Out by 5
Scott Adams, creator of the inimitable Dilbert, once put on his management-guru hat and propounded a philosophy called “Out by 5.”
The idea was that each person has only so many useful work hours in a day. A company that sticks strictly to 9-to-5 is likely to be more productive, in reality, than one which demands long hours.
Looking around, it’s obvious that the world has chosen longer days. School events and meetings start at 7 because that’s when parents get back from work. People work on weekends and take their iPhones and Blackberries everywhere so they can keep working.
The problem is, many of us end up producing work that looks as though we’re exhausted and fatigued… because most of us are. And, as Adams pointed out, much of this is pointless.
When I was a full-time survey guy working with a medium-duty (as in “more than five full-time employees”) survey firm, I discovered (I should say “rediscovered” because my boss, a very seasoned survey guy, already knew it) that the more rushed I was, the more mistakes I made – even given higher work output.
Simply put, the easy way to screw up in my field, and I suspect in most others, is to work too hurriedly or too long. Fatigue and rushing cause mistakes. Those mistakes end up costing much more time so you end up worse off than you would have been had you simply been willing to miss the odd deadline. What’s more, clients tend to forget a one or two day delay, but they remember when their bonuses are handed out based on bad numbers. You can do a lot of harm trying to meet a deadline.
With Chrysler trying to overhaul its entire product line despite a decimated engineering staff, having lost far too many people under Daimler and then under Cerberus, with many of the old-time experts having resigned, retired, or been pushed out, I wonder how many mistakes will be made because of that.
What’s kind of interesting is that a strict seven hour day would do quite a bit for the world in general. Let’s face it, people have been far too productive for the last century. We just don’t have enough work for everyone and we have not had it for quite a while. It’s a shame that our workaholism is being echoed by Asian nations, because their increased production will continue to demolish our economy, when it really doesn’t have to. China could move from its economic-war footing to a welfare-of-its-citizens footing, imposing a short work day and distributing work more evenly across a larger portion of its population, given its oligarchical government and government-owned companies. It won’t, but it could. That would relieve our economy of some of its strain, and maybe we could even do the same. Hey, why not go nuts and make it a prerequisite to free trade? Along with not using child labor, having some common safety rules, and the like? It would certainly help us to maintain our way of life a lot longer, and if we are to fall to China’s new empire, at least it would be a gentle fall. (I’d rather fall like England than like Rome.)
What’s more, I suspect that shorter hours would result in higher quality of life for everyone. Think about a Microsoft that didn’t demand crazy schedules – the programmers, freed of fatigue, could be more creative and more inspired. Think of cable boxes that did our bidding, intelligently! Think of routers that didn’t crash! Web sites that worked and made sense! And all the other things that fresh minds can do, but overworked minds often can’t.
Well, it’s a thought, anyway. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have surveys to attend to before the deadline comes up.