Educated employees prone to time pressures and long working hours

In Finland, highly educated professionals tend to be subject to long working hours and time pressures, according to a recent study on working hours from the University of Jyväskylä. At present, the average weekly working time is 41.6 hours per week, seven hours longer than the ideal of 34.1 hours. Time pressures rather than lack of money prevent this group from achieving a work-life balance.

Working hours

International studies have shown that managers, professionals and experts work longer hours than others. The University of Jyväskylä’s study (March 2004) examined working hours among knowledge workers. The research (in Finnish) was based on three different data sources. The first data were from a survey (pdf file) on working time. The focus group included highly educated 25 to 64-year-old employees (n=3,000). The second data source consisted of 10 different company case studies, representing IT services and the new media sector. Newspaper articles were also analysed as a third source of data.

Working hours vary within the group of highly educated employees. Around 10% work a short week (less than 34 hours per week), and about 50% work a normal working schedule (35-40 hours per week). However, about one third of this category work 41 to 49 hours per week; and one sixth had extremely long working times of over 50 hours per week.

For men, working hours in the IT sector did not differ much from working hours for highly educated men elsewhere in the private sector. Women’s weekly working hours were shorter than men’s: 40 hours for women compared with 43 hours for men. However, although women reported shorter working hours, they experienced more time pressures than their male colleagues. In addition, more women than men reported that it was difficult to reconcile working time, sleeping time and free time. This pressure was common among women of all ages, not only among mothers with children living at home.

Work-life balance

The boundaries of work and private life are blurring and work is brought home more often. This phenomenon was emphasised particularly among managers and university teachers. However, half of the respondents reported that their working hours were clearly demarcated.

Overlong working hours seem to have both voluntary and compulsory aspects. Reasons why respondents were working overlong hours can be summarised as follows:

• nature of work: level of challenge, continual flow of work, enthusiasm for and commitment to work;

• career orientation: desire to succeed and acquire wealth, aspirations to career advancement;

• problems in work organisation: too few employees in proportion to the amount of work to be done, poor management of duties, poor planning and delegation, project scheduling/customer demands too stringent.

The autonomy of work and income were highest among those who worked 50 to 59 hours per week. Among those who worked over 60 hours per week, working times were of a more compulsory nature, and these people reported a lower sense of well-being.

It was clear from the case studies that the companies had clear aims with regard to managing working time. There was a widespread belief that prolonging working hours decreases effectiveness, and that a balance between work and private life achieves the best results at work.

Time pressures and information overload

Many highly educated knowledge workers suffer from information overload due to time pressures and demanding work schedules. 71% reported working to tight deadlines and 66% said that there was always work waiting to be done. Time pressure at work resulted in sleeping problems, in an inability to detach oneself from work, and in difficulties juggling work and family life.

Conflicts about working hours, household work and personal time in families were common in the highly educated category: 45% said that there were conflicts every now and then, while 5% often had conflicts. More positively, 39% said that their working and home times were not a cause of acrimony, and 11% reported that there were no longer conflicts about working hours between the spouses.

The research revealed that women report conflicts more often than men. Conflicts were most common among people aged 25 to 44; this age category also reported the greatest time pressures.

Other interests

Work is fundamental to the highly educated group, but the most important issues of life are outside work. Most people felt a professional responsibility towards work, which included a willingness to be flexible and work long hours when necessary. However, only a minority regarded work as their primary focus in life.

The data indicate that there is a tendency away from long working hours and a work-dominated way of living. The emerging pattern seems to be an awareness of the risks of long working hours, based on the belief that there is more to life than work.

This information is available in the report Aikanyrjähdys - keskiluokka tietotyön puristuksessa (Time management: the middle class squeezed by knowledge work ), written by Raija Julkunen, Jouko Nätti and Timo Anttila, Department of Philosophy and Social Sciences, University of Jyväskylä. The research was funded by the Finnish Work Environment Fund and the Academy of Finland.