Do you have an employee that has become office furniture because of the number of hours he puts in at work every day? There was a time when employees stayed overtime either to get paid overtime or to show their reporting managers that they’re working harder than the rest. But, guess what, times have changed and thankfully so! For starters, no company pays overtime and secondly, just because someone puts in the extra hours, it doesn’t mean that he is working harder than the rest.
Narayana Murthy’s letter to his employees put work hours in perspective. He is known to have written a letter advising his employees to leave on time unless unavoidable. MensXP invites you to a debate about hard work versus smart work. Would you hire someone who was able to deliver in six hours as opposed to someone who struggles to deliver in 12 hours?
Working Styles Unplugged
Work Hard vs Work Smart
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On one hand, you may have an employee who finds it hard to comprehend what’s conveyed to him and finds it harder still to deliver in stipulated time. However, this is someone who’s willing to put in any amount of hours to get the job done. On the other hand, you will have an employee who delivers at the rate of knots but refuses to stay overtime unless absolutely necessary. Which one do you pick? Here’s a profile of the two types and how their productivity or lack thereof can directly affect outcomes.
·The hard worker who’s as slow as they come
This type of worker is willing to put in the extra amount of hours because he simply fails to deliver in the stipulated time. Just because he’s sitting and crunching numbers and codes furiously for hours on end, doesn’t justify the fact that he works more than the rest. Yes, he puts in longer hours but only because he cannot deliver in given time. One may confuse the number of hours with his results, however, it’s time to take a closer look at his output.
Let’s assume that you decide to keep this one considering that he doesn’t seem to give up, but you’ve got to understand that your subordinates dealing with him directly may consider him a hindrance. This holds true when he fails to comprehend a job at hand and the rest of your team spend a lot of their time simply helping him understand what he’s supposed to do. Try instructing someone who fails to understand, needs constant hand-holding, gets frequent reminders of what’s expected of him and then and only then does he get the job done.
He is wasting company time, employee’s time and of course, delayed results directly affect company profits.
·The smart worker who’s gets things done
These are rare and hard to come by but they are there somewhere in the great pool of corporate stooges. These are people who need to be told just once and voila, your job’s done. They’re faster than the rest, believe that once they complete their tasks, they can get out of the office, rarely every stay over office hours and may throw a fit if forced to on a regular basis.

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