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Intersting Article about Tech Job Vs. Life, Enjoy! Opinions are welcome

Thanks for the link Dale. Coming from the dealership world, it's mostly frowned upon if you're not putting in at least 10 hours a way. Managers will schedule you on a busy weekday to leave at 5, knowing your a fool if you leave.

Work any less that 50 hours and you're a "part timer". Work efficiency and effectively while your at work and it shouldn't matter (within reason) when you leave work.

I've seen dealers that would hire young single, knowing they could work more hours.

I have 2 kids and I enjoy going home to. I have a life and a family. As much as I love work, I have other responsibilities to help take care of. In many positions today work doesn't leave you. You might place it in your pocket for an hour or so but it never completely leaves you.

Who else here has been called a "Part Timer" for leaving the job early?
 
Who else here has been called a "Part Timer" for leaving the job early?

I get called a part-timer all the time for leaving when I get off & I have no interactions with customers so it isn't like I'm missing any opportunities if I head out. Also, I'm pretty sure most people here think I don't do anything at all during the day since I'm "the computer guy" and I don't actually sell cars. Quite honestly, I do work at home as well since I can work in an environment that is most suitable to my productivity. At work, I'm required to work in someone else's definition of a 'productive environment' which I don't fully agree with.

I like this from the article:

"Ultimately, I think the measure of our work is in our productivity, not the number of hours we put in."

I wish my current work environment embraced this outlook. I'm expected to get to an office and sit for 8+ hours doing something that I could easily do in a library and be more productive since I wouldn't have any distractions (phones ringing, people asking me to fix their printers, salespeople asking questions, etc.). I understand I live in the retail world, but I don't think this is the ideal environment for productivity for someone that doesn't interact with customers.

Love this video from 37signals founder Jason Fried about "Why Work Doesn't Happen At Work":



Am I alone or out of line with these thoughts?
 
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From a vendors perspective it is a must that we have someone here constantly to answer support/maintenance calls when you support 1,800 customers on a daily basis. We have no choice but to be readily available and prepared! I feel that if people see a trend of upper management personnel/upper support personnel, leaving early it sets a terrible trend for any business. Although it happens way to often everywhere. @Sweece -- that comment about the measure of work being in the productivity of what is being done, i think hits the nail right on the head!

Thanks for the feedback guys!
 
You're not alone Kyle. When I was Director Of Marketing and sitting at my main office at the dealership, it was difficult to get anything done. Phone calls (unimportant), people coming asking if I could fix something (Really?) and all the day to day distractions that happen at the typical dealership that prevents even sales people from being productive.
 
This reminds me of how things have changed, for the better in my opinion, in our industry. When I first started selling cars in 1978 I was told that I was on the "B" shift, you'll be here when we open and you'll be here when we close. Thats the way it was back then. The long hours and the grind of our biz was something that I learned at a very early age. That doesnt make it right. I still work more hours than I should. But just because I do it does not mean that I expect my sales staff to do it. Our guys are scheduled 45 hours a week, most work a bit more than that, but we do not guilt trip them for taking their time off. I feel I probably would not hire too many good people these days if the interview included the "B shift" speech that I got. So, Cheers to forward progress!
 
You're not alone Kyle. When I was Director Of Marketing and sitting at my main office at the dealership, it was difficult to get anything done. Phone calls (unimportant), people coming asking if I could fix something (Really?) and all the day to day distractions that happen at the typical dealership that prevents even sales people from being productive.
Sounds not entirely unlike my day (less so on those lovely rare occasions that our IT staff is onsite).

The productivity challenges spill over to other things too. Over the past year or so, I've started doing a smidgeon of work for our other stores (three other stores use a daily update Excel workbook I created). When I took vacation time to mentor my FIRST Robotics team at their regional events, I kept getting calls on my cell phone from unknowing managers and staff at the other stores trying to ask me questions. Finally, I changed my voicemail greeting:

"Hi, this is Billfred. I'm at the FIRST Robotics Competition Peachtree Regional until Saturday, so if you need me for work, don't. Otherwise, please leave a message after the beep. Thanks."

Sure enough, the calls ended soon after. For the Championship last week in St. Louis (the finals happened during that tornado--we could hear the hail coming down hard on the Edward Jones Dome roof), I took things a step further: I learned how to shut my work email off on my phone. It's been liberating!

I haven't gotten the "part time" jabs in a few years--as an hourly person, it kinda fades out--but even still I'm careful to keep that work/life balance. (Or, in my case, work/robots/life balance. The extra 15-20 hours a week during build season can take its toll if you're not careful.)
 
Great article! I'm sure it'll be lifelong debate of whether 8 hours and come and go at your scheduled hours. lol. In my opinion, somebody WORKING 8 hours a day is a much greater asset than somebody who is at the office 12 hours a day and fools around for 10 hours of it.
 
I learned how to do what I do now from a guy who reminded me every day that "12 hours is only half of a day".

For 30 years, I've been a 24/7 operator and about a year ago, I changed to a formal schedule: 8:00AM to 5:00PM with 1 hour for lunch Monday through Friday. You would think a lot would change when you go from "any and all" times of the day to just 40 hours per week. When I decided on this change, I had even talked myself into hiring a "protege'" to keep my projects moving along.

One year later... things have changed alright, but not the way I expected. In 40 short hours each week, I am actually getting more work done -without the extra help. I should have done this years ago.

My wife's really happy. I have a lot more time for "honey-doos".
 
Thanks for the link Dale. Coming from the dealership world, it's mostly frowned upon if you're not putting in at least 10 hours a way. Managers will schedule you on a busy weekday to leave at 5, knowing your a fool if you leave.

Work any less that 50 hours and you're a "part timer". Work efficiency and effectively while your at work and it shouldn't matter (within reason) when you leave work.

I've seen dealers that would hire young single, knowing they could work more hours.

I have 2 kids and I enjoy going home to. I have a life and a family. As much as I love work, I have other responsibilities to help take care of. In many positions today work doesn't leave you. You might place it in your pocket for an hour or so but it never completely leaves you.

Who else here has been called a "Part Timer" for leaving the job early?

I don't know how it got engraved in the dealer's culture that you are only working of you are physically at the dealer and that you are only a full timer if you spend 50+ hours at the dealer.

I remember the days, specially Saturdays, where I had to be at the dealer at 8am for a sales netting and I was scheduled to close at 8pm or later. I was flat out unproductive most of the day, I was pretty much burned out.