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Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

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Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#171

Post by matwood »

atorodius wrote: post #143
inapis wrote: post #7

I find 12 hours a day to be too much. And 6 days a week is throwing the mental health of a person off a cliff. I’ve frequently found, personally and observing others, that productivity drops after 6h of continuous work especially if it forces you to think a lot (which is pretty much always in software - you still need to apply your brain to connect the plumbing between APIs) Anything after 6h should either be menial…

I fully agree! Have found exactly the same thing for me, i.e., I can do about 6h of mentally consuming things a day.

I can do more if I'm allowed to make my own schedule. Throw a couple hour workout + lunch in the middle of the day and I can go back to mentally consuming work. Too few companies recognize that they are shooting themselves in the foot with the strict 9-5 or whatever hours.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#172

Post by matwood »

afarrell wrote: post #77
echelon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

996 is fine if you're a founder of a company. It's not okay for ill-compensated workers that will never become billionaires. We don't have much time on this planet. Why should he expect others to be droning slaves for him? People should enjoy what little life they have, not spend most of their time as cogs in a machine.

>996 is fine if you’re a founder Is it? You have production access to the company’s most important relationships. If you’re falling asleep in meetings or just unable to exercise emotional intelligence, that seems pretty bad for the company. EDIT: falling asleep in meetings is bad, not good.

Founders are already 'working' more than that. They are typically thinking about their company with every waking hour.

With that said, it doesn't mean they are not getting plenty of sleep. What it means is that when they are not sleeping, they are probably working. At the gym, they are probably thinking about work. At social events, they are probably thinking about work. Etc... It's just the nature of getting a company off the ground.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#173

Post by volkl48 »

acct1771 wrote: post #159
p49k wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because of that, the company actually don't need to force it's employees. It just keep giving them tasks which cannot be finished without... This sounds exactly like the accounts of what it’s like to work as an Amazon delivery driver.

Or a drive thru employee. Or an Uber driver trying to make minimum wage. Hm.

A drive thru employee works a scheduled shift and when it's over they're done.

I don't see how that example works with this topic of overtime/overwork.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#174

Post by theseadroid »

ackbar03 wrote: post #92

The prevalence of 996 shows why China is able to start so many strong tech companies. Discontent reflects the rising awareness for standard of living and ethical or not also sort of implies rising labor costs in future.

Strong copycats yes. Strong innovation tech companies? I dont think so.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#175

Post by rsln-s »

C1sc0cat wrote: post #118
ilaksh wrote: post #26

I'm actually kind of afraid to comment because I'm generally afraid of the Chinese government and I have a feeling they like Jack Ma and also like wage slavery just as much as him. Plus even if there is no government involved Jack Ma has quite a lot of power because of his money. But I feel this is a moral issue. The thing is, the system of employment is the evolution of plain old fashioned slavery. That is where Ma…

Not sure applying old English words or even western ideas onto a completely different culture helps here.

Some things are fairly universal and pertain to human condition in general, even if expressed in very western framework.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#176

Post by matz1 »

koonsolo wrote: post #101

Can someone explain to me how you can be productive for 12 hours on a single day? When I do concentrated programming work, I can maybe do 4 hours, at best 6 hours. It seems I can stretch it when doing more mundane work when I know what needs to be done. But this time is seriously reduced when I have to think about architecture or more complex stuff. The literature also point into this direction, where writers and ser…

You don't work full 12 hour continuously. You'll take numbers of breaks in between, for example lunch, snacks, napping, coffee, stroll around, exercise, gym, meditation, games, etc.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#178

Post by jpking »

human20190310 wrote: post #25

I'm beginning to suspect that the 996 schedule (and its equivalents in other cultures) aren't actually about productivity; they're about devotion. Devotion isn't something a CEO can explicitly ask for, but a 996 schedule is, so that becomes the expectation even if it actually has a neutral-to-negative impact on productivity. Richard Liu almost made this explicit when he stated that people who didn't adhere to it were…

I don't think that these 12 hour days are full of productivity. My partner spent some time in the summer as a researcher at a key lab in Shanghai. She observed that researchers put in long hours (if the boss was around) but often spent time on their phones and repeated experiments mindlessly.

Kai-Fu Lee discusses this culture in the Founders Fund podcast Anatomy of Next. He suggests that many of the workers will be the only ones in their family who have high paid office jobs. The rest work in factories, farms and other manual labor. Thus, they see an opportunity to be successful and lift their family out of poverty.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#179

Post by matz1 »

raducu wrote: post #122
thetechlead wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worked at Alibaba. Not trying to defend the company, just offering my observation. They do work much longer hour as compared to most American companies (like Google, I worked at too), even longer than the average Chinese ones. However, 9-to-9 doesn't mean people work 12 hour straight and nobody forcing anyone to stay at work until 9. Chinese work schedule includes 30 minutes to 1 hour extra napping time at noon, and…

But does it matter if you work continuously 9-9? If I stay on premise 9-9 I still regard that as work -- that still is my time that I'm selling to the company. Can you raise a child if you are away 9-9? You wake up at 7AM, return home at 10PM, how is that even considered a life worth living? That's just insane if you ask me.

It's not for everyone.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#180

Post by Kirth »

afarrell wrote: post #91
cbsks wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is. Because then the overtime is completely self-imposed.

If a sysadmin comes to work drunk, that would also be self-imposed. Would that be acceptable for the company? If not, why is it okay to come to work drunk-with-fatigue?

I always wonder about cases where a person's work depresses them as such that they start self-medicating (for example, with alcohol). Would that still be self-imposed, or a result of the circumstances?
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