Tuesday, November 09, 2010

A speech by Narayana Murthy on Sitting late at work

Infosys' Chairman and Chief Mentor Officer (CMO) - Mr. Narayana Murthy's Speech on Late Sitting:

Hope that many of us start leaving early for home after reading this... I am not relating this to the present scenario. I know people whowork 12 hours a day, six days a week, or more. Some people do so because of a work emergency where the long hours are only temporary. Other people I know have put in these hours for years. I don't know if they are working all these hours, but I do know they are in the office this long. Others put in long office hours because they are addicted to the workplace. Whatever the reason for putting in overtime, working long hours over the long term is harmful to the person and to the organization. There are things managers can do to change this for everyone's benefit. Being in the office long hours, over long periods of time, makes way for potential errors. My colleagues who are in the office long hours frequently make mistakes caused by fatigue. Correcting these mistakes requires their time as well as the time and energy of others. I have seen people work Tuesday through Friday to correct mistakes made after 5 PM on Monday.

Another problem is that people who are in the office for long hours are not pleasant company.
They often complain about other people (who aren't working as hard); they are irritable, or cranky, or even angry. Other people avoid them. Such behaviour poses problems, where work goes much better when people work together instead of avoiding one another. As Managers, there are things we can do to help people leave the office. First and foremost is to set the example and go home ourselves. I work with a manager who chides people for working long hours. His words quickly lose their meaning when he sends these chiding group e-mails with a time-stamp of 2 AM, Sunday.

Second is to encourage people to put some balance in their lives. For instance, here is a guideline I find helpful:
1) Wake up, eat a good breakfast, and go to work.
2) Work hard and smart for eight or nine hours.
3) Go home.
4) Read the comics, watch a funny movie, dig in the dirt, play with your kids, etc.
5) Eat well and sleep well.

This is called recreating. Doing steps 1, 3, 4, and 5 enable step 2. Working regular hours and recreating daily are simple concepts. They are hard for some of us because that requires personal change. They are possible since we all have the power to choose to do them. In considering the issue of overtime, I am reminded of my eldest son. When he was a toddler, If people were visiting the apartment, he would not fall asleep no matter how long the visit, and no matter what time of day it was.! He would fight off sleep until the visitors left.. It was as if he was afraid that he would miss something. Once our visitors' left, he would go to sleep. By this time, however, he was over tired and would scream through half the night with nightmares. He, my wife, and I, all paid the price for his fear of missing out. Perhaps some people put in such long hours because they don't want to miss anything when they leave the office. The trouble with this is that events will never stop happening. That is life! Things happen 24hours a day. Allowing for little rest is not ultimately practical. So, take a nap. Things will happen while you're asleep, but you will have the energy to catch up when you wake.

Hence "LOVE YOUR JOB BUT NEVER FALL IN LOVE WITH YOUR COMPANY (Because you never know when it stops loving you)" - Narayana Murthy

3 comments:

  1. In many companies, there exists an unsaid but presumed rule/culture of not leaving the office until your immediate boss has. Fortunately not so at my current workplace. However, the subordinate ends up sitting late at work. Productivity levels drop and dissatisfaction levels rise in every such extra minute spent in office.(a beautiful example of 'Your mind is not where your soul is').
    Guess the HR departments of such organisations should contribute to stop this pointless practice. And it goes without saying that if the managers do not want to promote this culture ...please come forward and say it.

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  2. Pooja Deshmane3:00 AM

    I totally agree with Aniket and vaishali...it is the job of HR to formulate such policies...well said....

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  3. I agree & very well relate to your point which states how difficult it is to manage expectations of those employees who work long hours,I believe it makes them feel that they are the only people working in the organization and rest are not so important.In fact i have experienced someone who started behaving as how the youngest child in a family of 4 kids would behave by trying to attract most of the attention and at the same time would want to be on top of everything... simply because that individual has put extra hours( whether productive or not so productive)

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