Morgan Stanley employees claim that they work 127 hours every week. If you do a quick calculation, a person who works for 127 hours a week roughly works around 18 long hours every single day of the week. If you add in the hours of getting to work, going home, taking a bath, dressing, the person would only have 4 hours of sleep every night.
Bragging about working hours has become the new badge of honor for certain types of workers, especially for lawyers, consultants, marketing specialists, and bankers. Many service providers who have clients from all over the world must answer emails and telephone calls 24/7.
For some people, working long hours shows commitment. There are certain professions wherein every hour of the day is billable. Therefore, the more work that's put in, the more money will be made.
However, is bragging about long working hours just lots of noise with only little to back up the claim? How many people claim to work for 90 hours a week plus an 8-hour business class flight wherein they just work for 30 minutes to an hour, take a nap for about 4 hours, and then watch movies for the rest of the flight?
As it turns out, there's quite a lot. Researchers from the US found that the more people brag about their working hours, the bigger the gap is between the reality and their bragging.
Labor Statistics Bureau conducted a research and they found that those who claim to be working 44 hours a week only work for 36.2 hours in reality. And those who are claiming to work 64 hours a week, actually work for 44.2 hours only. As for those who claim to have 74-hour workweeks, they only work for 52.8 hours.
Despite what everyone is saying, it's extremely rare for people to put in 55 to 60 hours a week of actual work.
There are many theories as to why the discrepancy exists. Let’s take a brief look at the ones that we think are the most probable reasons as to why people lie about their work hours.
●They are just exaggerating their working hours.
According to the US Labor Statistics Bureau, people aren't very good at giving estimates on their work hours. When you ask them about the amount of work they do every single week, Americans have the tendency to report much longer hours compared to when they keep an accurate diary of the work that they do.
●They aspire to be the "ideal worker."
In many professional jobs, there are expectations for the "ideal worker" such as full devotion and availability for the job. There must also be no other personal interests and responsibilities that may interfere with the commitment to work.
●They want to feel superior.
People who boast of their long hours at work are usually insecure. They want other people to be impressed by their devotion to their job. It’s the same reason why people would over-exaggerate the stress or difficulties of their work or tell other people that they are "incoming analysts" of certain companies.
