Today was supposed to be a half day for me. Out of the office by 12:30 pm. By the time I made it to 12:30, I had already worked 2 hours of overtime (I am salaried, so I don’t get paid extra for extra hours of work), and yet I had to stick around for another 2 1/2 hours to complete tasks and attend meetings. So – even though I used a half day of my own personal time to get out at 12:30 pm, I actually didn’t leave the building until 3:15 pm and, at that point, I had accumulated 44 hours of work for the week. You would think that my boss would say – “oh hey! since you already worked over your 40 hours this week, why don’t you give that 4 hours of personal time back to use another day?”, but my boss is remote so she did not say that. In fact, she scheduled me for a call at 2:30 pm – on a day when she knew that I was supposed to leave at 12:30 pm.
Now – I understand that working extra hours shows you are committed. I get that my place of business, much like many other places of business in America, values employees that will work many extra hours without complaint. The businesses do not value the worker’s actual output or our health, but we are expected to value our employers enough to give extra time from our week to them for the ‘common good’. This falls into the robot category. Robots might not be able to dance, but they can certainly work overtime without complaint. So, if we, as humans, complain about working a few extra hours per week they make us feel guilty about it. It doesn’t matter that we end up working more than the vacation time that they pay us to take.
That’s right – if you work just 5 hours per week ‘extra’ you are essentially giving your employer 6.5 weeks of your personal time back over the course of the year. So – for those of us that only get 2 or 3 weeks of vacation a year, we are giving them back twice that in unpaid overtime. Think about that the next time your work is piled up and you think, “I’ll just stay 2 hours tonight to get caught up”, because two things:
- you will NEVER get caught up
- your employer doesn’t care if you work overtime – they aren’t paying attention – they only pay attention when you want to cut out an hour early to go to a doctor’s appointment and you don’t line up the time to make up that hour – even when you have already worked 4 hours in the week of overtime – none of that matters – this is most especially true if your supervisor is remote – remote supervisors do not see you on a daily basis and do not realize you are staying late – even when they see emails come through after hours – even when they see you closing tickets after hours – even when they call and talk to you after hours – even when they see the green dot lit up on your IM after hours – none of these things are triggers – they will use you until you are used up.
So – what is the solution to this? I want this space on the interweb to be a place to vent about the issues we face in tech, but I ALSO want it to be a space where we try to come up with solutions to these issues. For we are not robots and we can think creatively and sing and dance and do all the things that humans do and problem-solving is one of those non-robot things that we can accomplish.
My thoughts on a solution are as follows:
- Stop giving so much of yourself to this company that gives very little in return – yes you get a paycheck but pay without integrity is meaningless. Sure it pays the bills, but what do our souls feel like on a Friday afternoon when we are still chained to our desks and our bosses do not seem to notice.
- Go into work and leave on time EVERY SINGLE DAY. This is non-negotiable. Stop staying even 5 minutes longer than the 9 hours of time that you are already in the building on a daily basis. You are not going to be rewarded for working overtime through more pay, so what is the point of staying? As I mentioned above – you will NEVER GET CAUGHT UP – so don’t give any of your precious time to the company beyond the 40 hours they are owed.
- Start looking for a new job for real. Don’t just look around and then chicken out when it gets too difficult to actually follow through on applications. Get your shit together and get a job in your chosen field.
- Take classes to bulk up the resume. Get certified in things that will help get a better job where you are valued as an individual contributor rather than just a cog in the customer service machine.
- Stop caring. Keep being an excellent employee, but don’t take the work personally. Disconnect from the personal elements of customer service and start being more of a robot. You can still dance and sing and think on your own, but treat your work the same way a robot would (minus the nonstop work). Do what you are ‘programmed’ to do and no more than that.
- Take care your yourself. You only have so many years to live on this crazy planet and if you are not well you cannot enjoy it. Be sure to take time for yourself whenever possible and always take lunch breaks. Stop eating at your desk, even if you are watching youtube. Get out of the office as much as possible and go read a book at the nearest coffee shop during your lunch break. Or spend time in the library. Or walk around the mall – or the park. Don’t give that hour to the company as well because work creeps in even when you are trying to ‘relax’ at your desk.
What are YOUR solutions? Do you have other things that you do for self-care at work? Do you have limits to what you will do for your employer? Do you need to make changes to improve your situation? Tell me about it in the comments!
Peace,
Chantale
