Is it weird to like working 100 hrs a week?
I always preferred to work over 14 hrs a day and always felt the 40 a week is not enough. Since my job requires a lot of analysis and research, it is quite enjoyable to work all day. I recently saw an article and could not understand why there is such a negative attitude toward long hours (80 is not a lot).
What do experienced people think about the hours in finance?
Most people are neither terribly ambitious nor workaholics, and would prefer a comfortable work-life balance over grinding 100-hour weeks at the office. If you're either one of those, then it's no problem. I like working long hours myself (as long as the work is interesting).
Let us know what you think when you're no longer in college
Working 80 hours a week is pretty fucking stupid if you ask me, let alone 100.
yea, these people need to get some hobbies. Or someone they enjoying spending time with. If you are putting in 100 hours a week, I really hope that its going towards your own company, and not someone else's...
"(80 is not a lot)"... Almost reads like a troll post.
hardooooooooooooooooooo
guilty as charge lol.
you have to do 140 a week here in order to be recognized. I do 100 a week on a slow week around holidays. usually average 150 a week.
24x7 = 168 hours per week in total
140 hours work
3 hours sleep per night = 21 hours
24x7-140-3x7 = 7
That leaves 1 hour a day to poop, travel, and shower. But you can maximize your time if you shower every other day and sleep in the office.
Edit I guess you can check emails in the John.
Wait until you have a family
So you can put them to work at a sweatshop bucket am I right?
“Damn you six years old. That modeling is shut. Our four year old could do better. “
Delete
Honestly going out too much gets repetitive and boring
Working long hours makes you appreciate those times you go out a lot more
As if going out is the only alternative to work.
yes.
Only if you’re married
I hate myself and I still want to have at least some time to pretend to enjoy life. You’re probably a sociopath.
Why do you hate yourself?
I feel sorry for anyone who legit likes working those hours. Fuck that shit because life is short and better enjoyed outside any office/cubicle.
If you have no friends, family, or hobbies, yeah sure 100 hours a week is fine, but if you enjoy working that much, you probably haven't explored the rest of life well enough. I like working, but I like other stuff even more.
Just a bit of side advice to the college students reading this.....in college, you need to figure out your career direction, but you also need to figure out what you like doing in your spare time and what you love. Otherwise, you end up becoming an empty workaholic tool or someone whose idea of life is working hard and then slamming a liter of hard liquor in their free time. Discover life and enjoy it.
Find the work you love and what you love when you're not working.
If you account for sleep at just 6 hrs/night, that still means you're stuck in an office plugging away 80% of your time. If you wanted to use 8hrs sleep/night, that's 90% of your time spent working. That's literally not getting anything out of life but work. How can you like missing on everything in life but work? And, if the bank decided to go a different way, they can just fire you and then it would be all for absolutely nothing.
IMO, laws of diminishing return and return on time are heavily relevant to working past 60 hours a week. Very, very few people can work at an optimal pace consistently after hitting past 60-70 hours, especially if it's thoughtful work with open ended thinking.
In fact, I'd argue a person who works 60/week but gets good sleep + exercise can do more than a person doing 80/week if you factor in productivity and tangible results per hour. I'd rather be the person who realizes "wait, I can automate this" than the person who spends the hours grinding and you more often than not need a well rested balanced mind to realize this
This guy understands science/importance of sleeping. +1
Everyone on here should read "Why We Sleep" -- your views on working 100 hours a week might (should) change quite rapidly.
Yes it is weird.
Sounds shit. Based on what I've heard from more senior people, you're going to regret this when you're older. If you're seriously happy, there is probably something wrong with you, but whatever floats your boat. I think it's a waste of a life to spend it all working and sleeping.
Plus, if you're working 100h per week you're probably getting paid as much per hour as a burger flipper.
Weird flex but ok
wouldn't u just wanna go home and crank?
There is not a negative attitude towards working long hours if you are not letting your mental health / important relationships suffer as a result of those long hours - it only gets brought up when it causes severe reactions from those doing those hours like in the article you mentioned. Specifically in finance, as you'll see below, I think a lot of the "long hours" are really just wasted hours sitting in the office. A few thoughts below on this general topic:
Didn't read any of the responses because the only correct answer is yes, you're a complete psychopath and if you push along the ranks your analysts will have dreams about killing you.
lol forreal though. There was a point where I was losing my mind, picturing killing my boss and shit. Lack of sleep + stress + asshole boss will do that to you.
you're a coward if you do anything less than 170/week IMO
Do you constantly fly while working to try and squeeze 25 hours into a day?
gotta be willing to do what others aren't
Ok wait. To play Devil's advocate, if you truly believe in the vision behind your work and want to solve the problem behind your job, I wouldn't consider it weird.
Plenty of people work 80-100/hour weeks for over 50% paycuts vs the comp we're talking about in finance and actually like it. If you run a startup or work in an early stage company, this can often be the case. If you're at a hedge fund and strive to be the 1% that actually adds value, then kudos to you. 100 hours a week could arguably be very worth it.
80-100 hours is only an inherent problem when you know you don't need to work that much to drive value in your seat but are pressed by external forces to sit there nonetheless
To add, if you are a surgical resident, you are working 80-100 hr weeks for years and probably 20-25% of the comp that bankers get.
I'm not going to hate - you do you. I'm sure employers would much rather have you than me all things being equal. But my dude, you're mortal, consider there might be something to spend your time doing besides work and "going out."
What is wrong with you?
Why are you on wso? Get back to work lazy ass...
Right now i work probably around 80. But that's because everything after 40-50 is spent building a business.
Nothing wrong working those hours if it is something you are truly passionate about but can't emphasize again you must first and foremost take care of your mental health/personal relationships first.
"Though it’s only the beginning stages of trying to figure out why this happened, I came across a concept, maladaptive perfectionism, that combines unrealistic standards of achievement with hypercriticism of failing to meet them."
https://www.law.com/americanlawyer/2018/11/12/big-law-killed-my-husband…
I am currently working 12 hour per day with weekends off, and I seriously dont get how you guys enjoy working more than that.
Monday to friday my life is pretty much: Wake Up, work, gym, sleep with maybe around 1 hour of actual free time.
How do you guys make time for other stuff with e.g 15 hour days?
You don't. For most people, 15 hour days usually result in not doing anything but working, travelling to/from work, and sleeping.
I seriously couldn't see myself doing that for an extended time period. I have had a few 80 hour weeks in my internship, and i fucking hated it.
The term “workaholic” exists for a reason - some people really do have a problem staying away from the desk.
I was and am a renowned hardo among my friends, @LeveredCat" . It has carried me far professionally and personally.
I imagine you’re young and new to the grind. With time I think you will realize there is more to life than just what we accomplish in the corner offices of ivory towers.
I suggest you read the poem “Under Ben Bulben” by Yeats, and the epitaph it concludes with, and really strive to understand the deeper meaning of the poem as a benediction for those who live their lives in pursuit of beautiful art. Think then about what it really means to spend a whole life at your desk clicking merrily away on the client’s deck.
There is joy in work, but folly in fetishizing it.
Never forget:
“Remember Man, as you pass by As you are now, so once was I As I am now, so you will be Prepare yourself to follow me.”
Prepare accordingly.
Buddy you’ve never worked a 40 hour week and you’re sitting here yelling working professionals that 80 is not a lot? Haha, this site gets better and better...
You have no one to impress here, just stop.
Those 100 hour investment banking and research jobs are soon going to go away thanks to technology. Or you will be replaced with someone younger. you may think you are investing this time in your career, but at the end your chance of a payoff are very slim. better off starting your own business and putting in those hours. remember, no one on their death bed every said "i wish i had spent more hours in the office".
Dude you're fine. Just do you. If you truly enjoy the work that you're doing then so be it, work however many hours you'd like and don't let others guilt-trip you into "having a life". If that's the life you want to live then I don't see why you should deviate into the type of life other people model on your behalf.
I think the vast vast majority of people (myself included) live life simply to maximize the feeling of happiness. Even though just like any other feeling, it's fleeting and is directly determined by circumstances and environments. I don't think you should be ashamed or feel weird about living a life with the goal of maximizing achievement or impact. Not saying you're necessarily selfless considering you're on WSO after all, but the world needs those kinds of people every once in a while (ex. Einstein, Tesla, MLK etc.).
MLK worked 100 hours a week?
Flagged.
Spoken like someone with no experience. When I was a young padawon, I liked the IDEA of working a lot. Now that I am working all the time, it just plain blows.
If you really work 100+ hours a week, you just think about wanting to go to sleep. Hell, I wish I could work out consistently or even (God forbid) go out on a date every now and again without work blowing up on me. It's a fucking curse and we all know it.
Nobody can sustain 80hrs + a week.
If you're working that long over a long period of time, you're either so bad at your job that you can't either a) get anything better. b) complete workload in a normal time.
Neither is something to be proud of.
That's not even counting social life.
I like grinding intensely hard in short bursts followed by breaks where I get to fuck around.
While 100 hour weeks are relatively uncommon for me, 75-80 hour weeks with weekend work are becoming a norm. To be blunt, I fucking hate it because I rarely get to see my friends and it freaks my family out. However, I do like getting paid a nice chuck of money each month.
90 hours a week with one day on the weekend completely off is great. I find that I prioritize my time better and that day off makes time with loved ones special every single time. Plus, working just feels good. What makes working a ton difficult is when there becomes no day off in sight, when weekends meld into Mondays and you can't distinguish between work life and family life. If you can manage to work a ton of hours each week and still keep some days "protected" then I think that's a good way to live life. Maybe not a life I'd want to live forever after retirement, but in my working years I want to be working.
Dude, I don’t think you fully comprehend what 90 hours a week means.
Speaking as someone who has had multiple in a row, they’re pretty brutal and the incremental to get 100+ is even worse.
Sun - 2-10 - 8 hours M - 930-330 - 18 hours Tu - 930-230 - 17 hours W - 9-1130 - 14.5 hours Th - 10-2 - 16 hours F - 10-8 - 10 hours then dinner and passed out before being able to go out Today - 11-6 (hopefully) - 7 hours
That’s almost exactly 90 hours and my social interaction was/is limited to Friday dinner and hopefully Saturday dinner/game watching. The rest has been sleep.
I'm speaking from experience. The most difficult part for most people is probably the sleep. I think how much sleep you need is mostly dependant on genetics. I need 6 hours a night to feel good and I usually get that most nights. Which means I have a real Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday night (plus usually a full day Saturday). That kind of schedule is definitely not for everyone though. All I'm saying is that for some people it isn't impossible to enjoy life while working a lot of hours. I would say though that if that got bumped up to 100 hours a week it would change the game completely and quality of life would diminish considerably.
I like to go to the gym. Pretty much impossible to do this with less than seven hours of sleep constantly.
If you have meaningful people in your life it would be challenging to keep them in your life as you literally have no time for them. Certainly would take the right type of mate and friends. Know several that have pulled it off and have done amazingly well (stratospheric!) Most don't as keeping that pace is ridiculous for 99.9% of humans. They either figure out another path to greatness or just decide they don't want "this" anymore.
The key is being honest with yourself. If you love it, great. If you don't great. Just don't try to play the game as that would be miserable.
I think this is not normal. Your nervous system will wear out and you will have to undergo a long course of treatment with a psychotherapist. Would your children like it? I think you should take care.
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