5:00am on a Sunday Morning and Im still at Work

[Paul McKenna]

Crap! This stupid project is killin me! Anyone out there???

[Francis Siu]

Sunday still at work?
I can use two word to summarize
Disaster and tragedy
Are these word suitable?
Pay effort and get back your reward~~~

[Andres Gonzalez]

9 pm aussie time ... we're living in the future!
how come you're an "Ugly Redneck" never seen that b4..

[Marilyn de Queiroz]

He made a donation to JavaRanch and now has the privilage of using the title "Ugly Redneck". See this page for further details.
[ April 27, 2003: Message edited by: Marilyn de Queiroz ]

[R K Singh]

its 10:00 pm IST.
I am here to support you ... but I like late night working

[Mark Fletcher]

Originally posted by Sriraj Rajaram:

Crap! This stupid project is killin me! Anyone out there???

Nice to know that in the post dot-com-bubble- going-pop! era, that some people are still living on internet time!
So whats the story, is it?
a) Project deadline was yesterday and the PHBs are baying for blood
b) The PHBs have assigned you a project, that in their divine wisdom has no user requirements, a specification on the back of a cigarette packet, and right now youre trying to figure out how to get data from sources A,B,C into source D?
c) An third party integration project? Any third party integration project! I always find these cause me the worse stress... their API's advertise that they can do a particular task but when you get down to it you find all kinds of bugs which push your schedule back Strange enough I find my weekly alcohol consumption spiking on these kind of projects
Mark

[aadhi agathi]

this may be of help or a projection to an alternate view. please take it seriously as it concers our outlook towards the thing called "life "
"I'll take a nap as soon as things settle down"
by Dwayne Phillips
I know people who work 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 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 behavior poses problems, especially in an area like IT, 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 oldest 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 overtired 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 24 hours 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.
--Dwayne Phillips
Dwayne Phillips works as a software and systems engineer for the US Government. He is the author of *The Software Project Manager's Handbook: Principles that Work at Work*

[Manish Hatwalne]

I had a project leader in my first company who told us that if you have work for more than 8 hrs a day on a regular basis, something is wrong with you or with the project/company.
Seriously, if it just once in a while, it's OK we all face it. That's a ormal trend of this industry, but it is happening more frequently, find out reasons and try to rectify them(if it is in your control) .
- Manish

[Paul McKenna]

Problem is
1. One man team handling all development
2. Stupid Websphere 5.0 takes eternity to get up and running
3. I'm addicted to Javaranch