Does it pay off to work late?
Yesterday I was very busy working on a recruitment plan of a new company. Although this was not so urgent, I wanted to complete the draft before I went to sleep. It was definitely too much, but I still wanted to see if I could succeed. As I progressed with my work, I got more and more tired and started to feel sleepy. Still, I decided not to give in, even though it was already 11 PM. I drank a lot of coffee to stay awake and kept on working, but it was getting very difficult to be productive. In the end, I did get it finished, but by that time it was already 2.20 AM.
As I got to bed so late and had consumed too much coffee, I did not sleep well. Obviously, when I woke up in the morning (I set an alarm to 8.30 AM) I did not feel very well. I was sleepy and it took me a lot of time to start working. Yesterdays late working hours had a very negative effect on my productivity in the next morning. Soon I realized that if I had stopped working earlier yesterday, then I could have completed the recruitment plan in just an hour or two in the morning. So, not only was I unproductive with finishing that plan, but, by working so late, I also ruined the start of the next day
That kind of experiment proved the fact that working for more hours means less efficiency. The more you work, the more tired you will get and the less productive you will be. It means that the amount of work done per one hour will decrease. Therefore if you work three hours on top of your normal working day, you might not get the three hour’s work done. Maybe instead you will only manage to complete the amount of tasks, which under normal circumstances would take you 2 hours.
The concept is so easy and everyone knows it but we still violate it. One reason is that we are behind schedule with our work and if the deadline is the next morning then we have no choice but to work late into the night. That kind of situation is the result of poor time management. It can be avoided by better planning, delegation, working more efficiently etc. This, however, was not the case yesterday, as I was not in a hurry with that project. There were still three more days remaining until the deadline. And yet, I did not stop working at the right time.
The reason that I worked for so long was that I was too eager to carry on with my work that I did not consider that it could be very ineffective. I overestimated my abilities and did not want to waste time on that tomorrow. I wanted to spend tomorrow’s time on new tasks. As a principle I succeeded, as I did not have to work on the recruitment plan on the following day, but as a result, my productivity was low. Therefore working late last night still wasted time the following morning.
How could this have been avoided? First, if I had not decided to finish that plan yesterday, there would not even have been such a problem. It is good to remind yourself that completing a task is likely to take more time than we think. If I had kept my schedule less tight then I could have avoided working so long.
Second, I should have followed the main rules of time management. Work less, work smart is a well-proven rule and there is no need to experiment about it.
Third, at the point were I noticed I was behind my schedule I should have admitted it and made a change to my schedule and finished that task on the next day. It takes some bravery to do it, but it pays off.
And fourth, I should have simply kept in mind that I should not work at night if there is no absolute need to do that.
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My name is Kristjan-Olari Leping. I am a speed reading trainer. I have an associated professor position at the University of Tartu, am a policy analyst in a policy research center, I am a trainer and I am involved in many other business projects. 