I was talking to someone recently who mentioned how many of his friends were disenchanted with work, including some who had decided to resign rather than grin and bear it.
In discussing the possible explanations, one of them was the downside of being connected all the time through the Web, e-mail and smartphones. It means people are working longer and harder – and working even when they’re not at work during “working hours”.
In a sense, many people are working all the time – a situation exacerbated by the current economic climate in which employees are being asked to do even more as companies reduce costs.
The question is whether “all work, all the time” is just the way it is these days. In a wired world with the ability to be connected pretty much anywhere, can you ever escape work? If not, what does that do for your personal/family life, and work/life balance?
Here’s a few more scenarios to fuel discussion:
- A friend of mine told me when he goes on vacation, he works from 7 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. every day. Then, he turns off the computer and Blackberry until 7 a.m the next morning.
- A colleague told me his boss has recently said there’s no need to respond to e-mail after 8 p.m.
- Chris Brogan, a social media consultant, recently sent a newsletter that included a snapshot of a “typical day”, which suggests he works 12 to 14 hour days.
- Amber Naslund, a community manager with a social media analytics company, said she works 10 to 12 hour days, including nights and weekends.
While I’m probably as bad anyone who works within the Web, I have been spending a lot of time thinking about the dangers of being unable to digitally disconnect.
I look at many people who active on Twitter from early morning to late at night, and wonder whether this is unhealthy, or simply the way it works these days.
I wonder about a world in which it’s difficult, if not impossible, to not be connected; a world where Twitter has to be constantly monitored, and replies to e-mail done ASAP.
More food for thought: check out this video in which Renny Gleeson talks about the “culture of availability”
Love the recumbent biker messaging during his ride – yikes!
Interesting post, and something we're definitely hearing a lot about these days. I definitely fall on the side of the probably-over-connected, and I fully admit that my kids get annoyed with me at times. But for me, as a newly-LLC'd consultant working as a digital nomad using purely my own intellectual property and my netbook, it's not a downside at all – it's pure joy for my work. And it took a long time to find that true career calling after a host of 9-t0-5 drudgery-filled jobs. In terms of daily process, I find myself in the car and in meetings for hours each day – and while that is part of working, being able to monitor Twitter and reply to emails at midnight is a luxury I now refuse to live without. I also think these tools have allowed me to meet many more fascinating people and experience really cool things in real life that I never would have before. So my advice to those people who are disenchanted with work is, don't complain about working too many hours – find something you love so much that it's not work, it's life. And that's a lesson to my kids too.
I don't think it's a matter of what's healthy but more a matter of what is necessary. For someone like Amber, being available and ready to act at anytime is a part of the job. The internet never shuts down and if you aren't available to do the job, somebody else will be.
One of the reasons why I packed in my job at 50 in a telecommunications company, these meetings with everyone working away under the table, presentations with people flown in from all over the world, only to see the main people being addressed busy clicking away under the table, not paying attention to anything. These are very useful tools, but we are going mad as a society these days, and huge decisions are being made by multitaskers who don't know how to think deeply about anything anymore.
Since I changed job earlier this year, I've made a deliberate effort to separate work and non-work rather better, e.g. I now have two phones, work one with just my work email and personal one with just my personal email and I (try to!) ration how much I look at the work one when not in work.
But the biggest challenge I find isn't technical – it's about reading and learning. I like doing both, but the line between reading and learning for fun and to be my job better is very thin. Even if I'm at home dutifully not looking at my work phone, it's easy to be reading something online and think "That would make a good post on our work blog".
Switching off a piece of technology is much easier than switching off your brain from work, at least for me.
Nice post Mark. I agree that people are working longer because of being always connected through the web and mobile devices such as the iPhone and BlackBerry.
This is one of the biggest reasons why I still don't have a smart phone. I'm considering getting one later this year but worry that it may take away from my personal life while I'm outside my condo office at conferences, meet ups, sporting events, dinner, etc.
Mark – I read a book that changed my life about 2 years ago. Tim Ferriss "The Four Hour Work Week". It completely changed the way I think about work, and I'm always someone who valued the work-life balance.
I highly recommend reading this book. It's just one of those things. A top 5 book in my life.
I think that folks who work with tech ARE connected all the time by necessity. Those are the people who need to keep monitoring Twitter and responding to e-mail immediately. But the folks who aren't in tech have no "need" to do this and don't. People don't expect it from them, either. As someone who works in tech, I think they're lucky.
My "work" day starts when I wake up and ends when I go to sleep. I take lots of breaks in between, but I'm very connected and, thus, find myself working a lot more than I probably should.
I haven't read "The Four Hour Work Week" that Chris mentioned, but someone recommended it to my husband and I'll read it when he's done.