MANY did not realise they have been working days and nights till their health deriorated or even died. In the name of survival of the fittest, employees are forced to wok too much and too long.
Cost of urban livings climbed gradually but not their salaries. Barking to the government won't help them much as life must go on and children need to be fed. Its time to do extra works for extra monies either in the same company or different.
Some go OT, double jobs, sidelines and any names as long as it can generate extra cash for them. In some poor countries, lecturers get extra cash after office hours as taxi drivers. Lower scale employees did double or triple jobs and they worked 18 hours a day including weekends. Sorry to say that some even part timely prostitute themselves to survive among the fittest.
Those situations happened in Malaysia even though we are no longer in the group of poor countries. We are slightly better than the Africans, Indonesians and the Mongolians. But we are far from USA, Europe, UK, Australia and other 1st world countries.
A recent survey in Malaysia found 70 per cent of employees spend between two and five
hours working beyond their official work hours every day, with 63 per cent
admitting to not spending enough time with their family due to long working
hours.
Jobstreet.com surveyed 954 employees across various
industries in Malaysia two months ago, shockingly revealed that nearly 54 per
cent of the respondents don't even get the chance to finish their annual leave
entitlement.
"More and more executives are staying back late in the
office, due to the increasing demands of their work, particularly meetings.
Many are forced to attend evening discussions, or clear their work after office
hours because of meetings, crises or other interruptions during the day,"
said Corporate Coach Academy chief executive officer Michael Heah.
"It's a critical time for both employers and employees
to do something about this before they suffer burnout, develop health problems
or put a strain on their relationships.
"Although many employees are aware that they're
spending too much time working, most are afraid to convey their unhappiness to
their bosses.
"Unfortunately, it's not in our culture to tell our
superiors how we feel or what we want," he said.
Nearly 75 per cent of the survey respondents stay late at
the office to complete their heavy workload, with a majority stating that
they're not paid for the extra hours they put in.
Only 25 per cent of respondents don't get any interruptions
from work during their holidays, while 78 per cent ensure their handphones are
contactable by their bosses at all times. Almost all respondents get emergency
texts from their bosses.
Heah commented that Asian employers tend to be more
demanding than Westerners because they themselves are workaholics.
"The reasoning that 'If I can do it, why not you?"
causes many employers to force these expectations and feelings of guilt onto
their employees. Just like how they are afraid to tell their immediate bosses
how they feel or what they want, these people inculcate the same behaviour in
their subordinates. Hence, this syndrome perpetuates in the workplace like an
ingrained work culture for all to follow.
"Having said that, most organisations are doing a lot
of 'fire-fighting' because business has become more challenging. This gives
rise to many unnecessary activities, which affect lives, in and out of the
workplace."
The work-life balance survey also revealed that the top
reasons respondents gave for working overtime were unreasonable deadlines and
an overloading of work.
The majority of respondents felt companies needed to provide
flexi working hours, allowing them the option of choosing from a range of start
and end times.
Another suggestion was for companies to have a policy
encouraging employees to work less than 40 hours a week, rather than making it
compulsory to work from 9am to 6pm daily.
About 60 per cent indicated that their company did not carry
out any initiatives to promote work-life balance at all.
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