The Idea in Brief
The 40-hour workweek is dead. But people aren’t just working longer hours. They’re holding down extreme jobs—logging 60-plus hours a week and enduring 24/7 client demands, tighter-than-ever deadlines, and unpredictable work flows.
Yet strangely, many extreme workers don’t feel exploited—they feel exalted. Some love the intellectual challenge and the thrill of achieving something big. Others relish the oversize compensation packages and status that come with the territory.
Extreme jobs fuel workers’ adrenaline highs and beef up entire nations’ competitive prowess—popping up in industries as diverse as financial services, consulting, medicine, law, and manufacturing.
Still, Hewlett and Luce see hints of dangers afoot: health problems and family woes for extreme workers, along with eroded corporate productivity when extreme job holders suffer the inevitable burnout or defect for less-demanding waters.
Extreme jobs may enrich your company in the short run. But can it live with the costs in the long run?
The Idea in Practice
How Extreme Are Your Company’s Jobs?
In addition to 60-plus-hour weeks, 24/7 client demands, unpredictable work flows, and tight deadlines, many extreme jobs have these characteristics:
- Inordinate scope of responsibility
- Work-related events outside of regular work hours
- Responsibility for profit/loss
- Responsibility for mentoring/recruiting
- Large amount of travel
- Large number of direct reports
- Physical presence in the workplace 10-plus hours a day
Why the Rise in Extreme Jobs?
Powerful intersecting trends have driven the proliferation of extreme jobs:
- Competitive pressures. With fewer corporate officer positions (thanks to merger mania) and an influx of talent (owing to diversity efforts), competition for high-level jobs has intensified. People are strongly motivated to work more than their rivals to win plum roles.
- The “extreme” ethos. Many people embrace the “extreme” ethos pervading society—exemplified by thrill-seeking sports and stunt-based reality TV shows. The ethos has bled into business—making extreme jobs look glamorous and desirable.
- Communication technologies. Technology has prompted a shift in people’s expectations and behavior. Instead of putting boundaries around their workday, they’re constantly glued to their cell phones and BlackBerrys.
- Work as social center. When people’s best friends and most stimulating encounters are at the office, they’re happy to work late. Their family and personal lives atrophy. Work, not home, becomes the place where people get admiration, and respect.
- More knowledge-based work. Corporations are now filled with people who use their brains more than their brawn. They enjoy exchanging ideas with peers and find long hours stimulating, not painful.
- Globalization. As companies gain global spans of operation, the need to oversee work in multiple time zones expands—increasing managers’ travel requirements and workday length.
Is There a Dark Side?
Sobering statistics reveal extreme jobs’ dark side:
- 36% of extreme workers aged 25-34 say they’ll likely leave their jobs within two years.
- More than 69% of the authors’ study respondents believe they’d be healthier if they worked less extremely.
- 58% think their extreme jobs get in the way of strong relationships with their children.
- 65% of respondents say they’d decline a promotion if it demanded more of their energy.
A financial analyst we’ll call Sudhir emigrated five years ago from Mumbai, India. He works at a major commercial bank in New York. Summertime, when he puts in 90 hours a week, is his “light” season. The rest of the year, he works upwards of 120 hours per week—leaving only 48 hours for sleeping, eating, entertaining, and (he smiles) bathing. Sudhir stays late in the office even when he has nothing particularly pressing to do. His get-a-life existence is a hazard of the profession—but worth it: As a 23-year-old with a first job, he is in the top 6% of earners in America.
