Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide • Hacker News Board

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#131

Post by hectormalot » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:55 AM UTC

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #111

pdimitar wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the most baffling mysteries of our time for me is the fact that this truth (more working hours = less productivity) is still being massively denied and the non-existent and strawman "arguments" against it have been beaten to death and debunked thousands of times... yet never fail to reappear in any discussion on the topic. It seems the economic pressure for supporting this bullshit story is still too strong. S…

Maybe it's because there's a lot of confusion created by people who claim that there's an inverse correlation between hours worked and overall productivity, instead of hours worked and marginal productivity. I have no trouble believing that (on average) someone who works 50 hours doesn't accomplish 25% more than someone who works 40 hours. I find it almost impossible to believe that they don't accomplish more overall…

Exactly! My 60th hour might not be as productive as my 20th hour, but it is productive nonetheless.

Currently leading a team I see different behavior from team members working longer hours. For example, we had a conversion to do that was running into a deadline. Together with a team of 4 we worked into the evenings to get it done. 2 of them 'compensated' by being there but browsing more Reddit, the other 2 actually sat down and got the work done.

I see a lot of comments justifying the first kind of behavior, and it doesn't make sense to me. If you are not productive because you are on HN, you're doing that to yourself. At 40-60h we're in the realm of that being a choice, and then you're choosing not to be productive.

FWIW, I'm not trying to justify people working long just to show that they are there/committed. That's a terrible practice too.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#132

Post by smcl » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 11:40 AM UTC

czep wrote: post #95

throwaway2016a wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In Japan, leaving before the boss is distasteful My personal management policy is I get in before and leave after all my employees incase they need me and to show them that I am there for/with them (within reason - if someone is putting a really late night I may leave first). The idea of not leaving before the boss leaves is weird to me. I get higher pay and more stock options, why should I be leaving early when my…

> If they get their work done they shouldn't feel guilty leaving at 5:00. Close but not perfect. My correction would be "even if they don't get their work done, they shouldn't feel guilty leaving at 5:00." The reason I say this is because one could easily argue that there's always more work to be done. That's always been the case for me anyway. But tomorrow is another day. When you've put in a full workday already, n…

I'm sure that's what the parent meant - I understood "get their work done" to mean "they are working productively over a long period" and not "they finished all assigned tasks for the day"

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#133

Post by visarga » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 2:18 PM UTC

pgz wrote: post #9

vivekd wrote: post #5

If the Japanese are working so much that some a literally working themselves to death - why is their economy so bad? My guess is that a lot of that time is getting used up with unnecessary busy work rather than actual productive labor.

Several people argue that working long hours will have a negative impact on productivity. For example if you look at EU countries, the ones with the economy in worse conditions are those with longer working hours (Greece, Italy).

> those with longer working hours (Greece, Italy).

I think it should make sense to have extended working hours in tourism, but it doesn't make sense in office work.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#134

Post by johansch » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 2:21 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #130

johansch wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

South Korea went even crazier and stole their consumer electronics business. (Both in terms of government subsidies and extreme working hours. And: contrary to the opinion of the united socialist workers of HN, extreme hours sometimes are sometimes actually needed in order to build something new, desirable - well before anyone else. The fact that "extreme hours" are also employed when that is not really the target do…

I'm not from the US and I'm definitely not socialist (had enough of that, thank you very much), but extreme hours has a specific role: crunch time. If you're in crunch time all the time, regardless of your field of work, something went terribly wrong somewhere.

Sure. And a crunch time can last 6-12 months and be effective. There are many examples of that in product development history. I can't imagine that doing it for longer than that would work though.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#135

Post by unsignedint » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 2:34 PM UTC

qbert wrote: post #127

unsignedint wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And that's exactly why I can't work there.[0] (Though, it's funny I was actually very close of doing just that.) Too bad I don't have perks of using foreignness there... [0]: https://hideki.hclippr.com/2011/06/02/social-expectations-in...

You could work for a foreign company within Japan.

That would have been tolerable for me, but considering I have been experiencing difference in overall sociological expectations by just visiting there, I don't know if I would have been truly happy if I were in that situation. I wasn't exactly "fit to their spec" back when I was living in Japan at young age, either.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#136

Post by pdimitar » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 2:40 PM UTC

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #111

pdimitar wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the most baffling mysteries of our time for me is the fact that this truth (more working hours = less productivity) is still being massively denied and the non-existent and strawman "arguments" against it have been beaten to death and debunked thousands of times... yet never fail to reappear in any discussion on the topic. It seems the economic pressure for supporting this bullshit story is still too strong. S…

Maybe it's because there's a lot of confusion created by people who claim that there's an inverse correlation between hours worked and overall productivity, instead of hours worked and marginal productivity. I have no trouble believing that (on average) someone who works 50 hours doesn't accomplish 25% more than someone who works 40 hours. I find it almost impossible to believe that they don't accomplish more overall…

I have no problem at all with you disagreeing, but you do make it sound like your point of view is an universal truth -- which it isn't.

In software development, I'd argue there's rarely a significant difference between marginal and overall productivity. It really boils down to personalities however, let's be real; and I am not gonna claim my point of view is universally true because it too isn't.

The more and more you work, the more BS you start to produce. You are tired, you start to imagine your bed (or girlfriend, or TV, or whatever floats your boat) and you start putting less thought into what you do and just go into "spear mode". One of my former managers used to say "If I see you tired, I prefer letting you go at Friday 14:00 so you don't spend your entire Monday fixing the bugs you introduced during the second half of that Friday".

This is a real phenomena. Granted it doesn't apply for everyone, but IMO you discard way too quickly those of us that do need some freedom and some "slack" to actually be more productive. And it's very generous to call the normal legal requirements not to work over 40 hours a week "slack".

This is also real: when I am having a very hard time and I can't solve something and I get nervous and stressed out, and if you're my manager and tell me "Dimi, just call it a day right here, you can do it tomorrow" -- you can be VERY sure I'll do it tomorrow. While conversely if you tap me on the shoulder 10 times for the remainder of the day, I can guarantee you I'll get absolutely nothing done. Different strokes for different people.

So no, "the free 20-30%" isn't something that the company can get from everyone.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#137

Post by markonen » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 3:05 PM UTC

I filmed this clip of the Dentsu HQ almost 10 years ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWX6--sQtsA

In it, you see how all the lights automatically turn off at 10 PM. You can judge how many offices still have workers in them by the lights being turned back on.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#138

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 3:25 PM UTC

pdimitar wrote: post #136

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's because there's a lot of confusion created by people who claim that there's an inverse correlation between hours worked and overall productivity, instead of hours worked and marginal productivity. I have no trouble believing that (on average) someone who works 50 hours doesn't accomplish 25% more than someone who works 40 hours. I find it almost impossible to believe that they don't accomplish more overall…

I have no problem at all with you disagreeing, but you do make it sound like your point of view is an universal truth -- which it isn't. In software development, I'd argue there's rarely a significant difference between marginal and overall productivity. It really boils down to personalities however, let's be real; and I am not gonna claim my point of view is universally true because it too isn't. The more and more y…

[deleted]

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#139

Post by hacker_9 » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 3:32 PM UTC

markonen wrote: post #137

I filmed this clip of the Dentsu HQ almost 10 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWX6--sQtsA In it, you see how all the lights automatically turn off at 10 PM. You can judge how many offices still have workers in them by the lights being turned back on.

Kind of sad people think they have to work past 10 PM, just to bump up their company image and bosses bonuses. This is what slave labour looks like in the 21 century.

Re: Dentsu CEO resigns after overworked employee commits suicide

#140

Post by ryanwaggoner » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 6:18 PM UTC

pdimitar wrote: post #136

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's because there's a lot of confusion created by people who claim that there's an inverse correlation between hours worked and overall productivity, instead of hours worked and marginal productivity. I have no trouble believing that (on average) someone who works 50 hours doesn't accomplish 25% more than someone who works 40 hours. I find it almost impossible to believe that they don't accomplish more overall…

I have no problem at all with you disagreeing, but you do make it sound like your point of view is an universal truth -- which it isn't. In software development, I'd argue there's rarely a significant difference between marginal and overall productivity. It really boils down to personalities however, let's be real; and I am not gonna claim my point of view is universally true because it too isn't. The more and more y…

If your point of view is right, wouldn't it imply that working 30 hours per week is ultimately more productive than 40? What about 10 hours? What about an hour?

Or are you actually in agreement about the shape of the productivity vs hours worked curve but you disagree where the peak is for software developers? If so, where is that peak do you think?