Poll

Time spent on non-work-related activities daily (excluding lunch/mandated breaks)

0 - 30 minutes
30 minutes - 1 hour
1 - 2 hours
2 - 3 hours
3 hours+

Author Topic: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?  (Read 6443 times)

fell-like-rain

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How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« on: May 11, 2018, 09:35:37 AM »
I recently decided to start tracking the amount of time I spend on non-work websites daily, and I was pretty surprised by the results- I was expecting something like half an hour, and it turned out to be about 75 minutes/day, on average (this is with an 8-hour workday). Now, a lot of that is casually browsing during large phone meetings, or having to wait 5-10 minutes for a build to finish, but that time really adds up in a way I didn't expect. Which naturally led to curiosity- how much time are other people actually spending on work? Does it vary a lot between industries? (Obviously this is more applicable to white-collar workers, because it's easier to waste time if you're sitting at a computer vs delivering mail, but still might be eye-opening)

Stimpy

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #1 on: May 11, 2018, 10:37:46 AM »
Depends on the day.  Some days it's an hour, others, I am working closer to 8+ hours, depending on what actually is happening.*

On average, probably close to 3-4 hours a day over my entire current job.

*In my job we are either working our tails off, or have practically nothing to do.  Feast or Famine.  So won't say it's typical representation of work.

sui generis

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #2 on: May 11, 2018, 11:14:49 AM »
It's weird, all my past jobs, I would have said maybe as little as a half hour some days, and rarely more than 3-4 hours.  This job does tend to be more busy, not only because there's more work and it's more challenging, but because I'm much less productive.  Partly because I have to research things more carefully, but partly because things are also just inefficient here.  It's annoying. 

Anyway, before I started this job, I honestly thought that everyone really always had these jobs that there was only like a few hours of work for within an 8 hour day and we were all just lying to each other about being sooooo busy!

renata ricotta

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #3 on: May 11, 2018, 11:25:40 AM »
My "work time" is billable in six minute increments, so I always know exactly how long I spend doing recordable, defensible work.  What's less clear is how much time I spend at work in excess of that, because I don't punch in or keep track of my lunches, breaks, etc. on top of the billable time.

Last Friday I was in the office from about 9 to 4:30, and billed 6.4 hours.  So, I spent about 1.1 hours not working, including lunch, for an 85% productivity rate.  On days when I am in back-to-back meetings or have intense deadlines, I bill pretty much hour-for-hour with very little non-work time.

Dave1442397

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #4 on: May 11, 2018, 11:43:00 AM »
For me, it just depends on how busy I get. The past week was very busy, with one of those emergency projects going on, so I barely had time to check my email in the morning. Other days, I can be waiting around for answers before continuing a project, or waiting for database backups/restores.

Bracken_Joy

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #5 on: May 11, 2018, 11:46:55 AM »
I'm a nurse. So... all of it, basically. Any down time I have is generally spent charting, or prepping supplies/meds for the upcoming section of time when I know I'll get really busy again.

sui generis

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #6 on: May 11, 2018, 12:03:04 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

Bracken_Joy

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #7 on: May 11, 2018, 12:06:50 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have a lot of control over my schedule, in terms of how much work I accept. I'm definitely the best possible nurse I can be at a max of 24hrs per week. Anything over that, and the burnout and cynicism builds quickly, within a couple months. At part time, I think I'll be able to work... pretty much forever, barring physical deterioration. Full time work though? I would burn out within a couple years, and wouldn't be able to handle bedside work anymore I think. I really do think the downtime is critical.

DS

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #8 on: May 11, 2018, 12:08:30 PM »
Tax season - 55-60 hours / 100%
Off season - 15-30 hours

Kwill

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #9 on: May 11, 2018, 12:24:58 PM »
I try to use structured procrastination to make the most of the workday. I know I can't do one thing nonstop for hours and stay focused, but I can move among different tasks during a day, depending on how I'm feeling and what comes up urgently. It helps to keep physical and mental lists of higher and lower priority tasks, absolute necessities and things that would be ideal to do if time and resources allowed, things that have strict deadlines and things that are long-term tasks.

Hirondelle

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #10 on: May 11, 2018, 01:59:26 PM »
My "work time" is billable in six minute increments, so I always know exactly how long I spend doing recordable, defensible work.  What's less clear is how much time I spend at work in excess of that, because I don't punch in or keep track of my lunches, breaks, etc. on top of the billable time.

Last Friday I was in the office from about 9 to 4:30, and billed 6.4 hours.  So, I spent about 1.1 hours not working, including lunch, for an 85% productivity rate.  On days when I am in back-to-back meetings or have intense deadlines, I bill pretty much hour-for-hour with very little non-work time.

How do you even track with this much detail? I mean, how easy is it to just get a little distracted, look around and stare at something for a few minutes?

Just Joe

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #11 on: May 11, 2018, 02:10:42 PM »
Half a day many days. Sometimes a full day. Rarely nothing all day.

Freedomin5

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #12 on: May 12, 2018, 07:29:33 AM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have to be careful how much water I drink during the work day because I don’t have time to pee.
I’m not only on every second that I’m working, I’m perpetually looking for the tiniest ways to shave seconds off of every single task I do at every single moment, and I’m often juggling multiple things at once.
There’s a reason I can only handle working 3 days a week. My downtime is outside of work, work is only for production and I’m not there every day, so I don’t waste any time when I am there.

Yup. I didn’t have time to pee today. God help me if I forget to pee before leaving the office on my hour long bus ride back home.

snapperdude

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #13 on: May 12, 2018, 07:32:08 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have to be careful how much water I drink during the work day because I don’t have time to pee.
I’m not only on every second that I’m working, I’m perpetually looking for the tiniest ways to shave seconds off of every single task I do at every single moment, and I’m often juggling multiple things at once.
There’s a reason I can only handle working 3 days a week. My downtime is outside of work, work is only for production and I’m not there every day, so I don’t waste any time when I am there.

Yup. I didn’t have time to pee today. God help me if I forget to pee before leaving the office on my hour long bus ride back home.

WTF! I think even Chinese prisoners get to pee every now and then.

Bracken_Joy

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #14 on: May 12, 2018, 07:38:03 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have to be careful how much water I drink during the work day because I don’t have time to pee.
I’m not only on every second that I’m working, I’m perpetually looking for the tiniest ways to shave seconds off of every single task I do at every single moment, and I’m often juggling multiple things at once.
There’s a reason I can only handle working 3 days a week. My downtime is outside of work, work is only for production and I’m not there every day, so I don’t waste any time when I am there.

Yup. I didn’t have time to pee today. God help me if I forget to pee before leaving the office on my hour long bus ride back home.

WTF! I think even Chinese prisoners get to pee every now and then.

But I imagine Chinese nurses, like all other nurses, do not. Haha. ;) I don't know what the other poster does, but it's well accepted among medical professionals that a 9 hour capacity bladder is a minimum job requirement some days. Ask any surgeon especially, poor fuckers.

snapperdude

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #15 on: May 12, 2018, 09:08:29 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have to be careful how much water I drink during the work day because I don’t have time to pee.
I’m not only on every second that I’m working, I’m perpetually looking for the tiniest ways to shave seconds off of every single task I do at every single moment, and I’m often juggling multiple things at once.
There’s a reason I can only handle working 3 days a week. My downtime is outside of work, work is only for production and I’m not there every day, so I don’t waste any time when I am there.

Yup. I didn’t have time to pee today. God help me if I forget to pee before leaving the office on my hour long bus ride back home.

WTF! I think even Chinese prisoners get to pee every now and then.

But I imagine Chinese nurses, like all other nurses, do not. Haha. ;) I don't know what the other poster does, but it's well accepted among medical professionals that a 9 hour capacity bladder is a minimum job requirement some days. Ask any surgeon especially, poor fuckers.


I would have to go the adult diaper path. When I gotta go, I gotta go.

accolay

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #16 on: May 12, 2018, 11:27:00 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I always wonder about people who aren't "on" all the time at work What do they do? It sounds pretty boring to me. If people really have 3+ hours of downtime while at work, why don't they get more work or go home early. Weird. I suppose to each their own- I'd probably slit my wrists if I had to work in a cubicle and especially if I had to sit in a commute everyday.

Also a nurse. I work a variable schedule and always wonder how people who work a M-F 9-5 get anything done during the week. I consider it a perk to have week days off and basically able to write my own schedule and work either as much as I want or as little.

I've occasionally had a 12 hour shift so busy that I didn't pee, eat or even have any water. Not healthy. Probably my fault, but sometimes that's the way it happens.

Hirondelle

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #17 on: May 13, 2018, 12:57:16 AM »
I always wonder about people who aren't "on" all the time at work What do they do? It sounds pretty boring to me. If people really have 3+ hours of downtime while at work, why don't they get more work or go home early. Weird. I suppose to each their own- I'd probably slit my wrists if I had to work in a cubicle and especially if I had to sit in a commute everyday.


Things lab people do when not "on" at work:
- Online shopping; not me, but many co-workers do this
- General internet surfing; MMM forums, facebook, whatever
- Call home; many international co-workers have big time zone differences with family so sometimes they call during work hours
- Chatting; very entertaining when multiple people aim for distraction simultaneously
- Additional coffee/tea breaks; when I have some annoying 15-30 min waiting step that doesn't allow me to do anything meaningful I just head to the coffee room and chat with other people there.

This probably sounds like a total waste of time that could be spend home to you, but in our case it's often that you just have to wait several hours for your experiment to get to the next step (e.g. "boil for one hour", "centrifuge for 20 min") and you have to stay around to finish it. I've even done experiments where you have to take a measurement every 10 mins (takes 5 sec) and then just wait for the next, for 6 hours! For those days I've installed DuoLingo so I can play around learning a language while waiting for the next measurement.

By the way; it also happens that I'm totally caught up in a very labour-intensive protocol that I end up not going to the toilet and skipping lunch so it can go both ways :)

renata ricotta

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #18 on: May 13, 2018, 10:38:42 PM »
My "work time" is billable in six minute increments, so I always know exactly how long I spend doing recordable, defensible work.  What's less clear is how much time I spend at work in excess of that, because I don't punch in or keep track of my lunches, breaks, etc. on top of the billable time.

Last Friday I was in the office from about 9 to 4:30, and billed 6.4 hours.  So, I spent about 1.1 hours not working, including lunch, for an 85% productivity rate.  On days when I am in back-to-back meetings or have intense deadlines, I bill pretty much hour-for-hour with very little non-work time.

How do you even track with this much detail? I mean, how easy is it to just get a little distracted, look around and stare at something for a few minutes?

It would be next to impossible without billing software. I use a program with multiple stopwatch timers for each matter. If I get a call for another issue that seems like it’s going to last more than 1-2 minutes, I pause my timer for the matter I was working on. I don’t pause if it’s less than that, because I figure they are hiring a human who has to glance to see if that new email is urgent or take a swig of water or whatever.

Anette

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #19 on: May 14, 2018, 12:13:01 AM »
Another nurse, but working in Europe. I also remember the busy days and nights working at hospitals described by others above.
However, I have been working nightshift ( parttime, 7 nights on, 12 off, repeat...) for several years now at a boarding school for handicapped children ( mostly teenagers).
During the week there are about 50 kids to care for on the weekend and school breaks often only 2-6 as most of them go home.

That means I have lots of time I can freely use for baking, preparing other food, I love to sew, read, study for my online university classes, wr ite letters watch television. My shift is 8,5 hours with half an hour break and I often have about 5 hours of time to fill with other things than work.

Now the flipside is that as a nurse this is a very boring, basic job. Mostly the children are not sick but handicapped, so less to do and also less  emergencies. Interesting are the very different handicaps and I love working with children. Some of them will still be up on the weekend and my work is to them play games, watch a film together and they also like me to bring my seeing machine so we can be creative together.  So in many ways the work is very rewatding  and this schedule has worked very well for me as I have five children and the pay is exactly the same for a registered nurse here than at a hospital! ( I had to work a lot harder for my money when I used to work at hospitals)

kei te pai

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #20 on: May 14, 2018, 12:38:43 AM »
Your job sounds rather lovely Anette!
Another nurse here (now retired , joyfully). Not only worked many shifts with no chance to pee, but often late off with no paid overtime or time in lieu. I remember feeling dizzy with fatigue at the end of intensely busy days. It wasnt just the physicality of being on your feet and active for 8-9 hours, more the intensity of concentration and  human interaction. I coped in my later years by reducing the number of days per week.
I still feel somewhat incredulous that people can go to work and fluff around for half the time they are employed. Or finish their work day and go for a run, second job, or study.

Linea_Norway

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #21 on: May 14, 2018, 12:54:41 AM »
For me it varies. Some days I can have boring tasks that I dread doing. Then it is very tempting to surf the internet instead. Not that the dreadful tasks disappear... Other days I have more inspiring things to do and I work at my own pace and can work quite concentrated in a good way.

Sometimes we have periods of testing with several systems, where I am the main player. I need to organize it, run the show, read the test steps over Skype and tell the other party what to expect, perform parts of the tests in our system, check the results in log files, note all the test results and findings, copy error reports and at the same time try to follow what a whole army of people on the other side of a Skype connection are saying. I have an assistant when doing this this, who is a subject matter and system expert, which helps a lot, who performs many of the test steps while I do the rest. Those days give me a terrible work pressure. I put in some breaks for my own sanity and bathroom visits and take an extra long lunch break. No surfing is done on these days. But on some days, some of the army of people on the other side of the Skype connection are having discussions about how the system is supposed to work. During those sessions, which can last for 45 minutes a time and are a waste of our time, we turn off our microphone, lean back and let them talk while we on our side talk about private stuff.

sparkytheop

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #22 on: May 14, 2018, 04:42:50 AM »
I compare my job to that of a fireman.  Majority of my shifts (I prefer nights and weekends, I have a schedule with few weekday shifts) I have duties I need to do daily.  There are two different main "jobs", and I alternate those nightly/daily with whoever I'm working with.  Some nights my duties might mean I drive by something and look at a few levels, and I'm done in 15 minutes.  On a 12 hour shift.  Other nights I might have 2 hours of rounds/duties.  Some nights I get called to do a job where I sit in a shack and push a few buttons over the course of an hour, but most of that time is waiting, so I make sure to have "portable hobbies".

I can't go home, because I'm there for the emergencies, and even though I live just a few minutes away, that would take too long to respond.  I could add more work, but why?  I used to be a gung-ho worker, but that got beat out of me a few years ago.  So now, I read, watch tv/movies, mess around on the internet, sew, quilt, crochet, calculate my retirement, update my budget, etc.  I plan to write out a bunch of recipes for my son on nights where I'm not motivated to do other stuff.  The guys who have to run the show on those off shifts have told me they don't care at all what I do on my shift, as long as I do my rounds and answer my radio when they call me.  The job is probably 95%+ stress-free, but when there is stress, it goes from 0 to 100 in instantaneously. 

I do have some shifts where I'm "on" nearly the entire time, but those are few and far between.  Even then, nothing is so important that I can't break away to use the restroom.

At this point in my life, this is pretty much my dream job (outside of being able to do something similar in a foreign country).  For full benefits, I have to wait until I'm 57 to retire, but I can handle that with this job and schedule.

driftwood

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #23 on: May 14, 2018, 05:32:59 AM »
Air Force Logistics Officer here...

Actually work I do each workday is usually 1 hour. This is doing EVERYTHING expected of me, and my boss's and coworker's perspective is that I'm doing a great job. Can be really boring and disheartening. The up side is that it means that everything's going well and everyone I work with is doing their job well.

On the flip side, when I go on work trips to do specific jobs, I work every hour of up to 18 hour days (or longer, but seldom longer than that). Usually eat at my desk or skip meals. No time on random websites or my phone or doing nothing. This is exhausting but really motivating and I get a lot of fulfillment from it.

Tom Bri

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #24 on: May 14, 2018, 11:27:45 AM »
I'm a nurse. So... all of it, basically. Any down time I have is generally spent charting, or prepping supplies/meds for the upcoming section of time when I know I'll get really busy again.

Bingo. I usually arrive at work a half hour early to start looking up data on my patients. On a typical night I might have <1/2 hour of non-busy time. This includes the supposed lunch break, which is usually spent eating while charting. There are occasional nights that are slow, and I can get an hour or even more of free time.

teen persuasion

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #25 on: May 15, 2018, 11:17:13 AM »
Eh, it's kind of blurry for me.

When I'm working (especially if I'm working alone), I'm always on.  I'm just shifting from one set of duties to another as needed.  If patrons come in or call, my focus shifts to them for that time.  Between those events, I focus on the other tasks to keep the place functioning.  Once I'm all caught up on those (for the time being, anyways), I shift to lower priority or less frequent duties.  If those are all handled, I can tackle future planning.  And so on.

In practice, some days are just handling patrons and putting out fires all day, with daily tasks whipped thru in the moments between.  Everything else can wait for a slow day.  Slow days (or slow times) are for those pesky put-off projects, but it may not make sense to take up a time consuming project when you have a slow time in a short window, so then I might do something like a little internet browsing or chatting.  But I manage the social media, so scanning Twitter/Facebook/Pinterest is really part of my job, too.  Checking out the local paper when I process periodicals is useful because I'm looking to see if our programs got some promotion this week, etc., or for issues our local patrons need/want to know about.  Poking about on other branches' websites is research for a redesign of our website I'd like to tackle, and to keep in the loop on competing programs they offer, or new ideas to explore.  Chatting with patrons is doing research on future purchasing and program planning needs.

So I've got to balance my curiosity vs my mental to-do list.  There's always stuff I could be doing, but what's more important right now?  Or what might save lots of effort in the future if I tackle it now?

Philociraptor

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #26 on: May 15, 2018, 12:06:16 PM »
Somewhere between 1 hour and all 8, but I probably average around 4 hours of actual work per day. I'm in production planning, so I check the short-ship reports every hour or so and adjust production as necessary, but I also have to be here from 8-5 since that is when sales is in the office. I also have to check on production from time to time outside of M-F 8-5, since we are a 24-hour company. When I'm at work but not working I'll troll around on the MMM forums (for now, it's been blocked before and could become blocked again at any time), read on my Kindle, watch Netflix on my phone, plan our next vacation, etc.

2Birds1Stone

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #27 on: May 15, 2018, 03:05:11 PM »
Hard to say, I'm salaried and work from home when I'm not traveling to clients or in meetings. I definitely put in more than 40 hours a week on work related tasks or work related travel.

Rural

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #28 on: May 15, 2018, 08:44:37 PM »
I stay at work when there's work to do that can't be done elsewhere and I leave when there isn't, so mine is hard to judge. On campus days can vary from 75 minutes to 15 hours. Work from home or elsewhere can be between 15-60 hours a week. I haven't tracked closely in a few years, but when I did, I averaged 45 active working hours a week for the time I was on contract. I don't count off contract months for which I don't get paid, but I work then, too, just less.

Dave1442397

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #29 on: May 17, 2018, 07:13:51 PM »
I noticed some comments about asking for more work if you're bored, or leaving early when there's nothing to do.

Personally, I hate being under worked, but at some companies, that's just the way it is (or was, back when I worked at one of those companies). At first, I was constantly asking for more work, and constantly being told that we had to wait for x or y, no need to hurry! After being there a few months, I realized that the office culture involved looking busy without actually accomplishing much. People would be there from 7am to 7pm and do a couple of hour's worth of actual work. Leaving early wasn't allowed, and I used to get the evil eye for leaving at my scheduled time, not that it stopped me - I wasn't waiting around to get stuck in traffic for no reason.

When the economy crashed, they cut the workforce by 50% within months by getting rid of all the contractors. Then they got rid of 50% of the employees a few months later. After all that, I didn't see a difference in the amount of work being done. Even with 25% of the original staff, we still completed everything on time. I was so happy to get the hell out of there.



DreamFIRE

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #30 on: May 17, 2018, 08:23:18 PM »
I know people who have put in about one hour of real work all week despite being there for 40 hours.  Total slackers.

I've always been overworked and have worked a lot of OT over the last 17 years, and even doing work from home on my own time.  I'm trying to cut down in my last year or two before I FIRE.

accolay

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #31 on: May 18, 2018, 04:55:50 PM »
I noticed some comments about asking for more work if you're bored, or leaving early when there's nothing to do.
Personally, I hate being under worked, but at some companies, that's just the way it is (or was, back when I worked at one of those companies).

I wonder how much this bloated inneficiency adds to cost?

TartanTallulah

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #32 on: June 07, 2018, 09:30:49 PM »
I'm so amazed at people/jobs that are "on" all the time while at work.  I mean, I know I said this above, that I thought we all had lots of down time and people were just lying...but in my old jobs, having that down time was critical to my mental health and to a well-balanced life.  That was time I used to think through things in life, plan vacations, go to dr appts, just all stuff that now has to fit into not-work time and no wonder we're all crazy in this world!  I get so much less done in my personal life now, I'm always behind on everything, because I don't have time to keep up with everything I'd like to.  Part of the reason for FIRE.  I think my ideal would be to work about 8-12 hours per week.

I have to be careful how much water I drink during the work day because I don’t have time to pee.
I’m not only on every second that I’m working, I’m perpetually looking for the tiniest ways to shave seconds off of every single task I do at every single moment, and I’m often juggling multiple things at once.
There’s a reason I can only handle working 3 days a week. My downtime is outside of work, work is only for production and I’m not there every day, so I don’t waste any time when I am there.

Yup. I didn’t have time to pee today. God help me if I forget to pee before leaving the office on my hour long bus ride back home.

WTF! I think even Chinese prisoners get to pee every now and then.

But I imagine Chinese nurses, like all other nurses, do not. Haha. ;) I don't know what the other poster does, but it's well accepted among medical professionals that a 9 hour capacity bladder is a minimum job requirement some days. Ask any surgeon especially, poor fuckers.

Yup, very much this. On many work days, the closest I get to slack time is ticking through a list of electronic prescriptions with one hand while eating a flapjack or cookie with the other.

There are plans afoot to develop a new building in which we'll be hot-desking so there will be no scope for keeping a stash of cookies in my desk, overrunning on my clinics when someone needs extra time, or doing non-customer-facing tasks in the order of my choice. I intend to be gone before then.

The only member of my family who appears to have secured a job with slack time is the one who has never left academia.

MaybeBabyMustache

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #33 on: June 08, 2018, 09:13:19 PM »
It depends on if you count international work travel time as "work". The travel is required to do my job, and I travel on weekends/evenings & typically work a full work week. But, when I'm on a plane, I typically just watch movies and/or read a book.

rdaneel0

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #34 on: June 08, 2018, 10:02:48 PM »
This is a great question. When I worked minimum wage jobs the answer was 95%-100% of time spent working. This was usually working on my feet, with the expectation that lots of random codes and organizational processes were memorized and could be executed super quickly, and the demand of always being in a people pleasing mood. That's part of what is so exhausting about lower wage jobs, which I think many higher earners do not realize. When I worked retail my standard shift was 10 hours, with a 15-20 minute break for lunch. That was and is pretty normal. At restaurants it was a shorter shift but much more frenetic pace, so maybe working for 7-8 hours straight, but absolutely hauling ass and working to full capacity that entire time.

Now I work in an office. Hahahahaha. OMG. Guys, I cannot believe how little people get done! I work in a field with very measurable output, and I'm at about double compared to the rest of my team. And I still waste a ton of time online, not working. It's insane how much time professionals spend just doing non work activity. Half the time I have to turn off my chats for the office because people are just carrying on long conversations that have nothing to do with work. I just don't feel right not working for that long while collecting money! It's madness. I know many professionals do work very hard (medical, fire, EMT, etc.) but it seems like a lot of the professional world operates on a pretty low standard.

better late

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #35 on: June 08, 2018, 10:17:46 PM »
I can work about 4-5 hours then my brain gets tired
i

This.
 I work part time so 4-5 hours a day I crank out work. Then I can feel my efficiency slipping and falling R's time to go home. They definitely get their money's worth paying me by the hour.

Tom Bri

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #36 on: June 10, 2018, 08:18:48 PM »
To those who answer that in their field people waste lots of time, I'd like more information. What fields are you in? I have worked in a lot of different fields, and pretty much never had a job that allowed much slack, so I'm curious.

FreshPrincess

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #37 on: June 11, 2018, 07:23:43 AM »
Sales.

To those who answer that in their field people waste lots of time, I'd like more information. What fields are you in? I have worked in a lot of different fields, and pretty much never had a job that allowed much slack, so I'm curious.

marty998

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Re: How much time do you actually spend working, at work?
« Reply #38 on: June 27, 2018, 02:13:28 AM »
Today? Not a lot. The project I've been working on for a year got repurposed. As such I'm now waiting for further instructions.

For the first time in almost 8 years at work I had literally nothing at all to do. So after viewing a fair bit of real estate porn and dreaming of country estates I left at 4pm.

T'was a very weird day for me all things considered.