Inefficiencies of Overtime Work In Projects

Fausto Betances is a project management practitioner with more than 15 years of experience managing programs and professional services operations in the global stage. With more than 200 successfully executed projects for Fortune 500 companies in the United States and Latin America, Mr. Betances has accumulated a vast experience managing diverse work environments.

  Resource Management  

In the knowledge economy, working extensive hours is sometimes equated to dedication, loyalty and even productivity. If a product can be produced in eight hours, two should be forthcoming in 16--a widely, if mistakenly, held extrapolation of production proportionality.

In some cases, employees volunteer to sacrifice personal time in the interest of their projects and their careers. In others, managers demand--tacitly or implicitly--dedication to the department, project or company in the form of extended hours in order to meet a particular deadline or objective.

While dedication, motivation and personal drive can carry the day at first, that doesn’t last. Sustained extended hours of work end up diminishing production and discouraging creativity. The expectations of a demanding manager, a challenging project or a tight schedule are ill-suited substitutes for sound planning. As seen in different industries, long work days over a prolonged period of time diminish the return of regular and extra hours and defeat the purpose of the additional effort.

For an employee working 10 hours per day, five days a week, productivity decreases to 92%(1) by the fourth week. At 80%, the dip is even bigger at the seventh-week mark. In other words, for every 50 hours worked, only 40 are actually earned--the same as having worked a regular 40-hour week with zero overtime.

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