In search of lost time

Laws governing working time may not be enough to stop the UK's culture of long hours

Lost productivity has long been an obsession of management and perhaps of the British in particular. Stories of the number of days lost to sickness, strikes and so on are a staple of our newspapers. However, over on the continent a more relaxed attitude prevails. As a Spanish friend once said, "We work to live; the British live to work." It's hard to deny - even the Germans work less than we do.

Perhaps it's the Protestant work ethic with its implications of self-discipline and cold showers or perhaps it's our cultural proximity to the US and its American Dream, but the UK is certainly obsessed with work. For media scions of blue-chip, blue-rinse Britain such as the Daily Mail, the drear prospect of "lost hours" has always been a word pairing to rank alongside "social worker", "Old Labour" and "modern art".

But the idea of an opportunity to prosper being squandered by malingerers, bolshie unions, faulty transport and the like is surely prejudice. Who truly believes that, outside the most humdrum process tasks, wasted time is about not being there? The wrong infrastructure, a lack of skills and unwieldy processes - these are surely more to blame for lost opportunity. You might just as well blame "time wasted" on boiling of kettles, gossiping and meetings about meetings.

The truth is that we work too hard. In congregations of IT managers, the subject is a feature of breakout sessions and water-cooler discussions.

The theme is invariable: not enough time to plan, to test systems, to act as a mentor to staff; more importantly, not enough time with family and friends outside work.

The issue has been exacerbated with the trends towards real-time trading, wireless and always-on working that with clanking timbre remind us business is a city that never sleeps and that, in the words of Intel founder Andrew Grove, only the paranoid survive.

However, outside forces may mandate a change to the non-stop culture.

The European Working Time Directive, designed to limit the amount of work firms demand of individuals, has had only a notional effect in the UK.

This is hardly surprising given the provision that staff can elect to work longer than the 48-hour a week maximum.

But the EC will look again at the opt-out clause no later than 23 November and the soundings are that it will challenge the UK's position as villain of the working-hours piece. In theory, this should benefit the staff of IT departments, where the need for helpdesk support, the unpredictable nature of systems availability and overrunning projects mean early starts and late nights are commonplace.

Ironically, such well-meaning interventions could carry an unfortunate side-effect. Setting up processes to limit the number of hours that staff work is likely to include an IT component - many software developers have already developed programs or adapted time-management software to deal with the issue. At the same time, the flexible working rules introduced with the Employment Act last year will see many IT departments spend an increasing amount of time supporting home workers.

The net effect of all this is that unless there is a real push from Brussels or a radical change in UK working culture, the IT department is likely to remain a bastion of the long-hours culture.

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