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?

Was going to start a similar thread the other day. I was told off at work twice in the last month for leaving at 5.30. I've been there for about 6 weeks, and I was told no issue with my work, doing great, get everything done, very impressed but it 'looks bad' if I leave at 5.30.

Wow I really think I'm lucky! Where I work people work really hard but are militant about their hours. No one works five mins over and if it doesn't get done during contract time then management either sort it or bring in more staff too!

The problem is once a few start doing it!

If teacher starter salary = £22,467, & if they did work 35hrs x 39 wks, that's 1365 hrs, £16.45/hr.

It's a very unfair system. I used to leave on time when I was breastfeeding a baby and I would work bvery hard in the day. One of my children also a lawyer with no children might have a lunch break out and then get stuck into work from 3 to 8[m and then go out to meet friends sfrom work - dead easy to do that and nice to work late with no distractions if you are without small children. (She does usually work very hard all day too actually, I don't want to suggest she doesn't but you can see the difference between someone rushing home to collect a child from nursery or in our case the person who came to our house to look after 3 children under 4 we had at one stage when we both worked full time).

I work for myself and email has made a vast difference. A lot of my work can be done remotely. I might be here working at home when the 2 youngest children get home from school (teenagers) for a brief chat or grunt about their day and to get the washer on... then I can work whenever I like. I was at my desk Sunday 6am today doing work. I don't work shorter hours but I am my own boss and it is much nicer to suit me hours (I am a mornign person my qualiy of work is very good from about 6 or 7am to lunch time and then worse after wards and I need to be thinking about bed by 9 and in bed by 10 - other people work best late at night).

I certainliy accept in jobs like we do when plenty of people earn £100k plus if they are good you do the work that is required and sometimes you get the work because you are prepard to work on that deal all night. However if people always have to work really long hours without breaks com[panies should be hiring more staff. The only reason I adore law after over 30 years of practising it full time is because I work for myself and get the balance I need between sleep and other stuff. Mind you there is no much I prefer to practising law so those up against competing with me will find it pretty hard particularly when my children leave home later this year.

"f most people could work properly the whole day - no chats, no internet, etc, then they could leave at 5.30. I knew someone who did that - but because we get distracted (eg this thread!) we end up working late.."

This is naive and may apply to your workplace but not mine. I have no internet access for non work when at work, don't chat beyond enough to be civil, don't have lunch hour but until a recent team change was still working 50+ hours a week because there was no way to get it even halfway under control otherwise. We needed more people (or less paperwork) and the powers that be wouldn't budge on either.

I used to work the equivalent of 2 extra days per week over my paid hours. I did it for almost 10 years and then I decided "sod them, I have my own life to live!" I now note all the hours that I work and if I have worked too many, I leave early or arrive late to compensate, so I only work the hours I am paid to work for. If that means that I don't have time to finish some tasks, then either they just don't get done or they have to be modified so that they take less time, or we take on someone else to do them.

Its not a new thing though. First day in my first job 30 years ago I was taken aside by the partner in charge of my department and told that although the official hours were 9-5 he expected everyone in his department to work 8-6 as a minimum. In fact everyone worked more as we were expected to charge 7 hours a day to clients (in 6 minute intervals) so you had to do overtime to go to the loo, get a coffee, make up for all the 1 and 2 minute jobs you had to do, on top of the ridiculous workload.

Last firm I worked for my boss had also worked in the department I'd started out in. Every Tuesday without fail he looked at the headline figures off the previous weeks timesheets and went to have a chat with anyone who had done more than 10 hour overtime just to check they were OK and to find out if the firm could help. Often it was simply a case of a big deal closing so long hours being needed but he would usually insist they took sometime in lieu afterwards to get some r&r.

Guess which firm had better attendance figures as people took less time sick....

I've been an office assistant or secretary in all my jobs, always arrived ten minutes early, taken my full lunch, and left dead on time. I've been given the side eye a few times but if I've offered to help other people with their workload and been turned down and I've done my own work, why would I hang around? My current job is great tho, at least for my secretarial team, we all leave on time except in emergencies - however other admin staff and lawyers aren't so lucky unfortunately.
One job I had a few years ago, I would leave at 5 and so would a few non managerial staff - they were finished their work so why wouldn't they? And one manager in particular would shout out "part timer!" Or "thanks for dropping by!" But a few times over the years I stayed late for project work and this manager was gone by 5.20, every time. All the managers were aside from one lady who often stayed till 10. So the others would basically stay late to look good then fuck off as soon as all the juniors had gone.

If teacher starter salary = £22,467, & if they did work 35hrs x 39 wks, that's 1365 hrs, £16.45/hr.

I also have to contractually sign something that states I work an additional 195 hours over the 39 weeks for things such as meetings, reporting (written and verbal parents nights) and so on. So that's an extra 5 hours a week, on average, unpaid before the other unpaid work to complete my job. Bumping it up to, almost, 55 hours per week.

Then it's expected to stay for pta events such as quiz nights and discos. These may only be once a term but it's still extra time as you are expected to help set up and clear up.
Don't forget things like HMI/Ofstead inspections where I worked a full 14 days straight to prepare, 3 weeks in to a new school year in a new school because they expected everyone to have all docuements and tracking/monitoring/planning completed. This was 8-5 Monday to Friday for two weeks plus two weekends 9-4 when the school was open and we were expected to be in working.
Or the Christmas and summer fayres when I am expected to man a stall and give up a Saturday.
Or the outwards bounds trips when staff are expected to be on call 24/7.

Then there are my lovely holidays.
September weekend - spent the Friday planning, catching up on marking and doing my forward termly plans. Spent the Monday planning for the week ahead.
October week - spent two full days while DS was at exs preparing for parents night, planning for the next term, making resources and so on. Spent 2ish hours for 2 other nights doing usual planning.
Christmas - again spent about 3 days preparing for the new term, resources and forward termly planning. Then another few hours a night for 2 nights planning for the week ahead.
February weekend and Easter - you see the pattern.
Summer - probably a week spent either in the school cleaning and sorting classroom (especially if a class swap is required) along with basic prep for first term. Then another few hours towards the end of the holiday to actually plan the first week back.

So my usual working week is 35 hours contracted, 5 hours over and above unpaid and then another 10-15 for planning and marking that cannot be done in the 35 hour week. Roughly 50-55 a week.

So 55x39 = 2145 hours = £10.47 per hour. Which is what, £2 something over minimum wage.
Break it down by each child in the class and you're working towards meeting the needs of each individual child every day flr less than £1 per child per hour.

Then I work an extra 15 days or so during holidays and for other events (full days, hours here and there, attending events etc). This takes my working days from 195-210, reducing my paid annual leave from 40 to 25.

And then to add insult to injury where do you think the resources in your childs class comes from? The presents at christmas and the end of the year? The games? The resources for extra curricular clubs?

This may have derailed the thread but I'm sick of people assuming teachers do bugger all for a great wage.
Other professions work just as hard, if not harder than teachers, and I am fully appreciative of my time off knowing I can spend it with my child and not worry about childcsre etc. I chose this career and I am more than happy with it. But no one would turn around and make the same assumptions towards other careers.

Teachers work very hard indeed. I suspect a lot of them would be happier as London lawyers on £100k+ actually. Consider a career change. Law rocks!

Janet I did actually study law to begin with, got my LLB and then went back to teaching.

For me it isn't the uniformed salary opinions or the expected unpaid hours at work to complete the task or the "but all the holidays" comments that get me annoyed. It seems to be the total lack of support from some parents which reinforced this 'teachers are the devil/all the teachers fault' attitude.

But that's enough derailing of the thread from me.

I worked in an office like this. Contracted hour were 9am-5:30 but you were expected to be in at at least 8am, many opting for 6am. Training was mandatory and only done outside working hours.

Friday meetings were held at 5:30 and were often stupid drinking games or challenges that lasted till gone 6. If you left before that you would be reprimanded.

Lunch was 30 minutes and I actually ended up starting smoking again just so I wouldn't get crap for leaving my desk.

Bloody hated it. If you didn't come in earl etc you were deemed "a slacker" and swiftly a reason would be found for you to leave.

Being sales it was a mantra of "you get what you put in". So many cases of burn out, workplace bullying, drug dependency. Horrible. So glad I work for myself now.

Can't stand places that expect this. Everywhere I've worked there have been people who get in at 6am and leave at 8pm because they're workaholics, and I feel terribly sorry for their families. The worst culprit at my current workplace has two small children.

I have a healthy attitude, I think. I get in 15 minutes early to have a chat and make a coffee. I leave bang on time. I take my full lunch hour. I stay late or skip lunch if there's a deadline that requires it, and I leave early or come in late if I have a doctor's appointment or something. My manager is on board with that and I would leave if he wasn't.

Life's really too short for presenteeism bullshit.

(well sail we don't all think like that. My children's teachers are mostly been wonderful and we are grateful to them every day. My mother (teacher) even when she was past retirement age would have ex pupils coming up to her in the streets saying they remembered her teaching them when they were six and how much they'd like it which is lovely. Perhaps everyone should thank a teacher this week)

On long hours it does depend on the job. Surgeons cannot leave operations mid way nor barristers leave court if something over runs. I do think in general people assume their employer will always appreciate what they do when really it's loyalty to yourself and building up brand you that tends to keep you in good stead. Employers have random redundancies or simple unfair preferences for person x over y and just because you work longer hours does not mean yo'll always do better than someone else. In fact too many women think that is the key whereas 50% of success can be going on about how good you are to other people in the company - not something a lot of us find easy, rather than just doing the good work.)

Thank you janet. I know not all parents feel that way but reflecting on my childhood when almost all parents sided with the teacher to now where a lot of parents accuse the teacher it can be quite disheartening.

So glad I'm a freelancer working from home now - so I choose my own hours.

Used to be a reporter at a local daily newspaper ( I won't mention the tiny salary as you'd probably die laughing) and the looks you got if you had the cheek to leave when your shift officially ended. Horrible.

I knew I had to get out when I was due to finish at 5pm one day and they had put me down in the diary to attend a press conference starting at 5pm. I just said no I'm not doing that and the news ed huffed and puffed and changed it. Handed my notice in a few weeks later.

(It does annoy me when parents always just blame the school. having a mother who was a teacher and my children's father is one probably makes me see the school side too but even so I still think as a matter of principle we should support the school over our own child much more often than parents tend to do. We can help at home - if my teenagers ssay XYZ teacher didn't mark this work or was late or didn't show up - I will often saying something like they are only human or they might have a row at home with the wife or just been sick of you lot, cut them some slack (and my boys are very nice to their teachers by the way as far as I know)) on hours and teaching my chidlren's father was head of department and they finished (ex boarding school) at 6pm every night and then as he did music there were almost always after school music things and before school even and Saturday school and then because pay was low he would do a 4 week summer camp in the summer holidays. Then to add insult to injury one year the head said he would not give him a pay rise because his wife (I) earned too much and it was harder for him to get home from school on time to collect our children because of being a male teacher (even though my husband was the one who had to be home first as I was commuting an hour to work). That sexism against male teachers with small children responsibilities may not arise so much nowadays however.

@CharlieSierra

You're 'disappointed by the work ethic' of someone who is at work for the correct number of hours?

Wow.

If you want staff to be in earlier then extend the hours in the contract and pay them more for the extra time.

Gosh, there are some extreme attitudes on this thread! I take my hat off to teachers in particular - not least because I'd find teaching a bunch of kids utterly impossible let alone the paperwork.

Presenteeism in my industry (law) is far less of an expectation now than 30 years ago when I started out. The worst was when my asshole boss tore a strip off me for not leaving precise contact details when I went on holiday for two weeks: this in the days before email and mobile phones. I think he honestly thought I'd give him the "facsimile transmission" and phone numbers for each of the several hotels we were staying in (and paying no attention to the five hour time difference either).

Nowadays there's an expectation that you will put in a reasonable number of chargeable hours, usually between 4 and 6, depending on your role, plus additional non-chargeable work of one sort or another. You're rightly expected to pull out the stops if a client needs urgent work, but long hours for the sake of them are actively discouraged.

Two senior people in the team I manage are awful time-managers. I've been mentoring both of them to try to reduce the time in the office (they are often working at 9 or 10 at night but their output doesn't hit the modest chargeable hours targets). In one case the answer is to hire in additional resources to deal with admin tasks; in the other it's really about managing workload effectively and using technology properly ( they're a bit of a "smartphone, what's that" type which means they do things inefficiently and basically waste their own time).

On the other hand I did have to have a tricky conversation with a junior lawyer who is very keen to leave on time every day (and is entitled to do so, of course, unless there's a pressing reason to stay), when she took a call from a client cancelling a hugely inconvenient meeting and then trotted off home without taking the 30 seconds, if that, to tell me. She knew that the meeting was incredibly inconvenient for herself as well as me and that we were both juggling work and home commitments to make it - not telling me straight away was plain inconsiderate and clock watchy.

Chilled I think that he should work the correct number of hours, I've just noticed he's not into give and take. Since he leaves on the dot of 4.50 if he arrives (walks through the door) at 8.50, I'm not going to be so inclined to flexibility either. It cuts both ways.

I'm a rural surveyor, I've made a rod for my own back by working long hours and never taking lunch breaks. My contract is written in hours "or as necessary". I often arrange 9am meetings 3+ hours travel from home to "lengthen" my working day and I have climbed the greasy pole and got promoted through surviving on minimal sleep, neglecting aspects of my personal life in favour of work.

Now We're looking for my replacement for mat leave, my boss has realised that my client work equates to 8.5days work in my five day week and needs to recruit a full time associate and a full time graduate to replace me.

My aim until mat leave is to only get in an hour early, take a good lunch and leave on time.