My editorial for the day.

I once got an email from a place I used to work at that started with this research factoid:

"Tardiness costs U.S. businesses more than $3 billion each year in lost productivity. The effect on the bottom line of the average business is significant: An employee who is late 10 minutes each day has, by the end of the year, taken the equivalent of a week's paid vacation." (source: HR Magazine, Nov. 2005, by Dianna DeLonzor)

Awesome.

Got anything about Saturdays?

And then the email went on to say that tardiness and leaving early were becoming an increasing problem in the company and restated the normal working hours.  At this point my coworker and I had been busting our behinds, working long hours, all with a paycut in hand.  To say we were insulted by this email would be an understatement. And here is the issue we had with the email.

Being the fantastic market researchers that we were and still are, this research has a flaw. It is not telling the whole story (and it's very outdated, but we'll ignore that).  How many weeks of unpaid vacation are employees getting for all of the extra time they put in?  What is the counter-effect?  Is the reason these employees are coming in 15 minutes late each day because they are staying an hour or two after work each day? Or possibly working into the wee hours of the Tonight Show?  How much time are they giving without being paid?

My coworker put together the best email in response to the email that we got.  Of course it didn't get sent to anyone but it sure made us feel good. It's hanging on my wall and always puts a smile on my face.

"Working overtime and being extremely busy every day can cause an employee to hate their job, cause depression, cause lack of sleep, cause frustration, and cause medical issues.  This has and will continue to be a problem for the market research department  So, our normal working hours are 8:30 to 4:15.  You do not need to work overtime because we don't want you to be late for the next day because you were up til midnight working and only spending one hour with your family.  (Source, {an awesome friend who will kill me for posting this but I'm keeping it anonymous so I think it's okay, okay?})"

And that pretty much sums up what happened after the whole company got this email.  People stopped working extra hours.  They worked during the regular business hours and were not tardy but did not stay late.  It was the start of the Disgruntled Club.

Not to mention a complete backfire on the company's part. One of many that would follow. 

Have I mentioned how much I love my NEW job? Don't get me wrong, there are many days when I work after hours. But that is okay.  That is normal, especially if you take pride in your job.  Here there is no reason for the Club.  They are successful and are busting out of their office space (no pun intended) (okay, intended) seams but so far nobody has been moved to Storage Room B and we all get to keep our staplers.  The thing that I love is that this company is so, well, normal.  And totally awesome.  And there is a completely mutual level of trust and respect.  They don't send out emails about old research cited from HR Magazine because they know that we all work our tails off and hours (although we have them - don't get me wrong) are honestly pointless as long as the work is being done to its fullest. And being a market research company they would probably laugh at that research too. 

I am so very very thankful for my new job is all I'm saying here folks.