finish early and sometimes late.

Junior and admin leave on time 99% and I prefer that.
The issue is the people who. Annoy do work within the hours because they struggle to concentrate/any other reason. It is the toughest on them.
I prefer to leave on time and finish off things later after kids bedtime.

I worked in an industry which is client focused and expected overtime from all staff. It was part of the model.

We used to have manager meetings and monitor overtime levels. Anyone regularly working very high overtime used to be monitored to make sure they were coping okay. This was a month on month comparison as sometimes one job would keep people busy for a few weeks. We would reassign work to help if we could.

The counter of that which made me uncomfortable was we also looked at people not doing overtime and would ofter reassign the busy people's work to them. Basically a built in expectation that overtime was necessary . The issue was that was how it was staffed so to deliver we had to get people doing overtime. It was sold as a team effort. If people weren't doing overtime then their team members would pick up the slack and do more overtime so the person usually felt bad about it.

First of all, I found this as being a very interesting thread. I am currently sitting with the cat on my lap (just posted yesterday asking for a name😃), drinking a cup of green tea & reading mumsnet.

Right. So I'll start telling you about previous jobs. As other posters commented before, I have been humiliated for leaving on time and taking my full hour lunch and reading/eating/whatever (not paid for lunch). I remember this job I had straight after I finished uni. It was in a famous store, as a supervisor for.... minimum wage. Yay! I was micro managed by staff who was there for a long time & they won't take any suggestions etc. Also the manager wanted me, only me to do SOMETHING, whatever that was, every single second. I ran for the hills as soon as I could.

Now I work in corporate banking. Hours are 9-5.30 with 30 mins lunch break. I arrive at 8.30, drink my coffee, open my laptop & read my e/mails, have a look at my diary so I see if I have any appointments etc, then do my job and at 5.30 my feet are out of the door.

I did have some friction with the area director who has her office based in our building and doesn't do shit tbh regarding the fact that I leave on time however I was blunt and sharp and told her exactly what I thought.

I do STRONGLY believe that if you can't do the job on time you have an issue.

I have stayed late before when it is necessary to get something finished but I changed my hours when DD started school last year to finish at 2 so I pick her up from school. I leave on time everyday & if anything urgent needs doing I hand it to my manager, getting to school on time is my number one priority. My job share partner has a laptop & she's regularly on it in the evenings, luckily I don't have one so I can't do any work at home.
My job is at a level where i can manage my work load this way but if I wanted to be more senior I would probably have to work more hours (for not much more money either). I'll think about that when DD in is senior school maybe....

Caprianna
Nothing to do with efficiency.

I work a lighter week than many other teachers (because im reasonay efficient and my school cares about workload) and I still can't get everything done in my 32.5 contracted hours.

Maths alone tells you it doesn't add up 175 books a week to mark + 22 hours of lessons to plan. average teacher time given: 3 hours

I work 40-45 & what doesn't get done doesn't get done. But there are many schools where the pressure and environment is so bad people can't do that without fearing a 'support plan'.

My current workplace is great with generous flexi-time and understanding management. I have worked in some terrible places though.

In my last job, I worked with a junior reporter whose working hours were 9-5 but often attended work events which lasted late into the evening. No flexibility about arrival time. One day he had a medical appointment at 6pm, and at 5pm as he was preparing to leave, the boss told him that he needed to attend something on the other side of the city. He said that wouldn't be possible as he had an appointment, at which point the boss laid into him, calling him unprofessional and saying that he should run these things past her first.

That's right. Run his medical appointments in his free time past his boss. It was a fucking monthly trade publication as well, not the bloody Times or skmething.

In my new office of six - mainly senior managers bar me - nobody takes a lunch. Therefore I feel I can't. One even joked how she couldnt believe people on the other site took lunch. what a terrible example for management to set!

I miss the other site where most were at my middle level or junior and we all took lunch. it was a happier building because of it.

I think there is a difference between generally working your correct hours and clock watching though. I'm flexible with my company in that if I'm really busy I do the hours to get the work done, but I wouldn't worry about saying I'm leaving early today or whatever. I have the same attitude towards my team usually, but I have a guy who started recently and if he's at his desk at 10 to 9 due to less traffic on the way in, he leaves 10 minutes early too. I do feel disappointed with his work ethic, and I'm sure if I tell him I want him to be available until 5 he will start aiming to be in on the dot of 9. I think if you start at 9 you need to be ready to start work, which means logged on and settled down, not walking through the door.

Maisypops, I wasn't specifically referring to teaching. There are of course many jobs where the workload is such that its too big to do within allocated time.

I am a manager and of course people differ in their organisational, time management skills and how they spend their time at work which impacts how long it takes to do their jobs too.

In my workplace we frequently work long hours, but we clearly mention this when we recruit and people receive very good compensation.

Just one example of how bad teaching is for insane hours.

One of the most challenging schools in the country (inner London comp), more than 30% don't have English as the first language.

Today (Saturday), compulsory support session for GCSEs 9-12. Afterwards Dh has to call the parent/carer of kids who haven't turned up. Talk them through the contract/detention if necessary/cajoling parents (who are usually overworked and had no clue that today was the day) explain, get them on board for next time.

Last time it took til 4.30pm to finish the above phone calls.

And before anyone says there's an answer to this (texts, letters home, no phone calls, loads of other techie options) - there is no technology for this. The parents don't speak good English, don't have smart phones/computers, very deprived community. And the school federation have determined this is the best way and instructed all senior leaders to do it. So there's not an option not to do it.

Imagine multiple things like above every day and you can see why a fair few teachers work 70 plus hours a week in term time.

Caprianna
Ah right. I thought it was a generic statement on if it takes too long then you're just not efficient.
Don't get me wrong there are some people like that.
One of DH's work friends complains she's working a 70 hour week. They had the same job. He'd get it done in 45-50 hours (par for the course in that line of work) ad shed be in all hours but he said that by the time she's gone for tea breaks, had a chat with people, sorted random stuff and generally been quite leisurely he reckons she must lose 1-2 hours a day.
He's of the view he'd rather work really hard 8-5/6 and then be off work. She takes it easy but does more hours and then complains.

just popped back to thank Maisiepops and dad onIce ..i really did not realise teachers were actually only effectively paid term time hours, i didnt want to start anything on MN...i genuinely did not know and now i do, so yes you guys are working well over what you are really paid for.
I have never argued you are not :)

Don't get me wrong, I've stayed late for work before - I also read & answer emails out of office hours, including when on leave.

However I am very lucky in that my line manager and boss make sure that everyone is only working their contracted hours. If you work say an hour late on a Friday night, they'll insist you go home early on the Monday.

Honestly it's a fantastic place to work, excellent holiday, pension, sick leave, support but the pay is less because of it, that's a trade off I'm willing to take.

My husband is much better paid than me but still only works his contracted hours as the norm.

I think there's a huge difference between people who work extra hours because they're in a caring profession and vulnerable people would suffer if they left on time. It's not right that they should be under that pressure, but I can understand why they feel they can't just leave.

But there are lots of jobs where managers or Chief Execs just have employees brainwashed into believing that they have some kind of obligation to stay late, work through lunch, be contactable at weekends etc.

Why? To make more money for the company.

That is unethical and exploiting staff. It's also detrimental to family and community life. There is nothing loser like about wanting to do a fair day's work for a fair day's pay and then go home to your kids or to coach the local football team or help out with the scouts or get involved with Am Dram or all the other meaningful things that used to be a normal part of life. Sitting under fluorescent lights in front of a screen until 8pm every night is a rather bleak way to live your life.

theredjellybean
No bother. Happy to explain.

I only get annoyed when see whiny anti-teacher threads by people who don't care about the facts

It's one of the reasons there's been a big issue with Durham TA in the news. They've always been paid their wage as X wage full time but only work term time. The wage is lower to reflect the fact they work only in term time. Now the councils are saying we want to slash you pay because you are being paid for not being in work (which is contractually true but the wage is lower to factor that in).
Say the pay is £12,000
Decent councils are saying 'what we'll do is raise the technical full time salary (say to £18,000) and then write your contracts as term time only so you have the same take home pay but the contract is neater & accurate'.
What durham council are doing is saying 'we pay you £12,000 and we want to cut you to £9,000 because you aren't in school in the holidays'.
And some goody idiots are all "yeah public services are stretched I can't believe these teaching assistants get paid for their holidays. They should have their pay cuy"
These are experienced colleagues who are amazing and who schools couldn't function without. They're increasingly specialised e.g. in my secondary we have specialist TA for hearing impairment, English as an additional language, autism, literacy etc.
But people who have a chip on their shoulder about school staff shout off about it

Dsis used to work in a team of 20 people. One person left, there was a freeze on recruitment so that person's tasks were shared out between everyone and it didn't have too much of an impact... However by the time that the 10th person was leaving and the work was still being shared out it was having a massive impact because people were having to do twice the amount of work. But because it had happened gradually it meant that each time they o ly needed to do a bit more and it would have been churlish to complain. When they did start complaining (probably about the time the 5th or 6th person left) hr and the management weren't bothered because they had coped so just said they must have been overstaffed before so tough. What they failed to get was that it had been a nice place to work, that there were busy times but people would all muck in and work long hours and then were able to recharge when it was less busy. It ended with everyone needing to work at those all in busy hours during the quiet times and then even more during the busy times, when they were all run down and doubly stressed and for many it wasn't physically possible to do all the time required. Then the bosses had the temerity to wonder why some of the events didn't run as smoothly as before or why things were forgotten or dropped or overlooked, occasionally causing real problems. It was also interesting that when one of them left they found the recruitment ban didn't extend to the senior staff. And none of them volunteered to take on any of the actual work or do anything useful to help in the situation. It ended up being a horrible place to work and dsis also left.

@user1485342611 But there are lots of jobs where managers or Chief Execs just have employees brainwashed into believing that they have some kind of obligation to stay late, work through lunch, be contactable at weekends etc.

Why? To make more money for the company.

I work for a commercial company, no noble aim whatsoever, but I have to say, my CEO works like a donkey. There is only me -> my boss -> CEO in my reporting line, so I am relatively senior too. But that guy?

Every week he will be flying off to Europe or America to support a big sales pitch; or flying to meet the various heads who report into him, or present at industry events etc etc. I have emailed him at all times of the day and night and got responses quickly. I don't begrudge him whatever he is paid because he works very hard for it - I wouldn't want his life!

So it's not all fat cats at the top in exec boardrooms.