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A long hours culture, where you and your team are regularly working more than your contracted working hours, can be seriously detrimental to everyone. Stress, illness and damage to personal lives can all be results, which are likely to come with drops in productivity and performance. A good work-life balance is important to a healthy organization, so it’s important to break the cycle before it causes long-term damage.
Identify the Root Cause
The first thing to rule out is poor time management. Before looking for other causes, make sure that you and your team are making the best use of your time. Is everyone using to-do lists and prioritizing their workload? Are people using their contracted working hours effectively, or are there inefficiencies which could be addressed? Before looking at organizational issues, it’s important to first make sure that everyone is using their time to best effect. There are many time management resources in this toolkit to help ensure this is happening.
Once you’ve ruled out time management as a problem (or addressed it where it is a problem) there are four major causes of a long hours culture:
- excessive workload
- lack of skills
- inefficient systems
- presenteeism
Excessive Workload
Problem: There Is Too Much Work to Do to Meet Deadlines and Not Enough People to Do it.
If this is the reason for people having to work extra hours, there are a number of ways to address the problem.
Realistic deadlines are important. Try not to set or accept deadlines which will not leave enough time to get the work done with the resources available. Look at reports from previous projects/tasks to see how long they took to complete. Monitor work as it progresses and talk to your team members regularly to ensure that the timescales remain realistic and manageable.
Before you decide who to delegate a particular piece of work to, be sure you have a complete picture of each person’s workload. This is particularly important if people are already committed to a number of different projects. Ask everyone to voice their concerns if they feel that deadlines are unrealistic. Bear in mind that some people find it difficult to say ‘no’ to their boss, even if they are already overloaded with work.
If a deadline cannot be met with the resources available, and if this happens regularly, consider the case for hiring more people. Whether it is within your budget to do so, or you have to make the case to someone else, if you can demonstrate that work demands regularly outstrip capacity, this should be a serious consideration. You may want to quantify the problem by logging the extra hours worked, detailing tasks and the time needed to complete them.
Sometimes, immovable deadlines will come up without the option to increase capacity. If this happens, speak to your team in advance, acknowledge and explain the difficulty, and consider offering time off in lieu after the deadline if you are not in the position to pay overtime for extra hours worked.
Lack of Skills
Problem: People Feel Overloaded Because They Don’t Have the Skills Required to Do Their Job Efficiently, and End up Taking More Time Than Necessary to Do Work.
Will some additional training and development help to bring skills up to the required level? For example, perhaps your team needs some training on new systems or technology. This could equally apply to you if there is an element of your role you are not entirely confident in.
Think about a skills audit or learning needs analysis exercise with your team to identify and prioritize development needs. If you’re not comfortable doing this yourself, speak to your HR or L&D department(s) for help.
Inefficient Systems
Problem: Existing Systems and/or Software Are Causing Inefficiencies, Which Waste Time.
This requires in-depth communication with your team, as well as an analysis of working practices. Ask people how long it takes to complete tasks and identify any pressure points or bottlenecks in the workflow. Make sure you are not the one holding things up!
Once you have identified inefficiencies, think about how they can be remedied. In an ideal world, what would the situation be? There are lots of free administrative tools available online to help with more efficient working. Figure out exactly what you need, and see what is available. Ask colleagues or peers within other organizations for any recommendations – especially those in similar roles to your own. Ultimately, think about whether resources need to be increased to help people work more efficiently, like investing in new or more up-to-date software.
Presenteeism
Problem: Team Members Feel They Have to Be Seen to Be Working Long Hours in Order to Demonstrate Commitment or Are Following an Example Set by Their Peers or Management.
One of the most important ways of tackling presenteeism is to set a good example. Your team will take their cues from how you work, so it’s important to be seen to manage your own hours effectively. You can do this by arriving for work on time and leaving on time. You should also try to ensure that you take your full lunch break, where you leave your desk (rather than eating lunch at your desk).
Of course, as management, it is more likely there will be situations where you need to work extra hours. But you should also do all you can to ensure that your team members understand that working long hours is not a normal part of their job.
Consider whether a change to your team’s working patterns could help alleviate some of the pressure. Would introducing a flexible working pattern or home-working arrangements be feasible, for example? Conducting a job redesign exercise, where you review responsibilities and the allocation of tasks throughout your team, might also help you to spread workloads more equitably amongst the team.
Make sure you aren’t rewarding presenteeism. Are your best performers the people who consistently work long hours? Remember that the decision to award pay increases, development opportunities or promotions should be based upon the quality of an individual’s output and their productivity, not just the number of hours they put in.
Of course, there is the possibility that you are in a position where working extra hours actually is expected and rewarded by your organization. This is the most difficult situation to remedy. In this case, arm yourself with the facts regarding the negative effects that stress and fatigue can have on employee health and productivity. As with all change management, the first step is to explain why the current situation cannot be allowed to continue.
The material on stress, wellbeing and work-life balance in this toolkit will provide information on the negative effects of stress and fatigue. If you can make the case that ending a culture of long hours will be good for employees and the organization, it should, hopefully, be the first step on the road to creating a healthier atmosphere.
