Advice that we should never allow ourselves to be overworked and burned out is easy to give to someone else.
However, what exactly do you do so that you don't end up overworked? In practice, it's difficult to achieve this.
Since I'm not one of the manager's favorites and I still care not to lose this job, it's very difficult to keep that balance and not let the manager overwhelm me with more work than I can possibly handle, leading to burnout and exhaustion.
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"40 hours, 45 tops then log out and walk away. You have a family commitment, a dr appointment. Until this is painful all the way up the mgmt chain, nothing will change."
That was my experience as well. I was given impossible deadlines and more responsibilities, but no bump in pay, and no real push to get me some help (despite my manager always saying she was on that).
I just started working 7:30-4PM and clocking out. Even then, I was never offered any comp time for the weekend installs I was always on the line for.
In the end, I got a "Meets Most" on my last review, and that was management's signal to let me go during COVID so they could ship my job to India.
Don't pass up using your R & R.
Maybe sack up Nancy and actually do some work
Good advice. With reduced team size and increased responsibilities cutting back on hours may be seen as lower productivity. It may also feel that way to you as well. But just know you are giving the company what was agreed on. They will continue to squeeze us until we are gone or dead and then squeeze who remains harder. Put an honest day’s work in and take your life back.
Totally agree! Lots of great comments and tips! Set boundaries!
Taper down your hours. Slowly reduce how late you stay over a period of time so it is less noticeable.
Alternatively create an errand that you must run at the end of the day. Then you will have to leave to run the errand. Never skip this fictional errand.
Assuming you are the type of person who need to complete tasks before leaving, you will need to develop a new skill. You will need to find a way to pause your work.
Take notes near the end of the day, so you will be able to read the notes the next day and pick up where you left off. You will need to stop working before the end of the day to cover this prepare-for-tomorrow phase of your day. There will be inefficiencies with shutting stuff down and starting stuff up tomorrow, that is normal.
The one thing you need to remember:
If Frank wanted you to be efficient, you would be properly staffed.
Set boundaries. Learn to say no.
40 hours, 45 tops then log out and walk away. You have a family commitment, a dr appointment. Until this is painful all the way up the mgmt chain, nothing will change.