What is your work day? What is your work week? A Poll

In My Humble Opinion
1

What is your work day? Flexible? Non? 8 hours, not counting commute? 10? How many hours a week? Staff or hourly pay? Do you work Monday through Friday all the time? Time-shift? Day-shift? Tele-commute? Split it between office and tele? Work 5 days but not Monday through Friday ?

I just read that New York City ( and the surrounding states ) skew the entire NATION’S commuting statistics. We have long-commuters. folks who drive more than 90 minutes to work. That’s me. 60 minutes means it’s an unusually easy day and I have a 1pm call time in the city. A 9 am call time means I leave my house at 5:30 am and am likely to skate up near being late. That’s right. It can take me much more than two hours to get to the neighborhood where I work a lot, and then I look for a street parking spot ( savings: $ 25-40.00 ).

The article talked about the steep rise in reverse-commuters who either drive or take rail or buses. About how the reverse commuters are moving in, numbers-wise, on the rush hour inbound people.

So, how do you manage your work week? Is it the work life-style you prefer, or would you go for another way of doing it? Have you had the pluperfect work situation and left it?

And, the million-dollar naughty secret query- if you DO drive to and from work, what do you do, or not do, in the car when driving ? Me, I use a headset and talk on the cellular, check info on my PDA ( dangerous… Inno ), eat food, drink coffe. Having confessed this, I must say it’s a terror, seeing what folks do at 68 mph.

I’m a freelancer. I could go the week with no work. Typically I drive into New York City a few days a week, but I can just as easily travel throughout the country working. ( the last 4 months have shown me Los Angeles, Boulder, Lexington KY, Toledo, Detroit, Canada, Philly and so on. Totally unpredictable.

Cartooniverse

2

I work M-F. My hours are 9-5 M-Th and 9-4 on Friday, but I usually go in about a half hour late to catch the mail at the post office. My office is a five minute drive from my house.

3

I’m employed full time by my company but we work as consultants on client sites. The hours depend on the project, but for the most part they’re somewhere close to 8:30 - 5:30 (more depending on what deliverables are due when). We’re all paid on salary.

A lot of times I wind up taking my laptop home with me to work, so I bill anywhere from 35-60 hours a week.

I don’t mind too much, it only takes me 10 minutes (15 on a bad day) to drive to and from work, since both my home and the job site I’m at now are right off the interstate. I can easily run home for lunch.

4

I’ve got a pretty straightforward 8-5, M-F job. A lot of people assume that, since I work for a university, I get the summer off. NOT!

I have about a 10-minute drive to work. If I didn’t have a car, I’d be screwed, because the town I live in has NO public transportation.

There are the occasional evening and weekend assignments, and, beyond that, my laptop goes with me everywhere. I often handle work-related things in the evenings or on weekends at home.

I am a one-person office (I have no support staff and I’m the only one who does what I do).

Cartooniverse, I don’t think I could ever have freelancing be my sole source of income. It’s that “I could go a week or more with no work” part that would freak me out. I want that regular, predictable paycheck.

5

I work 45ish hours a week, very flexible schedule (9-5 in the office, and some work in the evening at home). I telecommute at will-- we have a strict “Do not bring your germs in here” policy. If you’re sick, stay home. I’m only a mile and a half from the office, so I go in most days. Some of my coworkers with longers drives come in less often. As long as I meet my deadlines, I could probably make my own hours. I enjoy the company, though, so I keep standard “business hours”. Sometime during crunches it can get nuts, but that’s not too often. Sometimes my hours must adjust to fit around the production schedule-- yesterday I worked at home from 1PM to 10PM.

We are a very international business, so someone from the company is working, somewhere in the globe, at any hour of day or night. I think that’s what allows us to be flexible. I love my schedule, and the way the company handles the whole issue.

6

Regular hours are M-F, 7:45am-3:05pm. Irregular hours, due to coaching a high school speech & debate team, Saturdays and Sundays from 6am until hopefully very late pm, about twice a month. Total commute time, including stopping to pick up a paper on the way to school, 10 minutes.

7

Monday through Friday, with a rare Saturday if work dictates it. My hours are 9-4:45, but I’m usually at the office by 8:00am to try and get my stuff together before the day starts. I don’t take a lunch, but I could if I felt like it. I’m hourly, which is nice with the overtime. It usually takes me somewhere between 20 and 30 minutes to commute.

8

Standard M-F, 8:30-5 schedule (though I usually get there a little early and leave a little late). Hour plus commute each way (reverse, thank god) – I listen to music, mostly, and think. I keep a pad and pen in the car for jotting notes on whatever it is I’m thinking about – but try to “hold that thought” till I’m at a light.

9

I work at an English private school.

I work some hours every day of the week (but never before 10.30 :slight_smile: ).
I work Bank Holidays if they fall in term time, but get 19 weeks holiday per year. :eek:

10

I work whenever and as much as I need to to get my work done. I’m self-employed and work at home. My commute takes about 20 seconds: ten steps out of bed, eleven steps down, and about twelve feet to the left.

I love being freelance. Sometimes the hours can be killer (when I’m crunched, I sometimes work long stretches of mornings, afternoons, evenings, AND weekends), and if I take a sick day or a vacation there’s no one to pick up the slack. The buck stops with me, which can be both good and bad. And some days I wish I had an IT department to take care of computer snafus. But I love love love being able to manage my own hours, choose my own work, decorate my office as I wish, decide what tools and equipment to use, etc. etc. And I’m making way more than I did the last time I punched a clock. I can’t even envision going back to a Real Job.

Eleven years and counting.

Mr. S used to commute 52 miles one way, five days a week, and I had a 35-mile one-way trip to work. Now he drives about 20 miles one way (in our 50-mpg car) and my commute is zero. We spend a lot less on gas these days.

11

7:30 am to 4 pm M-F, 1/2 hour lunch. 30 minute commute to work, 45 minute commute home, reverse of rush hour (we live in the city and work in the burbs). We carpool (husband and I work together) and listen to audio books.

12

Salaryman here. Officially 8:30-5:30 weekdays, but on days when I’m teaching (like for the past two weeks) I usually arrive by 7:30 to check E-mail and gear up for the day. Most of the time when I’m teaching, I do a half-day on Saturday. I take about an hour for lunch. Most weekdays days I leave around 6 PM, but most of this week it was more like 7. About half my weekends when I’m not teaching I work a few hours at home or the office, but if I was required to, I probably wouldn’t. I’m like that. I’ve been following the same routine for close to five years and frankly I’m getting a bit burned out. I travel out to drilling sites or to out-of-town meetings about once every two months.

Commute is 30 minutes each way. I don’t do anything but drive, listen to the radio, and shake my head at the other folks who try to multitask behind the wheel.

13

What is your work day? 12:30 PM to 9:00 PM, except Wednesday, which is 10:30 AM to 7:00 PM.
How many hours a week? 40.
Staff or hourly pay? Hourly.
Do you work Monday through Friday all the time? Tuesday through Saturday.
**How do you manage your work week? Is it the work life-style you prefer, or would you go for another way of doing it? ** I’d prefer to work early in the morning and get off in the early afternoon like I did when I was in training for the job I have now. Being a new hire, I was low man on the totem pole when the shift bid was up, giving me very few choices for available shifts. When the next shift bid comes around I will have moved up the seniority ladder and will have a better selection of shifts to choose from.
Have you had the pluperfect work situation and left it? At my last job I worked Monday-Friday 6:00 AM to 2:30 PM. Perfect for me, but then I was laid off. :frowning:
**If you DO drive to and from work, what do you do, or not do, in the car when driving?**I play the music loud, shutting out any horn-honkers. I rarely talk on my cell phone as it is, much less when driving. On occasion I’ll eat something on the way to work.

In case you’re wondering, I work in a call center for booking travel for various credit cardholders who wish to redeem their award points for flights, car rentals and hotel accommodations.

14

**What is your work day? ** Typically 8-4. It can be 7:30 to 5 sometimes, though. If I had my druthers we’d start and end later, but no one asked me, and it’s definitely not the flex-time situation some people have.

How many hours a week? usually 40 there, 37.5 paid.

Staff or hourly pay? Hourly.

Do you work Monday through Friday all the time? How do you manage your work week? Is it the work life-style you prefer, or would you go for another way of doing it? M-F 90% of the time, M-Sat the rest. It works for me, given that anyone I’d want to hang out with works M-F too. Having days off in the middle of the week like I had for a summer job wasn’t very successful on the social life front. I also like predictability…I’m glad I don’t need to look at a schedule every week or two to know which days I’m working any given week.

Have you had the pluperfect work situation and left it? I’m not sure pluperfect is the word you were aiming for…but probably not. All my jobs have had something to be desired about them.

If you DO drive to and from work, what do you do, or not do, in the car when driving? I listen to music (and sing along), or the very occasional audiobook. And swear at other drivers, not that they can hear me. The cell phone stays off and in my purse. I’m frightened that 17% of people in a survey done last year said they use their PDA while driving. Mine is my baby, but I wouldn’t dream of looking at it while driving!

15

Semi-retired. I work a few hours on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, from noon-ish to 2 or 3. A good month, maybe 20 hours. One commute is 8 miles, the other is 20.

I’ve considered other part-time jobs, but I love the two people I work for and I love the flexibility, especially not having to drive when the roads are bad.

16

I work about 20 hours a week, putting in about five hours each day. In the winter, it cuts down to about ten hours a week, unless we’re putting in a new exhibit.

I’m paid hourly, but my pay is so low as to be a mostly symbolic gesture.

I live a block and a half from the museum, so I generally walk (unless it’s inclimate.)

I have the perfect job for me right now. It’s a great work environment-- we have a really good sense of teamwork going on and we have a lot of fun together. I get to be creative and my intelligence is respected. I can start projects whenever I wish or just bum around doing research all day if the mood takes me. Sure, I wish it paid a little more, but I figure actually being *happy *to go to work in the morning is worth a lot more than money.

17

What is your work day? 8:00 - 17:30 in the office. A couple of hours of concalls per week anywhere from 5:00 (damn EST) to 21:00. lucky if 30 minutes for lunch

when travelling, it’s usually 6:00 until I go to bed

I also lose about 1 weekend per month to work and/or work travel

How many hours a week? 55-60 average
Staff or hourly pay? Expatriate, so staff
Do you work Monday through Friday all the time? yep, and rarely get national holidays since I work for a global team.
Have you had the pluperfect work situation and left it? this is the closest I’ve had. too many hours and bureaucracy, but the rest is really good

If you DO drive to and from work, what do you do, or not do, in the car when driving? when I commute in the taxi, see customers or go to the airport. I turn on IM and then do as much email (80%+) as I can using a PDA, take/make calls. And if I get all of that work stuff out of the way, then I read wire service news, and finally start surfing the dope

18

Monday - Friday, 40-45 hours/week. I’m usually in the office between 8 & 9 AM, and am out of the office between 5 & 6 PM, hour lunch. Paid hourly.

Commute time is about 25 minutes by car, 45 minutes by bike, which I try to use once a week or so during the spring/summer/fall.

Occasionally on the ride home from work in my car I’ll talk on my phone, but it’s rare. I just listen to music or NPR.

I’ll usually ask my boss if I can work from home 3 or 4 days out of the year, and he never says no.

This is absolutely the work lifestyle I prefer. Love my job, the commute is tolerable and even better on the bike, pay and benefits and perks are excellent, boss is laid back, co-workers are actually easy to work with and intelligent. It has its moments as any job will, but I do love it.

19

I work Monday through Thursday, 7:00 am - 5:30 pm (4 ten-hour days). Occasionally, I will work late or will come in on a Friday if something needs to be done. I’ve worked this schedule for 11 years and will miss it much when I get a new job.

My commute is about 10 minutes by car–I listen to music and yell at the other drivers for entertainment.

20

Right now I’m somewhat away from my normal job so my hours are extremely flexible. I can go to work anytime between 8am-9pm M-F, 9am-7pm on Saturday and 10am-6pm Sunday. As long as I get my 40 in, it doesn’t much matter.
I’m about a 15 minute commute to work here in Missouri.

Before I came to Kansas City (for the month of October only) I was in California, mostly LA and San Diego. Some days I had a commute of 5 minutes, others 45 depending on where my hotel was and how bad traffic on the 405 or the 15 was on that particular day.

Those weeks I worked 5 days on, 1 off, rinse, repeat. Day 1 would be about 4 hours, day 2 was 14 hours, from then on usually 8 hour shifts, and OT as needed.
I did that from July-October. I never went below 55 hours a week.
This is only temporary though, I’m anxious to leave and get back home to my real job, which will be…:

…your almost typical 9-5ish M-F, where I will be about 15-20 minutes from home/school to work, until the Spring semester starts again, then I’ll probably work really long days on MWF and have 4 days off a week to go to school.

I haven’t known a normal sleep pattern in years.

-foxy