The End of the Typical Workday
According to the WSJ today (registration required), evenings and weekends are becoming a growing part of workers' schedules. Interestingly, and according to the article, only about 30% of American workers have a typical 40 hour, Monday through Friday, 9 - 5 kind of job. I often wondered when I would take a day off from my corporate job what all those people were doing in the stores, thinking "don't they have to work?!" Now that I am a full time college professor and have my own firm, my hours are much more flexible. Unfortunately, the definition of flexible often means working all the time. However, I occasionally get to sneak away to handle mundane chores and/or errands during the weekday when lines are short and parking lots are empty.
I was having a conversation with a high level HR professional colleague a while back. He was describing to me his new boss. While he routinely makes himself available 24/7 if needed, his boss is still living in the dark ages, going so far as to keep a secret calendar indicating days that she suspects he has not "put in a full day." So when are we going to stop measuring productivity by face time and start measuring results? It's people like this (a VERY high level HR exec.) who give HR folks a bad name!
