I used to work 10-15 hours a day, weekends included, in a small lab. I did not mind it, I felt seen, my boss was happy with my efforts, and I thrived in that atmosphere.
I now work completely remote for significantly more money, spending 10-16 hours indoors interacting with nobody. It's hell. My extra hours are unseen. I barely see the sun. My weight is ballooning.
My point: WFH is great for people with families or partners, or anyone who has essentially a settled home life. But for single people, WFH is torture.
I do 100% agree that it should be a choice, and not a mandate to RTO. I'd take it in a heartbeat if it was an option
Depends in how much you view your work as "work", I guess. In my old job, I used to spring out of bed burning with ideas I wanted to implement, and when you have that freedom to play with your work, the concept of billable work hours quickly falls apart.
In this job, I have less freedoms to play with my work, so I'm with you that 8 hours should be it
Nah. I respect your point but I don’t agree. I sometimes have this urge to do some extra hours because what I do is super fun, challenging and I learn a lot. It feels like gaming or hobby projects at times.
But what I learned after decade and a half in my job is that 6 hours of such work is a hard limit. Later one starts to burn out quickly. It’s like going on turbo boost. Nice fly but fuel is going down pretty quickly.
My brain performance goes also down quickly in such a sprint so the outcome quality goes down as well without even me noticing.
8 hours. Then I go with my life doing something completely different. No matter how much fun I have at work.