January 14, 2008 at 5:55 am
I am wondering how many hours a week you are expected to work? I have only worked at 2 different companies as a salary paid employee and am wondering what most employers expect.
My first employer didn't seem to expect me to work more than 40 hours a week unless absolutely necessary and usually there was not a need.
My second employer has always seemed to expect me to work more than 40 hours a week even though officially they only say 40 hours a week (at least that is what I was told 7 or so years ago).
What I don't get is that if officially you are only required to work 40 hours a week then why expect more? And if employers really want you to work more than 40 hours a week why not just say you get paid salary and we expect you to work 45 hours a week?
I guess from their point of view I am an underachiever since I very often work just the 40 hours and nothing more. From my point of view I am only working to maintain my family and if I could support me and my children without having to work then I would. My family comes first. So, since they are paying me enough to support my family I really don't care if others get better raises than me.
So, I am curious, where you work does your employer expect you to work more than 40 hours a week? I'm basically wondering if this is simply part of being in the technology sector as a SQL Server Programmer (which previous managers have implied that it is) or if the majority of employers only expect you to work 40 hours and don't care if you work more or not.
Robert W. Marda
Billing and OSS Specialist - SQL Programmer
MCL Systems
January 14, 2008 at 6:08 am
We're only supposed to work 40 hours a week too, but we're also on call. I worked a good two-three hours this weekend because of some problems in production. It's no big deal, but it's always there. I'm like you, I try very hard to stick to only 40 hours/week. Luckily my boss is very good with it. It's a choice. Live to work or work to live? How much do you want to grow your career within the company? Personally, I'd rather have a little more time at home at a slightly lower salary than an extra $1000 or two but I don't have time to go to karate or take the scouts on hikes.
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January 14, 2008 at 6:25 am
I forgot about that. Yes I am on call too and had to work 40 minutes from home this past Saturday. The thing is officially the time you work at home due to a failure or something doesn't really count towards your 40 hours. The 40+ hours I am expected to work is to be completed while at the office.
Its only in the past 2 years that management has begun letting us work from home sometimes but it is generally only if there is a need such as one of my children being sick or a doctor or dentist appt. But on a regular basis they will not.
Robert W. Marda
Billing and OSS Specialist - SQL Programmer
MCL Systems
January 14, 2008 at 6:30 am
Yeah, our company is weird about working from home too. I'm doing it today because a ton of snow was dumped on us. As much as I like my job, I just don't see any reason to risk life & limb getting there. I'm working remotely, but I know it causes problems when my chair is empty.
Our on call time is not counted toward the 40 hours either. Still, it's better than the days of the dot come when they honestly expected us to put in 60-80 hour weeks if there was enough work or not.
"The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
- Theodore Roosevelt
Author of:
SQL Server Execution Plans
SQL Server Query Performance Tuning
January 14, 2008 at 6:37 am
I'm lucky enough to be in a company that requires the 40 hours per week, but no on-call time. Where I used to work, 40 hours was the base, but there were some 50 hour weeks and that jumped to 60 hours when a huge implementation took place. On top of that, we were on-call 24/7.
Having been there and done that, I now know that if a company wants me to be on call 24/7 like that, they'll definitely have to compensate me well to make it worth my while.
January 14, 2008 at 6:46 am
Some employers expect more than 40 per week, but with poor reason.
The 40-hour week isn't arbitrary. If you look at the history on it, extensive experimentation and study have found that any job with any intellectual requirement (i.e., anything that isn't unskilled manual labor), if done more than about 40 hours per week, actually results in reduced productivity compared to a 40-hour week. Before the studies on that, the standard was anywhere from 60 to 90 hours per week (mid-late 1800s).
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January 14, 2008 at 9:01 am
I work 48+ hours a week. How? I do 8 hours shift Monday to Saturday. And sometimes I am on call on Sundays too. 8 hours is just on papers, it usually get stretched to 9 or even 10 hours a day.
January 14, 2008 at 10:28 am
It depends on the culture of the organization. Some places I've worked, I've been the only SQL Server guy, so I'm the guy in the office at 8 PM on Saturday trying to fix replication. Other places have prided themselves on being Type-A shops, where all-nighters are frequent, and that was my bad for not seeing that up front. Since then, I have avoided places that have a rep as sweatshops. Another poster made a good point about management expecting you to be there whether it's really necessary to the task or not. By having all their troops lined up smartly in formation, they might be showing their management what good leaders they are, and it might figure in their bonus, but it likely won't affect yours at all.
January 14, 2008 at 12:39 pm
I had worked for 8 companies, I always worked over 40 hours in each company. My manager in one company hinted me that everyone worked over 40 hours on my first day.
One company I worked for had a big project to implement, the management told people that they could not take vacation, even had to work during national holidays. I put in 60 hours a week for that project, thank God, it lasted only for 3 months.
Last company I worked for had three locations - New York, California and Chicago. I worked at New York. The people in Chicago and California were not very considerate since they already scheduled meeting at 4:00pm eastern time. My boss was at central time zone and he always called me at 4:30pm to give me something to do. Therefore I always had to work over 40 hours. I worked from 10 to 14 hours a day.
I found out one thing the more hours I put in, the company expected me to put in more !!!!!
January 25, 2008 at 5:28 am
I keep telling my HR mgr/Technical leads and others concerned (who decide the salary hikes) its not the number of hours but quality of work that counts.... but who listens...
"Keep Trying"
January 25, 2008 at 6:33 am
I've always asked what the hours are and what's expected. Someone should formally admit to what they want. Anyone that "hints" at more than what they'll officially say is being slimy or deceitful and I'd be thinking of looking for other employment at some point.
I work 7 days a week, all hours of the day and night, but I work from home and probably work around 40 hours, but spread out in 2-3 hour chunks. That works well from me, though me wife thinks I have problems since I rarely take days off 😉
40-45 is been my career average though there are definitely stretches of a month or so where I'd up that to meet a deadline. Beyond a couple of months, I think working 60 hours a week is counter productive.
January 25, 2008 at 6:37 am
Oh and I'd also add that for those of you that work more than 40, how much of that is because you're a driven person, looking to push your career or just feel pressure to work more. I know I'm in that camp. I bet your boss thinks you work harder than you need to.
However I'm also a project based, get things done person. If work is done, I have no problem leaving off at 35 hours some weeks.
January 25, 2008 at 9:25 am
I tend to be a contractor more than a permanent employer because I got tired of working more than 40 hours per week and not getting compensated for it.
I like to maintain work/life balance and my time off is important to me. Just working an hour or so over each day cuts into my off-work activities.
As a contractor, most clients like me to stay with 40 hours per week (to stay on budget), unless of course it is crunch-time to meet a deadline, and extra time is required (and I understand that need). The good thing about getting paid hourly, I get paid for every minute I am at work and that is important to me. I used to work a job where I regularly put in 70+ hour weeks (out of necessity) and never got anything extra for it. I began to resent my employer because I had no personal life and eventually left the company. They didn't care...they would just hire someone else to fill the slot...turnover was extremely high and that was status quo.
My take is that sometimes some extra time is required to meet deadlines, solve critical problems, etc., but if my job requires more than 40 hours per week on an ongoing basis month after month, then I have too many responsibilities, or someone planned poorly. My experience as a salaried employee was that my employers would work me as many hours as I let them.
Like everything else, it is a personal choice. If you need to put in lots of hours to 'get ahead' at your company, that is your choice. Life is too short to work all the time and being the 'big cheese' at my job is not important to me if it means long hours at work.
If it was easy, everybody would be doing it!;)
February 13, 2008 at 8:28 am
I always thought that the hours per week I stay at work must not be a trully mesure for my job but It seems like HR has no other way
Regards Ramon
February 13, 2008 at 8:41 am
I tried knocking off early the other day by using the "I've done 8 hours worth of work already today". Of course - it was noon, so my manager didn't go for it....
Hey - can't fault a man for trying....:D
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Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again?
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