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Working late won’t earn you a promotion

Career Tips

They send emails at 11pm, and are the last ones to leave the office. Even though your work day ends at around 5pm, you feel guilty and are tempted to restrict your communication between 10pm and midnight just to show that you are also working as hard. Every workplace has a few of these; people who seem to be working at all hours of the night and who make the rest of us feel guilty for not eating, living, breathing work.

Research shows, however, that in the mid-to-long term, people who are unable to switch off from work or who work extraordinarily long hours become less and less effective as time goes by. It’s also called the Law of Diminishing Returns. But how do you maintain a work-life balance without feeling overshadowed by 11pm emailers, and without feeling like you also need to compete in the race for ‘who’s the last to leave the office’ ?

Clarity

The Eisenhower Box, a diagram that has four boxes that categorises tasks between important and urgent is used by many people who are seeking to become better at time management. It is backed up by starting the day with a list of your most critical tasks in order of importance. Once you have clarity on the top half of your list, then it is easier to knock off at 5pm without guilt. This does not mean that you don’t not work late when you need to, but it should not be a daily habit that becomes the norm.

Distractions

How many times do we go to the internet to conduct specific research and find that, an hour later you cannot recall what you were looking for in the first place? If you spend two hours of your most productive time looking at cat videos or on social media, then it is likely that you will find yourself working later and later to make up for this.

And while it is easier said than done, the ability to cut down on your social media consumption during working hours is essential to getting through your to-do list within your work hours. To ease yourself into this, use a timer. Start with 30 minutes of uninterrupted focus and take 10 minutes after that to stretch, have some water or get onto the internet. After your 10 minute break is up, however, get back to work.

 Results-oriented

We do not just go to work for work’s sake, there are results that are expected of us. Seek clarity on these results and ensure that you are continuously measuring yourself against them. Who do you think will get more positive attention - the person who delivers results or the ones who leaves work at midnight every day?

 

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