Flexible timing or late sittings

Society Business and Career
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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

^ No hope for smaller companies. Lets see and hope that things change there too with the passage of time.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

Flexible hours is a cause near and dear to my heart...

My staff services clients who have real-time queries that must be answered while the financial markets are open (Toronto and NY).

They are welcome to in as early as they want or stay as late as they want so long as they are present during the market hours and their weekly working hours total 37.5 hours (this includes 2 15-minute breaks, but not the 1-hour lunch they take.

I have some people who come in at 7:30am and leave at 4:00pm and others who come in at 9:00 and leave at 6:00pm (this particular staff member leaves early 2 days a week).

My concern is that the clients receive timely service and that each person is doing the job they were hired to do and to work the hours they were hired to work.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

^ Sehrysh, this happens in the civilized world .. Flexible hours is a very different concept .. its not considered as working long hours .. coz people are either complete their legal hours of work though they may be working shifts as per the business needs.

but with long, unsolicited working hours, like what Ali explained in the previous posts, people dont even get paid for additional hours, the duty hours arent set ! they are just expected to sit around and work endlessly without any reward... and they are still making meagre salaries .. that is what exploitation is ..

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Can i say something in favor of working long hours please? :sid:

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^ yes do..

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I have been working in this organization since past 03 years. We always had fixed working hours. In Jun, 2012 a new boss took over our department and since then we have no fixed time of leaving office. I had arguments with him on this topic several times but he doesn't listen. He has issued orders that we(group of 8-10 main core people) have to intimate him before leaving the office. What the HELL!!!!

It is a Govt Organization in Pak. I agree it doesn't work as other govt org in pak do. It is one of the best place to work if you want to be in govt job.

Moreover, We had a policy issued by govt that if an employee works 2 hours post office closing hours he is entitled to come 2 hours late valid for an year. For this we had an operating procedure defined. Unfortunately, he doesn't let us follow that procedure by which we can gather those flexi hours and just want us to work as a donkey.

Junior managers have learned this from him and they don't let their subordinates leave too.

This is ruining our work environment and employees are getting frustrated.

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This face time bull has to end, while u can't abuse flex times, the clock watching mgmt types or worse colleagues really annoy me. At Citicorp one of the VPs stood at the door at 8:30 every so often to see who comes in after that, even though markets did not open till later. I got in around 8:40 two days in a row and he said, advantage of coming in late is that I will open the door for you, I was annoyed and responded, ..would be great if someone can open the door for me when I leave at 7:30 pm too. Shut him up.

Someone made comments to my wife that oh you are leaving early etc a few times, and she just told her colleague, I'm glad you keep track of my timings, I can always use you as an alibi.

Anyways that being said, much of biz world is around perceptions and relationships in addition to performance. So try to meet organizational norms, change them if you must or find a new place. it can be hard to change bosses' personalities and preferences.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

There are two genuine( and according to my opinion logical) reasons behind late sittings. 1) You want to shorten your learning curve 2) Your skill level isn't enough for you to do the job properly in the given time. Staying late because your boss shows up late etc is lame and not productive. As long as you are getting something out of it (experience, additional skills etc) even if its not monetary reward, is fine.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

I think productivity level in late hours is very low and that also affects your next day. The one who came up with the idea of 40 working hours in a week, must have reasons behind that. I agree with the idea of spend extra hours for learning new things, but in majority of the cases (especially here in Pakistan), reason behind your working late hours is staff shortage.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

I totally agree! What I have observed is that old aged bosses are more likely to spend more time in office and hence expect the subs to be in office too. They are usually done with their families and initial life issues and then they don't understand others need.

31

Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

Actually I do not agree with the approach that late hours can contribute in any manner in learning or completing a task for which regular hours are not enough.

If I had an employee doing this I would seriously question their calibre and learning ability. Like I said occasionally sitting out on a project is fine, that is acceptable ..

But if an employee has made a habit of sitting late for what ever reason, I dont think its healthy for them or the business. Infact a business appreciates those employees alot more who manage to get the job done quicker and smarter, hence why such people are highly wanted in any business and see quick progression in their career ..

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

CB- I agree with what you just noted but the missing piece is whether the workload on an individual is reasonable or not.

I think the late hours in investment banking or consulting etc as a ritual of passage is idiotic, and the whole commitment to work is asinine. Give people a work life balance, manage the workload properly, and unleash them to rock the business.

The citicorp team I was with had almost a 90% turnover in 2 years. when I left and had an exit interview they asked my reasons for leaving and I said plainly that the expected workload is ridiculous and that expecting everyone to put in 60 hours a weak may look good for EBIDTA, but basically is showing that either have wrong ppl in the roles and are pulling productivity down and everyone else has to put in extra hours to keep the things going, or that the business is being cheap and saving massively on resource costs. I honestly believe that and have despised the hours for the sake of hours, or long term long hours due to workload. temporary for a project, go live date, resource constraints etc is fine but not when it is the culture.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

Completely agreed X2.. i think the problem begins when businesses think they can get away with such behaviour .. in which case not just one or two but almost much of the staff will be sitting late and working their heads off till the last minute ! that , coupled with high turnover , definitely indicates the management's intentions !

Unfortunately most of us get exploited in the initial few years of career building .. the exact thing you mentioned, I realized only after my 3rd job ! before then I always thought, I am learning and should be thankful for the opportunity etc etc .. but soon found out it was all crap.. management trying to get us to work over unmanageable workload , day after day .. the breakdown happens soon and then the same management doesnt want you, they want fresh blood for senior roles !!!

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

Unemployment is another reason of late sitting people stay in office for late hours to make bosses happy so that thier job will be secure.
on the other hand, due to age of competetion, business process has become norm to set hard targets, unrealistic deadlines.

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

Ajaz, this only happens in third world countries that people think sitting late will make the bosses happy.. eventually the focus should be on productivity rather then the timings that a person sits at work .. because majority people have started doing this , i.e sitting late for no other reason then to make the boss happy .. now the management expects that out of everyone !

I seriously believe this practice should be shunned and discouraged. Its not healthy for the business , nor for the employee

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

I sort of agree to some of the comments which suggests that late sitting shouldn't be a norm but employers are not to be blamed entirely. For example, when I post a job on any of the portals (rozee, mustakbil etc) the maximum number of replies are received on a Monday between 9 AM to 11 AM which is supposed to be the start of the work week. You don't like your current employer and want to switch, apply in your own time and not using the company's resources. Every time some one takes a short leave for some 'zaroori kaam' its for an interview scheduled at some place else.

Anyways, if the complete process is followed by the book, there won't be any need for late sittings. Though I still disagree on the point that if you work beyond 40 hours per week, the productivity is lower etc. (don't kill me please :@:)

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If i am quite happy with my current employer I would not switch a job for smaller raise. I personally would prefer a good working environment over 5k to 10k salery raise.
poeple are not happy with employers for a lot of reasons and as an employer you must know all those but didnt mention here :D

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Re: Flexible timing or late sittings

I wasn’t talking about my employees :snooty: I was talking about people applying for a job in my company.