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Why do people waste so much time at work?

bbc.co.uk

11–20 of 230 posts

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#11
> In this respect, entire occupations might be considered phoney - from life coaches to "atmosphere co-ordinators" (people hired to create a party vibe in bars) to "chief learning officers" in the corporate world.

People hired to create atmosphere in bars might be "phoney" in an object-level sense, but as far as their job goes presumably they do provide an actual service to someone, by causing more people to visit the bar.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#12
"We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian-Darwinian theory, he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors. The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had to earn a living." -- Buckminster Fuller, 1930

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#13
In my case it's the lack of documentation about a huge system (ecosystem, I'd rather call it), in contrast to an overengineered methodology and process, which involves mandatory code reviews by people unfamiliar with the code and 6 test phases before production.

If I crank 10 lines of code a week I consider myself lucky, and it won't take less than 3 weeks for them to hit production.

The combination of that with long builds and releases (30min minimum) makes me always have something to do, but I'm always waiting for something to be able to move on (build to be finished, answers from experts, validation by QA...). That's where HN and r/programming kick in.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#14
post #5

Because if they got their job done and left they would be fired. If they got their job done, they would be given more work. So one takes the maximal amount of time to do a task given the requirement that they be in the office for 8+ hrs a day.

If they have 8 hours of work time and finished their tasks in 6, does that mean they have exhausted their usefulness to the business? Why not spend these 2 hours doing some small miscellaneous tasks?

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#15
post #14
post #5

Because if they got their job done and left they would be fired. If they got their job done, they would be given more work. So one takes the maximal amount of time to do a task given the requirement that they be in the office for 8+ hrs a day.

If they have 8 hours of work time and finished their tasks in 6, does that mean they have exhausted their usefulness to the business? Why not spend these 2 hours doing some small miscellaneous tasks?

Laziness

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#16
I don't think it was ever different. The idea that there should be enough time to sleep and have hobbies, that's the new thing. Just because our parents already experienced these privileges doesn't mean it's an old topic.

And if something like this happens so regularly, so naturally, I think instead of logically arguing about it we should worry more about how to handle that. I'm thinking about that other article were sales people were working together to make it looks like they all would work 80 hour weeks.

Last but not least let's not forget that our bosses also actually don't care abut our work hours. Caring would mean that they would need to look at hour work schedules and time tables, etc, instead of going to the golf club. For them it's more important that they can make a good impression on their bosses and customers as well. As long as we deliver that impression they don't mind that we all act like we are working 80 hour weeks, including them.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#17

"We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because…

Let's say we all agree that the global amount of resources are enough to support all of us without work, just for simplification.

Then what about distribution of these resources? I feel many people work to fight over that distribution, not just to produce. E.g., there might be no $1000/h lawyer who would think that they produce even $100/h worth of resources. But they might still work 80h/week (or make the impression) to get a bigger share of the pie that is already there.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#19
post #14
post #5

Because if they got their job done and left they would be fired. If they got their job done, they would be given more work. So one takes the maximal amount of time to do a task given the requirement that they be in the office for 8+ hrs a day.

If they have 8 hours of work time and finished their tasks in 6, does that mean they have exhausted their usefulness to the business? Why not spend these 2 hours doing some small miscellaneous tasks?

Often lack of infrastructure, or communication about what needs doing. Traditional businesses are poorly documented, and not transparent, so knowing what you might do and how is often extremely difficult.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#20

"We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because…

Excess labor was traditionally consumed by planning grander festivals.
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