It is not easy trying to get things done during this period. People are clearing leave and the organisation is at doe what half strength, and yet productivity is expected to be up there. Expectations are growing and time is getting limited.
Bottom line is how much is enough? Are we expected to work 44hrs a week or do 44hrs worth of work a week. The two options are a huge world of difference.
Making people work 44hrs can lead to 2 scenarios,
1. The employee slacks during the 44hrs and gives a low output but still bring home same pay.
2. The organisation maximises the use of the employee and forces them to churn out work worth more than 44hrs in 44hrs. Organisation profits in terms of productivity, but socially it's kills the people. It kills me. The stress adds to frustrations and it becomes easy to snap and all sorts of things. A whole myriad of negative consequences are possible because of this sort of work culture.
In name, many organisations are moving towards promoting work life balance, flexible work timings, etc. I see many of these cases are just that, only in name. Because in actual fact, the organisations are still shoving like 60hrs worth of work into 44hrs.
The first step to real work life balance, work time flexibility is to be able to identify in your work scope, what constitutes work that can be completed in 44hrs in a normal pace with the regular breaks in between. Only when that baseline is established can employees empower themselves. Employees will then be able to judge more effectively what is over time, how to make the time spent flexible.
But big question here is, who is so free to go and set out the base line work rate for each job? HR will not do it, because it takes away the grey area which allows the organisation to overwork you, and blame you for inefficiency. As an individual stuck in the vicious cycle of clearing work day after day, I don't see much opportunity or time gap available to do this.
~We are riding a sinking ship and we are bailing water by removing and using the very planks that form the ship.~
社会的脚步日渐加快。
我是否该迎头赶上，还是该豁达地坚持自己的脚步？
到最后是追赶的努力赞许，还因为追不上被遗忘？
在盲目追赶的同时，是否也忽略了人生其他的美好？
我想选择昂首阔步，自行自乐，享受每一个小确幸。
社会能否容许我散漫的步伐？
~ no one is good at juggling many things at a time. You start off with one and get good at it before slowly adding the rest. It takes time n hard work. ~ Cat Grant, Supergirl